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Chapter 1. The Nest

"Carro Busto is his name", the trader nudged you as you stared at the man who had a husky and a retreiver at his side with a very finely made steel longsword at his hip. But you had seen this sort of people before, it was his face. The man known as Hornet was the leader of this village. His face was torn and scars littered his neck to hide beneath his shirt and duster. Dented and bent was his helmet, Hornet was a true veteran.

He lost a good portion of his nose and it left a terrible mutilation that was patched up. It looked like an animal had torn and clawed at his face, his hands on his blade as well as his neck showed old injuries. "He's no pretty boy", the trader laughed in the little building set up for outsiders visiting and trading. Many people stared and laughed at Hornet as he did his daily job. Hornet paid the women and men no mind and inspected goods and helped to trade, silver passing through many hands.

With a beer thrown on the table in front of you, the trader with you smiled, "They make it here and it is their main trade. People come just for the beer, it ain't half bad and no one worries about getting some weird disease or gut worm." He took a big drink and as did you after inspecting it. A little earthy but it wasn't half bad.

"I heard some stories about Hornet, and everyone knows he lost his face to some panthers but I haven't seen you around before. So lets spread some gossip!" He held up his bottle and you toast with him, mildly interested in hearing about the man called Hornet.

"He's not just the leader of this village for no reason, he led the charge against the Gorar of the River! They had been attacking in vengence after Hornet slew a tradesman from the tribe." This trader got a little more quiet as his eyes watched Hornet pass him by to another Caravan.

Silence for a moment as he passed and the man seemed to gain his courage and voice back, if only a little in a slightly hushed tone. "White, the Gorar's leader led the largest attack seen since 200 years. They swarmed this village and I hear in reyaliation, Hornet's men rained down on them with a hail of incendiary mortars." He moved his head over to the back wall where the entrance to the village was. "You saw all that security right? You had to have." You recall seeing the turrets on each side as you came in along with some traps that you barely had caught with your eye, Hornet being the one who had guided the influx of traders into the post away from the entrance for safety.

"There were too many for even that to properly take care of, two men posted on guard by the turrets with shotguns and the damn tribals were jumping right into the ditches built near the mountain while under heavy fire. Hornet there? His dogs shread at them as they walk through the traps and attack the sentries and turrets. Hornet? He challenges that bastard White head on with two others right at the entrance." He points to a lady who was seen cleaning the area and serving the traders as needed with food and drink. "I hear this story from her, she was captured that day, and lost her leg to Hornet." Her leg had indeed been replaced, a prosthetic in its place, handled with simple wirings and computing to do as the user wanted.

Your attention is soon drawn back to the trader. "They got a tombstone for White outside the gate. Hornet had gone toe to toe with one of the best spearmen this side of the planet. White ends up going low but Hornet charges foward well. I heard Hornet lost his toe but in exchange, White was sliced at the neck, cut clean off. Remaining man there ended up running away along with the rest of the craven." He finishes his beer so it didn't warm on him. "Don't screw with that man."

You hear some loud ringing of bells and a scrawny man comes running in, bursting through the door. "Hornet it's the Pirates, they are coming!" Hornet draws his blade and his dogs follow behind him, past the window you can see others with sniper rifles run past, soon followed by shotgunners to take up position for defense. A loud rumbling was heard. Some yelling ensued and all the traders remained at their tables, looking to the source. A large explosion blew the wooden wall of the tavern down and the trader just sitting with you lay dead from the shrapnel, inadvertently shielding you.

