#cravers

Bang!

The report of the old slug thrower is muffled by the back door of Xarla’s. Even so, the sound still echoes through the ally. Aural traces of violence that refuse to dissipate. The child tenses. They are huddled under a stubby awning in the back ally just big enough to keep Hekim’s acid rain mostly off.

The door slams open and a Lumeris barrels out. He slams into the wall of the ally and clutches his side; a pool of grey blood spreads across his shirt. The shirt alone is worth enough to feed the child for a year. The pale green alien sweeps his gaze up and down the ally. Don’t look here, the child thinks. They don’t want any part of this.

Two more gun shots punch holes in the door. Beams of yellow light stream​ through the gaps. And the Lumeris slumps to the ground.

The door opens and bathes the dying man in golden light. It swings closed and rebounds open again. Xarla likes those null-friction hinges. As the door swings open again, a shadow appears on the ground at dead man’s feet. The shadow is tall and diaphanous. The child hears the hissing and popping of a Craver breathing apparatus. They tense up even tighter. Don’t look at it don’t look at it… It’ll see for you sure if you do!

They don’t need to look to know what they’ll see. The monster. One of the ones who took the child’s parents. The ones who burned one more tiny planet over 5 cosmic strings from here… But they can’t resist. Fear makes one eye creep open. The figure is 8 feet tall, covered in a scratchy looking grey cloak that hides the creature’s horrific patchwork of cybernetics.

The tall figure reaches down with powerful grey arms and lifts the dead man up against the wall. Two more arms explore his shirt and vest. They cast aside a tiny gun and a wallet before they find what they are evidently searching for. A pouch. Leather. One of the figure’s extra hand dangles the pouch in front of it’s hood. It’s hand tightens on the bag before tucking it away in a fold of the cloak. It doesn’t talk. It doesn’t gloat. It just turns and stalks out of the ally.

Someone else will clean up the mess.

It takes several minutes for the child to open their eyes all the way. When they do, the see that the door’s latch has finally clicked in. The shadows have swallowed the dead man, except for the tiny rays of light still stabbing through the holes in the door, and something else.

Tiny motes of golden sunlight hang in the air like fireflies taunting the corpse. They float languidly towards the ground where ally floor. But they float slowly, as though Hekim’s point-nine-three gravity is a mere suggestion. The motes coalesce into an illusory ribbon spiralling to the ground.

The child creeps from their hiding place towards the corpse. The lights have come to rest in a tiny puddle of acidic rainwater. The child knows first happens what happens to shiny things that land in Hekim’s fetid rain water. The water strips and corrodes them within minutes. They become worthless. But not these motes of sunlight. They keep shining.

The child makes a decision and reaches down into the water to scoop up the sunlight. It doesn’t burn them! Afraid to look, they open their hand. The spark of sunlight still glows gold.

The next day, they take it to the freighter captain called Kalof. She has always been good to them and she has been to space, she should know what the sunlight is.

Kalof’s eyes go wide when the child opens their hand. “By the Endless, Kid! That’s Dust!” The captain crouches down beside the child and asks “where did you find this?” The child doesn’t answer. They don’t like talking. They clutch their hand to their chest as though afraid the once kindly captain will take their sunlight.

Kalof holds out her hands as of pouring sand on to the deck. “What you are holding there, is Endless’s gift to us. Even a few grains like that is worth a lot.” She pauses. The child doesn’t move. “If you give it to me, I can afford to take you off planet. I know a place you’ll be safe and where even this tiny amount will buy you a nice home. I just need a couple grains to be able to afford to refuel. What do you say?”

The child doesn’t speak. “Y'know,” Kalof says, “On Auriga, they say it only takes a single drop of Dust to change everything.”

20 years later, the former child stands on the bridge of a warship. Defensive cannon fire knocks torpedoes out of the void around them. The child, now an admiral, clutches a small vial that hangs from their neck as they shout orders. It’s a habit they picked up at the Academy. For a while, they tried to hide the habit, they worried it would make their crew crew respect them less if they showed fear. Time has show the opposite to be true. The vial contains the remaining half of the sunlight they found in that ally. A broadside from their flagship rips into a Craver gunship. A tendril of Dust a kilometer long pours out of the side of the gunship. The motes attempt to repair the starship, but the damage is too great.

The gunship pours kinetic weapon fire back at their flag ship. The flagship’s barriers hold, and the gunship slowly disintegrates as each shot from the flagship’s massive defensive cannons dislodges more and more of it’s fragile hull.

But the flagship and her admiral aren’t satisfied with a few gunships. They plunge towards the heart of the Craver swam. Fighters swoop towards the flagship, some firing others attempting suicide runs against the bridge. The defensive guns pick star fighters out of the black like a frog catching flies.

As the flagship’s last remaining salvo of Dust laden torpedoes hammer against the hive ship’s hull, the admiral feels the vial crack under the pressure of their fingers. Explosions from deep within the hive ship show that at least one torpedo has scored a lethal hit. Gouts of blue flame tear their way along the hull. Dust pours from the engine compartment like blood from a skewered fish. A final, brilliant, eye searing explosion tears apart the vessel and tosses the admiral’s flagship like a toy hurles by a stellar god. The explosion overloads the barriers, scorches the hell and flash melts the outer layer of hull plating but the ship holds.

Later, the logs will note this as a minor victory. One of many fought over this system. But the admiral knows the truth. That this, like all of their battles, is a victory that should never have happened.

Image: CookTopCove Oh, gizzards, humble darlings, tender and yielding, hiding within your muscular embrace a secret known to only the culinary alchemists. Through a slow simmering dance, you metamorphose into delicate morsels, your robust nature yielding to the touch of a fork. A gentle caress on the palate, surprising and tender, you defy expectations and elevate the ordinary to…

Games Cravers Play: 

A group of video game designers were

building a new game. They were looking to

develop a building that was unique and

recognizable within the games. Instead of

focusing on a Chicago landmark, they

incorporated a different landmark...

a WHITE CASTLE!

Cartoonist Cravings:

White Castle Slider-inspired art made

for an Incredible body of work as this

native Detroiter made his way to LA-

but he couldn't resist the Crave for long,

so he soon returned to his hometown.

After coming home, he created some

special animation for a White Castle

Thanksgiving stuffing recipe video that

could only have been made by this

passionate Crave-Man!