The Tale of a Trinacornagon

What greeted the two alien beings was an alien world, with an alien sky. Two red suns hung above their heads, one large and one small, giving the atmosphere an unavoidable air of gloom.

Looking around curiously, Jeffbob seemed as though he were searching for something. Seemingly disappointed, he shook his head.

"An empty throne, such a thing is nothing more than a husk."

Deciding not to engage with the nonsense spouting from Jeffbob's mouth, Ziriothrax took the opportunity to study where he had been led to.

How...strange. The stars here are...different than before. We are no longer on the corpse they call Unitopia, but this place is no less strange. Binary suns, and a solitary moon orbiting a gas giant the only rocky structure in the entire system. Cold and desolate, if there ever was life here, then it has long since disappeared.

I can taste the ash of extinction on my tongue, such a thing I could never mistake.

"They will follow the path set before them, and they shall go along it willingly. Here where the stars are hidden, where truths are free. This is a place hope comes to die."

Jeffbob blathered on nonsensically, though no-one had any clue what he was talking about. Well, apart from me of course. I know. I could tell you too, but I won't. It's not because even I don't know.

I do know, and any such insinuations otherwise will, as I have said before, result in legal action. Be warned and tread carefully, lest you incite my insatiable wrath. I'm not some dumb little cricket-

Twitch.

-I have actually obliterated planets before, and I am not above doing it again. Do NOT test me. Ahem, back to the Tale at hand:

"Enough with the blithering nonsense, you half-brained excuse for a lobotomised ostrich. What fool thing are you gearing up to say this time?"

Ziriothrax broke the silence, finally fed up with Jeffbob's antics.

"Hmmm? Antics? I know not of what you speak, young cricket. As for 'nonsense', well. Do you need another lecture on perspective, or do you get what I am trying to say?"

Grinding his insect teeth, Ziriothrax felt the rage of trying to argue with someone dumber than a brick wall.

"Still, I suppose that regardless of the thorny coating, the hidden flower of your words do indeed bear succulent fruit. As for a pattern, little cricket, that will be slightly harder for you to see than you think. Any more than that would be unfair, and cheating is NOT the way of Vegetable-kind!"

This text was taken from NovelFire. Help the author by reading the original version there.

"You think you have any inkling as to the limits of my capabilities? I have wrought destruction across entire universes, Trinacornagon. You are nothing but another in a long line of so-called insurmountable obstacles that shall, like all those before, lie in ruins at my feet soon enough. This, I vow in my Great Name!"

If Jeffbob was perturbed by the ongoing thunder in response to Ziriothrax's oath occurring in a sky without an atmosphere, he did not show it. Merely chuckling, he nodded.

"A man who sees only trees, will chop off his hands for an axe. And a man who sees only axes, will never know what a tree is. Ponder upon that, little cricket."

This...is literally nonsense. Well intelligence reduction is a known side-effect of long-term anti-saniton exposure. Any other would have had their brain melted into butterflies by this stage just from the secondary exposure caused by a single conversation. Of course, for the Great Me, such a matter is trivial. In that town, he seemed to be restraining himself, no doubt part of his strange obsession with 'respect' and 'politeness' and other such disgusting concepts.

Ever since leaving, however, he seems to have let go of such constraints. Sickening hypocrisy. He knows exactly what his actions shall bring for the countless innocents in his wake, and yet he restrains himself in front of those unworthy, atrophied beings? To lecture me on good, while consigning an entire universe to a slow descent into absurdity?

I would wager such an act is worse than death, for at least she is simple and uncaring in the swings of her scythe.

"Be careful of jumping to conclusions, little cricket. You know not of what you know not."

"I haven't 'jumped' to anything," Ziriothrax snapped back. "Your hypocrisy has been well established through multiple lines of conclusive, hyper-logical reasoning. Your actions show in immense irreverence for the sanctity of life, and for the soul of the universe you pollute with every radioactive breath you take."

Jeffbob fixed Ziriothrax with the blank, lifeless orbs of obsidian he called eyes. They held a strange hint of confusion.

"Now where exactly did you come to the idea that I do not know of the consequences of my actions?"

Ziriothrax was taken aback, his wariness increased manifold. It was as if that simple idea did not even cross his mind.

Or perhaps it did, and was taken. From me? It dares? No - now is the time for caution. Cutting the line now would only bring up an unsatisfying catch. Let the fish circle for a while longer, let them bait an even greater prey from the depths.

"You have consigned a galaxy to a fate worse than death."

Ziriothrax's voice was hoarse, Jeffbob cocked his head and responded in an even tone.

"And what of it, little cricket? You seem awfully caught up in the details for one who touts of his own genocidal prowess as often as you do."

Opening his mouth, he closed it once again, speechless. Jeffbob merely shrugged.

"Well, of this place, it appears that we were too early. Too early, too late, too late, too early. I suppose timing has never been my strong point. At least I think?"

He paused, adding helpfully.

"I'm not sure because I don't have any memories in my head."

Almost giving up on life, Ziriothrax took one last look at the crimson-saturated landscape, burning it into his mind before a flash of purple and they disappeared.