Through the smoke, they charged the caravan guards who shot at them with pistols and bolt action rifles. At least the ones not affected or trapped in rubble. Many began to die around you as the table you were at became your cover. Drawing your own pistol, breathing feels heavy and hurts a little. With your back now to the table for cover, you look back into the room, forced to watch men and women die. You feel your arm suddenly being tugged at. "You are comin with me young'in" an old man with some scars on his face and an assault rifle in his right hand grabs you with his left. The room being defeated, the injured and surrendered were being grabbed. Being dragged towards the smoke, you could only accept your fate. Hornet suddenly came running through the room, a sword piercing the man's arm on you to force him to release. With a swift motion and pulling back, legs stanced wider for power you watch as Hornet pierces his chest and the man falls quickly. "Get the hell up kid!" You follow his direction and get up, the dogs ripping into the other pirates, Hornet rushes one of the men and cleanly slices his chest forcing him to fall quickly. The third pirate had a large shiv in his hands and while bitten on his leg, he reached down and stabbed the dog in the neck. Hornet's husky had fallen. With no emotion on his face, he was already at the pirate's front and sliced his leg off, leaving him useless on the ground.

A whistle and his retriever was at his side. Reaching for your arm, he rushes you both outside, the village was on fire. "I'm going for my wife, what are you going to do?"

Go with hornet?
or
Run out the entrance?

I'll let you guys choose. I was reading some old goosebumps books and I liked the choices they gave for story direction. I figure I would try the same, Chapter 2 will be out sometime in 2 or 3 days so most voted on choice wins. Let me know what you guys think as well. Thanks, Age.

Awakening protocols entered...
Sentient organic life massing detected...
Launching scout vessel...

A bright white screen filled a sudden void in this narrow tube. Its engines began to purr, "Calculating Trajectory". A monotone voice came from the screen talking to the empty metal walls and doors of the interior. "Target confirmed", and the engines began to tear at the ground as soil, sand and rocks were thrown from the thrust of thr engines.  The tube lifted quickly enough after the warm up and it made it to the planet's stratosphere before the engines cut to allow the ship to use smaller thrusters to right its direction before the main thruster engaged once more. Wothout slowing down, the ship came hurdling back toward the ground, the air's friction caught flame on the outside of the shell. With a hard crash the tube left quite a crater and yet remained mostly undamaged. Flames caught gently on the surrounding grassland dancing in the wind.

"Observing", a small latch the size of coffee mug opened up to allow insect sized droids to release. The tribes men had built a wooden wall surrounding their huts and livestock which the small mechanical insects easily flew over. The insects made their way into the homes of the unknowing, quietly observing the organics as they speak at eachother pointing to the where the tube landed. As they spoke and argued the tube was coated in bacterias not native to the land. Essentially turning the land and air around it toxic. It would only spread further.

Time passed for some days, animals died in the area and the toxicity spread over the walls and the people and their livestock began to get sick. It would of had to been the thing that landed, so they set forth a small party. Stabbing at it with spears and bashing it with clubs did not even leave a scratch but a sudden voice came from this object. "Safety measures engaged" and the tube opened up, doors and pods reveal machines to these people, a large mass of rings would spin and undulate to move along with two more machines. Their arms bladed and their bodies tall. Mechanical heads looked to the people and they moved fast. Throwing a pila, it only scratched these hell monsters. The people were sliced and gunned down by the gatling gun of the larger worm-like droid as they ran away.

None escaped and now the machine's protocols came to self preservation. They made their way to the walls, tearing them down with sheer power. A slaughter ensued.

The village lay aflame and destroyed, bodies littered the ground and five survivors managed to escape this hell. Whatever supplies and weapons they could manage to grab, they did. They had to run away as fast as they can and start a new life in hopes of never reliving that nightmare again.

The machines had gone back to their tube for now, settling back in once all organic life in the local area was no longer functioning. The mechanicals all returned to the tube, the doors and latches close and systems turn off.

Four years later the screen would light up, the bright white light tearing through the darkness inside.

Awakening protocols entered...
Sentient organic life massing detected...
Launching scout vessel...


I hope you guys enjoy this one. I read the scenario story of the tribals and thought I would try and imagine the background. I won't say this is my best work but I have not had my coffee yet.

I like this. Its maniacal. More.

Okay if you ask it.


