Interstellar: Exploring The Cosmos With My Anomaly System
Chapter 43: Anomalies

Chapter 43: Anomalies

"Elliot, barrier—now!" Fiona barked, her gaze darting to the crowd of onlookers still milling beyond the safety markers. Their wide-eyed stares lingered on the horizon, oblivious to the shadows seething beneath the treeline.

Elliot’s hands snapped upward. Earth tumbled as a translucent shield erupted from the soil, crystalline filaments weaving skyward like molten glass.

They fused at a single apex, sealing the dome with a resonant hum that sent vibrations skittering down Fiona’s spine.

"Barrier deployed!" Elliot reported, watching as Takashi dashed forward at the notice, the fists of his mecha tightening. William on all fours shot out towards him, its tentacles reaching for his limbs.

"Deploying thrusters!" He announced his mech sky rocketing to the sky for a mere instant, dodging the attack completely. For a heartbeat, it hovered—a silhouette against the sun— the rays shining past it’s cracked before plummeting like a comet toward the creature.

The Vaeltheir recoiled.

Its tentacles swiftly snapped back into place, its claws digging into the ground to brace itself as it sent them his way once more. Takashi quickly pushed the lever up on his control’s, the arm of his mech grabbing two of its tentacles as the other two grinded on his metal exterior shooting off bits and pieces of metal exposing the mech’s internal hardware

"Shit!" He cursed, his hands clamping tightly on one of the buttons on the lever, the Mech plummeting down onto the William, kicking up dust into the sky.

Fiona watched on, her gaze intense, in case something happened.

"Fiona! Above you!" Elliot cried.

Fiona’s eyes snapped to the sky. A second anomaly streaked downward—a jagged black comet—its carapace gleaming like oil-slicked armor.

"Not today," she hissed, slamming the controls to full throttle. Her mech’s palm split open, blue-white energy bolts screaming upward in a frenzied barrage.

They vanished on impact. No scorch marks. No recoil. The creature didn’t even flinch.

"It has no effe—"

Harry slammed into her mech, the claws behind its giant arms screeching against reinforced steel. Fiona’s cockpit shuddered, alarms blaring as the titans grappled—her mech’s hydraulic arms trembling against the creature’s grotesque, pulsating limbs, digging into the mech causing it to spark.

Up close, its obsidian shell wasn’t smooth. It breathed. Ribbed plates dilated like gills, exhaling a sulfurous haze that fogged her viewscreen. Then the dome split—a grotesque flower blooming into a circular maw lined with serrated teeth.

Its tongue lashed out. Not flesh, but a whiplash of bone and cartilage, glistening with mucus. It slithered over her mech’s torso, probing seams, searching—

"Get. OFF!" Fiona roared, thrusters flaring as she strained against the creature’s weight. Her console sparked; metal groaned. The sound of the thrusters caused its plates to move faster, clearly disturbed. Her eyes widened slightly as she noticed.

The tongue’s tip sharpened suddenly—a needlepoint drilling into her shoulder joint.

Then something cracked.

Elliot barreled in like a meteor, the foot of his mech driving into the beast’s side, the sound of crunching bone ripped in everyone’s ear as the creature gets sent back.

"Thanks..." She muttered, her mech getting to their feet once more.

"Don’t mention it..." Elliot nodded, his gaze drifting towards the other creature that slowly got up, its movements were sluggish but not any less threatening.

"Did you see the—" Fiona turned to Elliot who was already typing away at the keyboard, something popping up on her HUD.

The sound of buildings falling echoed across the battlefield, William tossed through the already weakened buildings. It tumbled, landing on its feet, claws digging into the earth for stability before it cried in retaliation.

Its tentacles raised once more as it dashed forth to Takashi once more.

"They just keep getting up—" Takashi muttered,

"I did, new information gathered...uploading now!" He announced, Takashi’s eyes scanning the HUD before grinning.

"Nice one El!" He shouted, his hands snapped forward on his controls as the thrusters began to hum loudly, causing the mech to go barrelling forward. The thrusters began to flicker, Takashi arching the mech’s leg as far as it could before the thrusters turned on once more, launching it towards the creature in a blinding yet swift red arc.

