Nebulas back up

   Rhulan walks beside a Ju-el officer beside a row of windows over looking the blue and green planet below, beside Rhulan is Xin and a petite woman with long blond hair wearing a black Victorian style dress that reaches her ankles, the exact style something Rhulan has never seen worn by an actual person, only a doll causing the sorceress to wander if the girl is just one of Misaline's plaything sent along with them.

   They enter a room, where much to Rhulan's disgust several Dimension Police officers are waiting, Suranaku among them as well as a large man in black and white plastic looking armor, as well as the black lace wearing magical mercenary Nefaria.

   "Only one magical mercenary?" asks the Ju-el officer.

   "Unlike you," says the man in the plastic looking armor, "we only need one, our own officers will do just fine."

   "how can you be so certain," says Rhulan looking at Suranaku, "I am told this enemy is a far greater deal than a small child...isn't that right...child killer."

    "Evil must be purged!" screams the man in the plastic armor surprising Rhulan as he was not the focus of her words.

   "A child killer as well," says the petite girl, "his mind betrays him, he too has taken part in the hunt for the soul chain of the Primal Shadow, murdering expectant mothers, babies in their cribs. The crimes of the hero of Peres are nothing compared to those of this man. Hell awaits him with drooling jaws."

    "What right," says Suranku, "do either of you two have to judge us? Rhulan who so cold heartedly has killed our officers, soldiers, and adventurers, corrupting the innoncent, transforming heroes into demon beasts to sate her carnal lusts; and the S-class criminal Singularity, responsible for slaughtering countless officers who have tracked her down for her crimes against the multiverse; always with a smile on her face. The fact the Ju-el would even work with such monsters;"

   "If we can get to the matter at hand," says another man behind the Dimension Police and Nefaria, a small man with a white beard, "the third party is watching in, although they would prefer not to interact with us directly."

   "That is right, bickering abominations." comes an odd clicking voice from a speaker on the desk, "The Croon Alliance would rather not have to work with your murderous monsters, throwing the same sins back at one another; you should all be purged from the multiverse, children of the destroyers."

   "Croon," says Singularity with a smile, "I understand they taste good with butter, especially their wriggling larva."

   "Demon!" clicks the voice.

   "Enough of this." says the Ju-el officer, "we knew it was folly to bring them all in the same room together so I'll make this quick so we can go about our missions. The planet below mercenaries is Ano-dote, it is a neutral ground for our three empires to interact, negotiating spaces to avoid one another mostly. However,"

   She clicks a button on her wrist and a hologram appears showing a blue woman floating in the air above a primitive city, she has massive wings with a single silver frame like a pterasaur's wing in a sense minus the claws; and a blue glowing energy membrane upon her back.

   "This entity," says the officer, "appeared above one of the Ano-dote's cities, as you may not know the sapient life forms of this planet appealed to all three of our empires to observe and protect for various reasons we won't be discussing here; you just need to know this being is part of a race of very powerful aliens who have declared themselves gods and pass judgement on planets. She acts as a sort of herald for them; she has announced that a World Eater was going to appear to reshape their planet. We are here to intercept, arrest, capture, or else destroy this World Eater."

   "World Eater?" asks Nefaria, "excuse my ignorance in this matter, but I deal with gods and demons, what pray tell is a World Eater?"

   "Something that eats worlds," says the man in the plastic armor.

   "What Vorace means," says the bearded man, "is they are unnatural life forms designed to consume matter without ever giving anything back to the universe; essentially living pocket dimensions of destruction."

   The Ju-el officer looks down at Singularity and back at the hologram, "We have carefully selected a team to deal with this thread. Singularity and Xin have both driven off World Eater's before, and Rhulan has on record slaying Eldritch and holding her own against at least two Amana."

   "Slaying Eldritch is also a crime against god's design," growls Vorace.

   "I have killed gods," says Rhulan crossing her arms, "and done more than they say, World Eater...I fought in a war against a race of living stars called the Amo'nel and the celestial that lead them; Sahralia."

   "The Amo'nel," clicks the voice over the speaker, "Sahralia the Star Killer, monsters fighting monsters is glorious, fight each other, abominations."

   "That begins to annoy me," says Rhulan.

  "Not to question your empires," says Nefaria, "but this entire meeting seems like it only required the officers here, the rest of us could have easily not bothered with each other and been sent on this mission; for that matter why are there so many of us? I personally feel a tad out of place beside these two lunatics and not over there with the other Magical Mercenaries...unless the Dimension Police mean for me to fight against them, I'd rather not be so...direct about it, I am not an open combat sorceress as you will recal."

   "Indeed, indeed," says the bearded man, "this is more a meet and greet, get to understand this planet; for any action by any of us, all of our empires must be involved. So even if by some chance only one of you was required there would still need to be some effort on all our parts. Naturally we are preparing a military front against this threat; however the term World Eater is very vague and we don't know other than that it eats worlds what sort of threat it will be, it could be as small and relativly harmless as that lizard thing the Ju-el monitor, or as massive and overwhelminly powerful as Sahralia, Zahnon, or Ohraltus."

   The old man *shudders*, "However should it turn out to be a magical threat, like so many world ending threats are, after all we know little of Ano-dote's mystical heritage or ancient prophesies if any that could have been set in motion ages ago like so many worlds have done; well in that case."

   "In that case," says the Ju-el officer, "we have prepared anti-magic drones and these three Eldrtich killer class spell casters."

  "Uh, I have sealed Eldritch away," says Nefaria.

   "As have I," states Suranaku staring at Rhulan, "granted you are more a demonic dragon than what I had thought of so long ago arn't you."