Just as every night the old fort stood quietly. The people merry and their bellies full. The forests provided plenty to these settlers from the stars. Food, medicine and weapons were plenty. Trade with the tribals and other settlers provided steady supplies and livestock with only the occasional raid of the local banditry.

Others would think it strange but this walled off village was happy. Very, very happy. Grandiose statues line the work places with lights glowing from the walls at night as if a beacon of hope.

However within the walls was the cave of a certain doctor. He toiled away every night, the dark caverns lit by occasional lanterns flickering in the dark to give a dim lighting through these tight halls. Humidity and evaporating rains would condensate on the ceiling. It kept this sanctuary to the doctor quite comfortable. Crack, crack, crack. He swung his axe over and over.

Nights like this made good to sneak away prisoners at night into his workshop. He worked as if he found some sort of light, as if a god commanded him. Deeper in the cavern still behind a steel door barring off any light lay the starved and insane. Raiders, law breakers and the unwanted lay in this dark room. The doctor really liked to just... amputate. Replacing legs with pegs and cutting organs out. Experiments were common and the victims would be brought back to the cells with a lost leg or arm, maybe an organ cut out.

Cells they were provided were dark and not fed. His latest experiment on the table was dying of infection. So the good doctor would give him god's medicine. Amputation. He whacked his axe cutting into the leg of his patient who was barely awake from herbal remedies given to him. The patient was kept drowsy, but alert and feeling. The doctor found it necessary that his patients feel as much as they could without passing out. How else would thry experience the same joy as he gave them after all?

Every night screams lined the walls of the cave while music and festivities every night would drown their screams for help which suited the doctor just fine. As long as he helped the colonists as they wished he could just tell them a few escaped here or there. His supply of prisoners was always refilled and when brought into the emergency room, no colonist would question where an organ they needed came. He hated that. They didn't feel anything. The colonists of the settlement got medicine that put them to sleep and made them feel no pain. The best care for them.

"Nevermind them", he would think. He loved his moments in the cave. This couldn't last forever. The god who gave him his orders was brutal and malicious. But he was kind to the settlers. "Why?" the doctor thought to himself. Great joy could be given to everyone! It was his responsibility as a doctor. They needed the best care he could give. But not in the god's way. No it would be done his way. His chance came soon when good medicine wore thin with a lack of trade for some time.

Amputate. It was time to amputate. He finally gave the colonists experiences they could never forget! What joy! This was everything he wanted. God could not protect these colonists. He was god now! He made the decisions and it was his pleasure to see their faces as some died from various infections leaving the nights quieter and quieter over time. His prisoners had all also died soon enough without food or care. Soon the lit walls held just the good doctor. All alone. With his passion unable to be fulfilled any longer. He plunged a scalpel into his heart. His name was...

A dry wind flows over the arid landscape, carrying with it the faint sound of carnival music. Perhaps his life was actually meant for this. He had been a clown entertainer for so many years but it has never quite felt... so right. At least not like this moment. He shuts off the channel that the old tube was turned to that had been playing carnival and kids tunes. The air was now silent. He smiled, and not just the painted smile he had on his face that was sloppily melting from sweat and the natural oils of his face. Today was a good day where he was free!

Around the man, large robotic creatures began to encircle him as he stood over what was his audience. Friends, loved ones, and even his son lay among them. Stabbed to death. His make up, their blood and bodily fluids, and his grin.

That grin was of a man posessed, the machine had told him, nay, screamed at him. This is what he needed to do. For days and days he resisted that call but his mental threshold could only go so far.

So he decided to start a party. He was an entertainer afterall, smearing the blood of old, rotten corpses that had fell to their base defenses, he starts the party. Nobody had noticed until it was too late.

With screams and gunfire, he cut them down like a madman, his face renewed with each corpse he left laying on the ground. That permanent bloodied smile with twisted music had never failed this party.

Injured badly, he felt the malicious screaming in his head finally stop. He looked down and saw many wounds and bruises on his body. A silent scream as a scythe from one of the machines took his neck.

