8. You Don’t Need to Strike the Heart to Poison the Prey

Ophion had orderedone of each of the thirty-two egg preparations loaded onto the ship's food catalog and was now about halfway through consuming them in no specific order. Whatever piety ruled the being had gone out the window when the dispenser presented him with his first selection: an egg-and-cheese frittata. Auren had watched with an equal mix of fascination and disgust as the hulking alien devoured a week's worth of calories in a single sitting, not bothering with utensils, able to expertly lap and stab at the food with his barbed tongue in a way that was revolting on some primal level.

"His shits are going to be terrible," Lupo murmured into Auren's ear. "I'm disabling my need for sleep for the time being; one of us needs to be on alert 24/7 now."

"I suppose you're right; we can take turns if you want…" Auren offered, feeling bad not doing his part.

"Nah, it's fine. I spent five years awake; I can last a few more days. Besides, just because you're a machine doesn't mean you don't have mental health—you need to take care of yourself, just like before, or you'll lose touch with who you were," Lupo warned once again.

Auren had a hard time not believing him. It wasn't easy to imagine how long he might exist as he was now. That is unless the reptiles really did manage to topple humanity—spilling endlessly into the void they had dared to lay claim to and massacring them world by world. Abominations, Ophion had called them. He eyed the reptile uneasily as the lizard finished the last of the eggs, its singular frenzy to consume finally satiated.

"Thanks, Lupo. I don't deserve you," Auren said, increasingly glad to have met the man.

"Where I'm from, food is earned. Such excess makes you soft," the reptile observed from the booth. "No wonder your worlds are so easily taken."

"And where I'm from, people say thank you when they're fed," Lupo replied, clearing the plates from the lizard god, who was licking hisscaled face clean, removing the last bits of egg from around his fearsome-toothed mouth.

"And you, quiet one, you judge us, do you not?" the alien barbed, flicking its attention to Auren now, seemingly content to toy with them.

"What's to judge—you pick off stray colony worlds. I'd like to watch your fleets park themselves outside of a place like Obila and see what a truly defended planet is capable of," Auren retorted.

And it was true; the alien threat had only ever shown itself around the periphery of human space. Space command had only just begun to predict upcoming targets successfully—as they had with Vesperion—but none of the alien incursions had been successfully rebuffed. Each instance had been a total wipe for the human forces, not a single soldier or colonist left standing—except for him. But human space was vast, its resources nearly limitless.

"You don't need to strike the heart to poison the prey," Ophion advised. "Do you know what drives evolution? Efficiency. Nature made The Game. To win, to survive, is to be near godhood," the lizard compelled, its tongue flicking excitedly.

"Oh yeah? Is that why you're stuffing your face with alien eggs, a prisoner on our ship? How's that working out for you?" Auren shot back haughtily, not liking the creature's arrogance one bit.

He'd hated bullies his entire life, and he couldn't unsee the parallels between this thing and all the assholes he'd known growing up on the streets, looking to prey on smaller guys like him—on those they found to be weaker. The creature pounded the table angrily, hissing at him as its huge tail lashed at the ground. Lupo eyed Auren uneasily before turning to their guest/prisoner.

"Sorry, tensions are running a bit high. Let's all tone this down a bit," Lupo insisted, nodding encouragingly at Auren and Ophion as though they had all agreed to the same thing.

Auren considered taking his chances and trying to take down the alien with his synthetic strength, but he was uncertain whether it would be enough to topple the enormous creature. Instead, he decided to relent to Lupo's better judgment.

"Sure. Yeah, fine," he said.

Ophion stopped hissing but offered no apology. Instead, he sat back down in the booth and just stared at Auren unnervingly.

"Ophion, it might help us if we understood how you came to be here on this ship. We mean you no harm," Lupo said.

Auren wasn't sure whether that was true, but he remained silent anyway.

"We'd have to go back to the cargo bay for me to explain further," Ophion said cryptically, still leering at Auren.

"Lead the way, my egg-loving friend," Lupo incanted.

The lizard rose, and Auren and Lupo stepped aside as he thumped past them and out into the hall, his tail swinging haughtily as he thundered along. They followed him in uneasy silence back into the cargo bay. It took Ophion a while, peering amongst the shelves, before he found what he was looking for: an enormous mantle designed for him and him alone. Ophion snatched it from the shelf and began to slide it on.

"Hey, wait a minute!" Auren yelped.

He watched helplessly as the lizard slipped the device over his head. The alien tech worked instantly, and where one moment there was a hulking, seven-foot-tall lizard, now there was nothing at all. Ophion was utterly invisible.

For a second, Auren worried that he would be ripped to pieces by the advantaged alien, that the whole thing had been a setup for yet another of his species' brutal massacres. Yet, even as he had the thought, the mantle was slipping off, the alien becoming all too real again. Ophion gently placed the device on the shelf where he had found it.

"I came here to conduct research ahead of the invasion. I'm what your kind would call a scientist—although science and art are the same to my kind. I was captured while studying your homeworld. My lovers were murdered, and I was enslaved by the owner of this ship. And now, I am here, trapped with you abominations. But The Game must go on. I will walk in peace while I am aboard your ship. You have my word," Ophion said.

"And was getting caught a part of your game?" Auren asked.

"Everything is a part of The Game," Ophion explained. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I'd like to rest without being disturbed. My kind requires a great deal of peace to digest after feeding. Show me to my quarters," he commanded.

"How can we know whether or not we can trust you?" Lupo asked skeptically.

"You cannot. But if I wanted to kill you, I could have done it when I was invisible. Believe me, abomination, my kind is made for war. You do not want a fight with me. Now. My quarters," Ophion boomed.

Auren looked at Lupo and shrugged.

"You can stay in the dorm, for now," Lupo said. "Follow me."

And just like that, Lupo led the alien out of the cargo bay, leaving Auren to stare at the cryopod, wishing he'd never mentioned the thing.

A Keth. They'd found one of them. His mind couldn't help but race back to Vesperion and imagine hordes of the lizard monsters ripping his comrades to pieces in the trenches with those cruel talons. The mantle the alien had produced was tech like nothing he'd ever seen—it might as well be magic as far as he was concerned.

Auren shivered at the thought of the alien, then turned and left to join Lupo. He doubted he'd ever eat an egg again.