  "There will come a day," says Rhulan, "when I will kill you."

 "I think that is our cue to begin tactical talk," says the Ju-el officer, "the mercenaries are relieved...to go out seperate doors and stay away from each other's teams, till we have the battle plan ready."

   ******

   As Vorace walks down the corridor from the meeting room Suranaku speaks, "Vorace, don't let that woman's words get to you; she is just a demon and a witch; a trecherous and hypocritical Suihrai."

   "I advice you both," says Nefaria matter of factly, "to take Rhulan's words very seriously. Beings like her can be very patient, waiting thousands of life times and incarnations, planting memories and intent within future incarnations, or else in other things least they say some day forget or cease to care to be certain their wills are done."

   "What do you know of her?" asks Vorace.

   Nefaria *smiles*, "I know very little about Rhulan on a personal level, but I know what you've seen of her, is not her, play her game and you will lose, unless you know their rules as well as I do. Keep that in mind should you ever be so foolish as to try and take her on directly."

   Nefaria walks away while thinking, "Xin the cat witch, Rhulan the sorceress of storms, and Singularity...the World Eater...to potentially battle an unknown World Eater the Celestial Maiden has announced. Either the Ju-el know more about what is coming than they let on, and know plenty about those three...or the Dimension Police don't; bastards might as well be throwing us to the wolves.

  As Nefaria is walking away Vorace remarks to Suranaku, "don't worry I don't take the words of witches to heart, I don't see why Egono or Horand couldn't have been brought into this mission instead of hiring some insane sorceress."

  ******

   -Several hours later-

    In orbit above the planet a large number of ships are present, the blue sleek and stlyish ships of the Ju-el, the grey bulky gun ships of the Dimension Police, and the odd red and brown cockroach looking ships of the Croon Alliance.

   "Celestial Maiden approaching," remarks a Ju-el officer before a large screen as Rhulan, Singularity, and Xin have to sit back and watch.

    "So much for doing anything fun," remarks Xin.

   A large blue glowing tear drop shaped object stops before the blockade, a blockade none of the locals who are barely have a mile away telescopes, the wooden slow moving creatures with their various life stages below and their massive pollution filled cities are completly unaware of what is happening above them; their short term memories not even recalling the Celestial Maiden having visited them before; all their culture and technology the result of extremly gradual progress and meticolous note taking with pictures as they lack any written language; their memories refreshing anything not muscle memory or immediate family connections such as offspring, sibling, and parent recognition; each time they wake up. An entire culture that could only advance thanks to those dedicated enough to fight off sleep to draw the hows and whys of their inventions.

   The blue teardrop unfurls to reveal it was the wings of the Celestial Maiden. She let's out an electromagnetic pulse wave from her mouth that sounds like a song on instruments, and Rhulan furrows her brow realizing it is reverberating through her celestial aura allowing her to hear it. Behind the Celestial Maiden a massive portal appears and from it a two hundred foot tall woman with smooth golden-orange skin that fluctuates in waves of color and hues between golden, goldenrod, yellow, and shades of orange. Her hair is like a nebular cloud waving about from the back of her head composed of yellows, oranges, and strips of blinding white light. Her eyes are oval openings filled with brilliant orange light, she has a nose and mouth, a face that Rhulan finds oddly familiar, reminding her of seeing the Star Killer Sahralia so long ago.

   "Not responding to any..." starts one of the Ju-el officers, stopping as the Croon ships all open fire, blasting the being with rods of yellow exploding torpedo energy, the Dimension Police ships have also opened fire on it, beams of blue and red, the Ju-el ships are ordered by their captains to join in as well, firing circulating blue beams and purple discs from smaller drones. The entity however pays them no mind, floating forward like a statue, the "hair" the only part moving. Ships are forced to move out of its away, three of the Croon ships ramming it and exploding to no effect. However a closer look reveals the energy blasts and explosions being drawn in an absorbed by the skin.

  "A higher class of World Eater," remarks the Ju-el officer, "this is not like the Golden Devourer at all,"

  "Open a channel," says the Ju-el officer, "on all frequencies, radio, quantum, sub-space, we have to try at least speaking to this entity, strike a bargain with it."

   "Channels open," remarks the Ju-el at the controls.

   "I am Captain Jor'Da of he Ju-el Empire, Entity approaching the planet Ano-dote. We do not know your reason for attacking this planet; however this world is under our protection as well as that of the other two multiversal empires that have engaged you. Know this is a small number and we have far greater weapons. However we are also willing to bargain with you, tell us your reason for attacking this planet and we may be able to assist."

   "Asssissst?" clicks the Croon commander coming on screen, a cricket like creature, "assisst? You betray ussss."

   "This is dumb," remarks Rhulan.

   The entity stops its progress, its otherwise skinless, stiff metallic surface of a face, actually twitches its eye and turns its head towards the ship.

   "We need to be on the surface," says Singularity.

   "Yeah," says Xin opening a portal, "That Amana is going to end up destroying this ship if we stay here."

   "Hold on," says the Ju-el as the three of them leap through the portal. With the portal closed she announces over the comms, "All Ju-el ships stand down! I repeat stand down, we have confirmation that is an Amana. I repeat, that is an Amana in all its glory approaching the planet! Stand down!"

   The Ju-el ships manuver far out of its path.

   "We already suspected this," says the Dimension Police captain stroking his beard, "Suranaku, Vorace, Nefaria, teleport to the surface, engage this S-class criminal for all the locals to see and scribe for generations to come. The Ju-el may have some pact with the Amana, we do not!"

   ******