This story was brought to us from a tribal we captured. Their story detailed how they see us and the way we fight.

In the jungles to the south there lay a large stone wall. Impassable to those who seek its riches. They are but men in the wall. But outside the wall they lay fire down upon those that oppose them.

Our people, some of our bravest warriors seek their riches and the fire power from inside. Yet those who survive tell the same stories time and time again. Burns covering their bodies.

The walled off tribes people known as New Dawn are not very frightening. What is frightening is the fire they rain from the sky. The jungle is set aflame, our people scream and burn. Entire areas of land scorched beyond recognition with occasional charred remains of animal and human alike.

We had learned however that we could attack in the rain and our losses would not be as great.

We had gotten through the wall. Such cheers were heard over all the lands as their wall was torn down and we rushed inside to claim our spoils. Yet another wall lay ahead however. Between these two walls as well lay traps and metal guard dogs who spit metal bees at us. Many died from the swarms of bees and many more die to traps.

This retreat was less heart breaking to us. We got through the wall. They could not possibly continue to prepare against us forever.

The next raiding party to come back told of how the walls were repaired and their walls seemed unmolested. This dark magic protects this fortress and we may never see its riches.

I do not organize raids anymore, but warriors seeking glory and riches come along and form their own bands promising to bring our people riches and glory. The fires consume them though.

So now I sit here from my own raid. You brought me into your walls and give me shelter, food and medicine for my wounds. You say you defend yourselves and I understand this. I just wish my people knew that the people who originally lived here had died long ago and it is our own people enlightened by the original travellers who inhabit these walls. Who rain fire on us and who lay metal guard dogs and traps. It is our own people behind these walls. Our own people we fight. And it is our own people who we all try to kill. I wish this war to end Fire Lords.

The sun is as high as ever. I'm watching the ground get smaller as I take off in the ship the colony made. Not everyone was coming. So I thought I'd tell some of you kids a story about what we left behind. That's right, what, not who. Because that woman was a demon straight out of hell and I wasn't even religious before her.

We had crash landed, just some simple folk on a ship headed for an outer rim planet that we heard was doing well. Something went wrong and next thing I knew, there were 3 of us on the ground.

I was a field medic. I didnt have the guts to pick up a gun but saving a life? I wouldn't think twice. The other two were a married couple. One of them was good with a gun and had some nifty knowledge on architecture and construction. His wife, well she wasn't bad at anything, but she wasn't good either. Together the three of us managed to set up a corn field on a dirt patch we found on these sands in the desert. Food was scarce though, and while I helped where i could, fights started to break out between the husband wife and myself. I never thought I would ever hit someone but I was starving.

Whatever miracle happened there, we did not end up killing eachother and I was able to patch up our cuts and scrapes from the fights. The crops had grown in and while a little early and young, we ate like kings.

Then the demon came. By herself, she came up to our door, the husband and wife made quick work of her by ambushing her. Next she awoke, she was on a bed under my medical care. She was an older lady, around 80 years of age. I took care of her and spoke with her. While she came here originally to try and scavenge off our supplies what she could, we ended up feeding and housing her. She joined us.

This old woman seemed harmless enough, but when we gave her our only bolt action rifle, a fire lit in her eyes. Single handedly on a large scale tribal raid she managed to kill 4 before they even made it to our defensive wall. Running inside, two more were ambushed by her and the architect. Oh dear with this story I seem to forgot to mention their names. While we ended up calling her Death in the end, her name was Nina. The achritect was known as Vale and his wife's name was Erin. My name is Micheal.

With the tribals defeated swiftly, we were inside our walls at the end of the raid. In all the commotion as I watched on I saw that Nina was on the ground holding onto herself. I rushed over and saw her leg conpletely severed. We rushed her into the barracks and I began treatment immediately. Vale and Erin cleaned up the dead and threw them into the deepest part of a nearby cave we were using to refridgerate our food in the desert heat, although in the very back were two grizzlies that... Ahem.. Disposed of the bodies cleanly for us. A good trade we got for them.

