* * * *
When you're several thousand years old, you have a lot of time to think.
Especially when you spend the majority of that time alone.
Kryo, as he had come to be known, was a very pragmatic man. If, that is, you could call him a man. He had not been one for much more than the first thirty or so of the thousands of years he had existed. His pragmatism was deeply rooted in the fact that he had been forced to do whatever was neccessary to survive for the past few thousand years. Only the most open-minded individuals in history had been able to understand him--most others saw him as some sort of demon or evil spirit, and as such he stayed away from them as much as possible.
However, the times had changed, as they tend to do. Humanity had made contact with other intelligent life forms, and the tide of xenophobia was ebbing. Many people were now able to embrace the concept of "unconventional" life forms.
Chief among these people where those of the Midwestern Confederation. These kind and hard-working people were striving to combat one of the last and strongest groups of xenophobes yet remaining--the interstellar pirate gang known as GROSS. And besides, the tendency of tme midwestern people to embrace the simple joys of nurturing the land reminded him of older, simpler times--times when he was yet human.
"Focus. Here. Now." thought Kryo.
As was said, when you're thousands of years old, you tend to have a lot of things on your mind. As such, it is very easy for your thoughts to drift.
Kryo was alone and unarmed, on a hostile world. His first officer, safe aboard the cloaked Ranger class ship which Kryo had named Blizzard, hated when Kryo did this. But it did need to be done, and it was fun to boot. Besides, his crew were simply used to having a human commander. Kryo, as he was, knew that any threat he might encounter on his covert mission would be miniscule.
The world where he presently was had taken some rather extensive amount of work to locate.
It was the world which held the hidden factory that had been producing clones of the hated pirate emperor, Pontius.
* * * *
"Cap'n, our thermal sensors are showing an anomaly in sector four. It looks to be very cold," called a security henchman. "The stupid things are probably just acting up again. Have maintenance go look at them, mate... er, matey," replied the commanding officer.
It was not long before a maintenace detatchment reached the sector four entrance and went outside to have a look at the sensor. They never noticed the dark blur fly in the open door behind them.
Kryo floated down the hallway silently. Aside from the heavy locks on the outer doors, which he had easily bybassed thanks to the careless maintenance team, the facility's security seemed to be very lax.
Eventually, he arrived at the entrance to the hangar which housed primary cloning system. Amazingly, it was actually guarded.
Kryo approached the door, hoping that the guard would notice him. After all, if noone noticed him, then what fun would the mission be?
"Odd," Kryo thought. The guard was reading an australian magazine. The guard was not so engrossed as to not notice Kryo's approach, however. "Who the hell are you?" asked the guard. "Never mind. Just show me your authorization and get on your way," the guard continued.
"Even odder..." thought Kryo. He wasn't wearing any sort of disguise, other than his usual cloak, mask, and gloves. The guard didn't seem think that someone dressed like this was uncommon. There was no reason why anyone would need to be so heavily clothed in a pirate facility... unless... "No, that couldn't be it." Kryo thought.
Kryo lifted his head and allowed the guard to see his glowing blue eyes. "What the--!" the guard shouted, reaching for his photon pistol.
Kryo, unfazed, began to slowly remove his right glove. The guard quickly snapped off a couple of shots into Kryo's torso, and stared in horror as he saw his shots burn holes in the creature's cloak and pass directly through its body with only a slight sizzle before they impacted on the wall behind.
"That stings," issued a gravelly voice from behind the mask. "And I just bought this cloak."
By this point, Kryo had removed his glove and dropped it on the ground. The guard's expression grew even more incredulous when he saw that the creature's hand was composed only of a glowing blue vapor.
"Now you pay." said Kryo simply.
With that, he thrust his hand into the guard's chest, his sleeve crumpling up in a pile around his arm.
The guard gasped his final breath, his heart and most of his blood now almost completely frozen.
"That never gets old," thought Kryo. He let the man fall to the floor, then picked up his glove and put it back on.
He then proceeded through the doors, and stood in awe as he beheld the hundreds of cloning pods before him, all holding copies of Pntius in various states of maturity.
Kryo collected his composure, and set his will even harder.
He began to seach for the central control systems, and happened upon a concealed door.
He opened the door, and was awe-struck once more. The room he had entered contained a smaller cloning system--and it was was hard as work churning out none other than mutated drop bears and wombats.
His wild suspicions had been correct. Either this facility had been secretly commandeered by the rebel Australian faction known as Freedom Force, or the Aussies and Pirates were cooperating. Either case was unfavorable to MWC and thus could not be allowed to continue.
A little more searching, and Kryo found what he was looking for--the coolant lines for the factory's main generator. He removed his gloves and placed each hand into one of the lines, and waited a few moments for the hot fluid to congeal and eventually freeze into an impenetrable blockage.
As his cloak had two gaping holes in it from where the guard had shot him, Kryo released the frozen particles he held suspended within himself (in order to maintain a basic humanoid shape and hold his cloak on). His cloak landed in a heap on the floor below him, and he hastily set off flying through the walls toward the outside of the factory.
Two minutes later, as he stood beside his cloaked shuttle craft donning a fresh, intact cloak, Kryo watched the factory erupt into a gigantic fireball as its coolant-starved generators reached critical temperature and exploded.
"Mission accomplished" he thought contentedly to himself.
* * * *
Full version of this story (with preface detailing the origin of the Kryo character), can be found at http://idle.thehueys.com/midwest/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&p=601#601
Stardock Forums