The beast recoiled, the sound of the thrusters irritating its face, the heel of his mech digging into its skull, shattering it as its teeth poured out from the seams. It’s body going limp under his foot, kicking up granite from the roads as Takashi used it’s head to slow his momentum.

Harry fully stood up, immediately getting a barrage of blasts barrelling towards it.

"Over here, jackass!" Fiona barked.

The Vaelthier’s head snapped toward Fiona, its gill-like plates flaring as sulfurous steam hissed into the air. The creature lunged, its claws gouging craters into the asphalt.

"Elliot!"

"Got it!" He shouted, a loud static noise coming from his mech, reaching the Vaelthier’s ears. It plummeted to the ground, its head shifting uncomfortably.

Fiona shot at it, her blast struck Harry’s flared gills as sulfurous steam billowed out. The creature’s plates shuddered, Fiona blasting the creature over and over, relentlessly until it fell limp onto the ground.

"Threat neutralized..." She muttered, watching it go limp at last.

Fiona smiled and turned to Takashi who gave her a thumbs up, the veil lowering, filling the air with the cheers of the on looking citizens.

Elliot stared at the creature’s lying corpse, with a sense of unease that he couldn’t explain...

’He’s no longer human...’ He thought to himself, watching as Fiona and Takashi address the concerns of the crowd along with the news team.

"How does it feel being the first reborn soldiers to go into combat?"

"What’s it like after finally breaking out of the void?"

Questions like that fly high in the air, Takashi and Fiona doing their best to answer, even as they keep coming.

An HUD popped up before the boy, his eyes widened in fear once he saw it. The signs of life.

"Wait-"

A wet snap cut through the celebration.

The corpse’s shattered skull rotated 180 degrees. Elliot watched, frozen, as fractured chitin knit itself together with the other, flesh upon flesh building on itself until it towers even over their mechs.

"Fiona, Takashi—" He struggled, his mech getting whipped aside by one of the creature’s many tentacles, drawing their attention.

Fiona turned, her gaze widened in shock as Takashi ran past her to get into his mech as soon as he could. His hands quickly reached for the controls of his mech.

"Everyone evacuate, immediately!" he shouted, the mech carrying his voice across the town as he turned to face the creature.

It was a mass panic...

[30 years ago]

[After the event of the blip,]

"We’re coming in with breaking news!" A woman shouted, her voice blaring over the tvs in the comfort of many homes. "Over half the universe is frozen in time, due to an unknown phenomenon!"

She stood on a planet surrounded by people who seemed to be covered in nothing but pitch black darkness, staring at them felt like staring into their souls, their very being. The world was in chaos, many had already shattered from car accidents driven into the buildings surrounding them.

"Many people are calling it the blip!" Her eyes shifted to the dark night sky that overshadowed them, her gaze widening the moment she saw. "Quick! Cameras on that right now!"

The colors writhed like serpents made of starlight, tearing through the fabric of the night. The stars themselves began to blink out, one by one, as if devoured by an invisible maw. A low, subsonic hum pulsed through the air, vibrating in the bones of every onlooker.

And almost as if it were in an instant... They crashed to the earth in an earth shattering collision. Gusts of wind blew past them, dust and debris kicking to the air. The reporters struggle to stand against the rage of the it’s entry.

"What is that..." She pondered, her skin feeling the heat it carried from its journey through the atmosphere. "Close in on it!"

It lay half-buried at the heart of a smoldering crater, its edges fused with the asphalt of the shattered street. Tendrils of smoke curled upward from the impact zone, where the pavement had melted into glassy, blackened waves.

"Is that..." She muttered, her eyes scanning the familiar color scheme that hid under the glowing heat, her eyes falling to the familiar hatch that faced them. "The Interstellar police force!?"

The hatch opened, letting steam part into the clouds above, the bodies of the interstellar police force stuck inside, while some remained empty, their bodies charred, yet just as affected as the others.

The reporter staggered closer, her breath catching as the steam dissipated. The interstellar police cruisers—once sleek vessels armored in iridescent alloy—were now grotesque husks. The charred officers inside weren’t just dead—their faces were frozen in terror, eyes hollowed into voids mirroring the "blighted" civilians around her.

Their... their eyes," the cameraman whispered, zooming in.

Inside every visor, the officers’ pupils had been replaced by swirling galaxies, tiny stars winking in and out like dying embers. The reporter’s hand flew to her mouth.

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