Back to Nina though, I cleaned her wound and we gave her a peg leg, she laughed and gave me an argh as to imitate pirates from children's stories. But immediately she picked up her rifle. I suggested her military service to be over.

She responded as if to mock me, "Who else is going to protect you kids?" I never understood why she even cared about us. Years pass and she fought off raids as we gained more members, usually people who were running from tribals or pirates. We even found an older 84 year old man named Boomington. He was a peaceful man who loved to build. He was also a fair engineer, hell, this guy ended up tiling our base with stones he carved himself. But he couldn't hurt a fly. We asked him to slaughter some Iguanas that seemed to have comfortably made their home among us and he shook his head. He could literally not hurt a fly.

I don't know what hit it off for them but Boomington and Nina ended up marrying. Vale, Erin and I were happy for them. They aeemed very happy. Vale had carved up a bed for them, of their.. union. Either way, it was one of our nicest beds we made and we gifted it to them as their wedding gift.

Then a large pirate raid happened. I was sleeping and awoken to the sound of explosions and screaming. Nina Vale and Erin were our soldiers by this point. We had just gotten another younger girl to take up arms with them to help.

I saw horrible things that night. Vale and Erin both were burnt and crumpled and torn in the rubble of what used to be our hospital room. They must have tried to use the wall as cover before a grenade took them and the wall. Nina was backing as quickly away as she could on her peg leg. Leading them through our turrets hot zone while firing on them herself. She managed to take a good portion of them out before a grenade landed at her feet and she couldn't run away fast enough. With the monster downed, I watched as her good left leg was blown away and she was on the ground screaming. Our new recruit rushed the grenadier as he was the one of the only two left. Killing him with a swift blow on the top of his skull with the butt of her rifle. She rushed the other man after as he was trying to take Nina away. I believe the young girls name was Alysha. She had come here not that long before this raid.

She gun butted the man, forcing her to drop Nina. In the end we captured 3 pirates and I saved Nina again. With another wooden leg. I spoke with her husband Boomington, "She is still under from the medicine but I think its time she hung up her gun." Boomington nodded, holding her hand while she recuperated.

We built two graves outside the hospital room so Vale and Erin could rest together in peace. Being the last original from our ships crash made me feel quite lonely. Some time passes.

A few raids here and there but with our best soldiers gone, we are forced to rely on more automated security measures. But it works. Nina was forced to go take a different job as she just couldn't move as well anymore. But this lady in such a few short years had killed so many that I lost count after 20. She was a grim reaper. And as I leave her, Boomington and the others now. I'm going home, but I know, on a spot in the desert, she might not be able to get very far, but if you go in a certain lady's fortress. I can bet you that if you make it past the defenses, a bullet will be firmly lodged in your skull.

Off the mountain sides where the cold nips at your fingers snd the trees are sparse, lay a small colony of people living out their day to day on what supplies they have.

This was not a normal day. A volcanic winter had happened some months back, no big deal, and supplies were plentiful and heat travelled throughout the mountains out of their carved homes and work places. This was a bad summer, the coldest they had seen. A little off the colony in a nearby stable lay two huskies, one very pregnant and the colonists were excited and gleeful for the first puppies to be born. Some colonists imagined them as hunters and soldiers while others sought companionship from the new generation of fur love.

On this snowy day while the people worked the greenhouses for potatoes, healer's hand and devilstrand a bear had made its way into the colony. The poor female husky was so pregnant it could not even run away. The screeches of the dog as it was mauled were heard very clearly and the militia consisting of two women armed with rifles and a man with a pistol rushed out.

It was too late however. She had passed with the pups never to see the light of day. The white bear's muzzle was red as it ate into her stomach. The colonists made quick work of the bear with a few shots to the head.

Today was a sad snowy day.