Coalescence

Everything was white. There wasn’t a trace of stars or planets or dust. There was nothing.
There was the void.
The Fallen stared at his hands, his body glowed with a pinkish aura, a cosmic radiation
that engulfed him whole. It was warm.
“Hrm. A positive universe. How shortsighted of them.” In the white vacuum, the
words carried no sound. The Fallen flexed his hands, the ice began to melt away into
water droplets that floated around him. Caught in his orbit, they streaked across the
blank canvas of the void before him like tears on a porcelain doll. They formed no pattern,
there was no order to their arrangement. The Fallen flicked at a larger droplet and
it burst into more chaos. He needed to make this universe a little messier. He continued
aloud-but-silently, “After I’ve thawed and regathered my energy, I’ll return. I’ll try
again, even if I have to start over from the beginning.”
Something moved. It slipped quickly across his body. He squinted to try to make out
what it was. It moved again. He saw it this time, it was a shadow, and it was growing.
He waved his hand in a swimmer’s stroke to turn around in the gravity-less nihility
and instantly his eyes went wide.
A voice roared through the void. It was an old voice, one of the oldest. Even without
air and vibration it was heard. It would not be refused. To the Fallen, it was familiar.
It said only two words, but they were words that permeated the Fallen with horror and
fear.
“I… Hunger…”
Cyclonus held Crasher with an arm around her shoulders. She took three small steps
forward, each getting less shaky than the previous. After the third step, Crasher waved
him off. She looked across the room for Darkwing, who was helping the serpent from
Beest climb down from her container. She hissed her gratitude and hurried to join
others of her kind gathered nearby. She threw her scaly arms around a one-eyed white
feline in black armor. “Uncle Daburu, you are here! I didn’t know what happened to
you after they grabbed usss.”
The alien identified as “Daburu” smiled and nodded. He opened his mouth to speak,
but the words did not come; he wasn’t one of Hot Shot’s better experiments.
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