Only when you're still growing! Humans are capable of the greatest and worst things.

This was a new planet, but familiar in many ways. Skyscrapers, combustion engines, billboards and flashing lights. Bipeds with mops of motley colored hair - humans. Familiar to her and even cherished, though these ones certainly didn't cherish her. She'd been incarcerated within a secure facility, a blacksite in the middle of the desert protected by facsimiles and strawmen as much as by the advanced weaponry that they hoarded from the other countries of that pale blue dot. It was all very familiar - it was the filter for all human worlds; the crux where their civilization either threw itself into the stars and united, or crashed back into the ground like a sputtering star that had its last bit of fuel ripped away. Even her own world had such a time, though there certainly had not been only humanity on that one.

Her head snapped to the side as the man across from her smacked the plastic table like it had been the one ignoring him. She clicked her tongue and smiled apologetically. The daydream had distracted her after the threat had come into her senses. The man across from her was an intelligent sort and had already adapted to the situation. Aggression would get him nowhere and he knew it had just been a lapse in her attention. They both knew that his palms were slick with sweat and the eyes behind his glasses, carefully guarded, were hiding whisper thin threads of fear.

After all, she had destroyed quite a few buildings according to their reports.

She opened her mouth, sharp canines and predatory eyes immediately breaking what demure veneer had come over her. That which was not already spoiled by the scaled, fifteen foot length of tail that lazily moved in the air behind her. Or by the pointed, expressive ears that flicked this way and that as she listened.

"My apologies. The threat I spoke of earlier has just passed through your heliopause. You were saying?" She paused expectantly, though the silence drew out a tad longer than necessary.

"...why should we believe you? You destroyed one of our cities - or nearly so - and then start speaking of some cosmic threat that our own instruments can't detect. Not even a whisper. It looks like a ploy - a way to buy yourself time." His voice was calm, controlled. This wasn't a half-baked interrogator or some sort of up-jumped fop that grilled random captures. He carried himself to well, too confidently. His breathing and heartbeat were steady despite the intensity that sparked from his words. He was holding himself to the edge of readiness, as focused on her as he was on holding himself ready to fight and evade at a moment's notice. A proper representation of the knife's edge that humanity could expose when honed.

She would not insult that.

"Because as advanced as the instruments you have are, you never saw me coming either. Nor the ships in counter orbit on the other side of your sun--"

A bit of sweat, and the two MP's at the door stirred.

"-- nor the thing that I engaged on your behalf. The other captured critter you're holding nearby. I wasn't able to kill him before your people interrupted. If he wakes up, your planet will fall under his thumb in days. If the projectile his ship fired - that threat - hits, then you will have a brief reprieve." A breath, the man focused on her words even as her tail swished behind her like a satisfied cat. A reprieve, they needed that - to think, to plan. Anything.

"...as the planet roils and splits in half. "

The room grew quiet. A few rooms away, through 'soundproof' walls and layers of steel, a little servant relayed the muttering of the gathered group of men and women. Those who held the seats of power in this country and had brought her here to be interrogated. Tempers flashed, voices raised, and as it came to an apex she opened her mouth to speak again. Yet she was interrupted by the man in front of her.

Though he might not see it, approval flashed in her eyes.

".. So, either fall to this or yourself, is that it?" Contrary to the expected, it was not defeat that infected his words. Instead a line of steel and grit reinforced it. A silent telling of the iron in his spine and the planted flag in the earth that told her he would grip the blade of the knife plunging into his heart for a still-beating second to try and defend and save those he wished to.

"No. Conquest is easy; I would not have saved the living souls in the buildings we dropped for a conquest." She stood up, and the soldiers at the door drew on her with practiced ease. Then fell to the ground in a heap, snoring comfortably. A spark shot from her hand and in that outstretched palm a miniature sun grew. It expanded, sketching out a complex and interconnected lattice of symbols and intent that burned brighter than the feeble light above them.

​

Then, fresh air. They were standing in the desert, atop a plateau within view of the compound. It was now they could see the threat with their own naked eyes, as if a star was streaking across the sky, growing bigger and bigger with each passing second. The gaggle of suits that had been listening in on them looked at the sky, eyes wide. The interrogator looked at it with grim remorse. There was nothing he could do. He had done all he could and now he could only watch the knife sink into his heart and end everything he had ever fought for. Alas... or?

More of those selfsame intricate runes. More, larger, crackling with energy that they drew from the very air. Static fit to raise stones from the ground and flatten the sand for a hundred meters into shifting, mesmerizing patterns. In the center, their prisoner with a hand outstretched. Her face a mask of delight, bending the whims of might and magic to her will and with a lash of her tail, a bright lance of energy speared forth to transfix the Threat she had spoken of. The crack was deafening for the moments it happened - the snap of lightning as the bolt broke past sound itself. Further, a thump as it pressed through atmosphere then--

​

Bright. So bright. The nighttime desert turned to midday in harsh focus from the colliding stars. The thrum of a helicopter could only now be heard, breaking for the taken group as they stood behind the woman and stared. As much as the spectacle had shown them, so many more questions were raised. She turned, arms outstretched as the little half-cloak she had been wearing around her shoulders caught the wind.

"The Tir'Nian Federation would like to open diplomatic channels."

// Hi there! I'm Miri Auri, Exarch. I like to write stuff! You can find more stories I've responded with here on Writing Prompts on my profile, as well as links to other stuff I do! I am also open to messages and comments, so please feel free! I hope you enjoyed this little glimpse into my world. \\