Speed Is King

“There’s really nothing much you can do this week. The beasts will continue to be aggressive and crazy for the next five days. Just make yourselves comfortable and keep your laser guns by your side at all times. Winter will take a permanent position here to protect you girls while I go out and hunt.

Don’t wander around unnecessarily and keep a low profile. Do not trust any human beings you encounter, and do not tell them anything. Take them in if you must, but do not hesitate to kill them if they turn violent or unreasonable.” Elliot warned the girls after they had finished breakfast.

“Yes boss!” Camelia immediately replied.

“Noted.” Kara nodded.

“Alright. See you girls later then. Just holler at me using the communicator if anything happens!” Elliot quickly turned around and left the mansion.

Camelia and Kara watched him leave and disappear silently.

And then Camelia turned to Kara and asked, “Hunt spiders?”

Kara merely smiled her pretty smile and grabbed her laser gun.

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

“I knew they won’t stay home quietly.” Elliot chuckled when Winter reported to him.

“Just let them do whatever they want and keep a vigilant eye for strong beasts. Don’t wander too far from the town.” Elliot told Winter.

With that, Elliot focused back on his conversation with Red who was flying alongside him high up in the sky. Red was in his red ball transport and had no problems keeping up with Elliot’s flying speed.

Frosty was flying by his side, and completely enjoying the sensation of flying. She was the complete opposite of Red, and rarely spoke. Elliot loved her to bits.

However, because Red was so talkative, Elliot had no lack of details for all the information he needed to know.

In summary of the thousands of words which Red had fired off relentlessly like a full powered 10,000 shots a minute hyper machine gun:

The Parasite Games was a type of Game that the Gaming Commission sometimes sets up. It was a Long Colonization Game – One that pits tens of sentient, brain-controlling parasite races against each other by dropping them into a planet full of powerful beast tribes.

The Game would last for at least 10 years and some even went on for as long as 50 years. This was to allow the parasites time to infest the tribes and then explode out to fight for the world.

The Parasite Games were always full of intrigue, backstabs, infiltration and all sorts of exciting happenings, and was a relatively popular type of Game.

Until one of the parasites evolved, of course. And caused the biggest and most dramatic disaster in the history of the known universe. A disaster that was, apparently, still raging on unabated.

“I was a Game Master before I became a fugitive. And I remember that planet very clearly.” Red said in Elliot’s public mindspace as Elliot resigned himself for another long bout of storytelling.

He kept one eye out for powerful beasts he could hunt down or even tame, and began to fly leisurely in the sky.

“It was a beautiful planet. The land, the water, the sky were in perfect proportions and life absolutely thrived there. It looked like a planet of the Gods. But we didn’t care. The planet was full of exotic and powerful beast tribes with absolutely zero technology. It was as though it was built specifically for the Parasite Games.

Of course we launched the Parasite Games on it. We hyped it up to be one of the most epic Parasite Games to ever be launched, and we received an unprecedented amount of interest for it. The bets were shooting off the roof, and the media coverage spanned almost the entire known universe. And because of the hype, and also because it was a Long Game, we received more than twice as many requests for “Inserts”.

“Inserts” are basically powerful and bored young masters/mistresses who seek to experience the thrill of participating in a Game. We’ll secretly drop them into the Game along with a bunch of death-row fugitives and they can have their crazy fun there. They usually join the game with more powerful weapons, stronger armor and all sorts of advantages.

In the case of the Parasite Games, these Inserts joined with powerful anti-infestation tech on them.

These young masters and mistresses were given full freedom to do whatever they want. In fact, if they were able to turn the entire game upside down and gain complete domination over the game world, they would be honored and highly rewarded.

It was a game within a game for the ultra rich and powerful.

With a hundred Parasite Tribes, a million deathrow fugitives and almost ten thousand “Inserts”. It was the biggest and potentially most glorious Parasite Game ever.

And with the way it started, it certainly seemed that way.

The hundred Parasite Tribes were the most powerful ones we could scrounge up, and they were extraordinarily efficient. They all took control of their respective beast tribes within one short year, and the Game was beginning to heat up ahead of schedule.

The million fugitives and Inserts quickly made their own factions and some were already even marching on several Parasite-infested beast tribes.

It was glorious!

We don’t know when exactly it happened. But along the way sometime in that first year, one of the Parasite Tribes evolved.

We only found out because for some strange reason, tens then hundreds of Inserts started to request to leave the Game. Being an observant genius, of course I immediately noticed that they all were from a particular region of the planet. And after a rapid but full investigation, my team discovered the evolved parasite.

But it was too late.

Hundreds of infested young masters and mistresses carrying hundreds, or even thousands of their parasite brethrens hidden in their luggages had left the planet and returned to their own clans, empires, systems, you name it.

Within a single day, the Shadow Parasites, as we’re calling them now, had taken control of many powerful clans and kingdoms.