V.O.K. is written from the perspective of an Alpha, the universe’s most skilled special operations soldiers, who act as the High Order’s eyes and ears in every corner of the universe and when necessary, its unflinching reapers. LT, a stoic combat veteran and his sarcastic Sergeant, Bill, are engaged in a seemingly simple recon mission on the scorched surface of the now abandoned Earth. Upon discovering that they were once human and the history of their species, the Hemosapiens is a lie, the very people they’re meant to protect turn against them.

An honor bound warrior species known as the Thyr spread across the universe preparing for war, as LT and Bill are pulled across worlds, expected to quell the threat of their home galaxy’s destruction. Meanwhile, a Hemosapien made Plague selectively spreads across the universe turning people into blood thirsty, powerful, animalistic echoes of their former selves. As everything goes to hell, LT and Bill trust in their skills, sarcasm, and the bond of blood to dismantle the increasingly corrupt High Order.

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 Dec 25th 2467 1:30 pm Earth Time

There are a lot of things in this world (and a great many other for that matter) that I never expect to see. Whales for one. Rumor has it they died out hundreds of years ago. I've always found it hard to picture a beast that big swimming seamlessly through the ocean. Of course, in all fairness, the oceans of Earth were a lot deeper back then. Humans most definitely. It's odd seeing as our society, our lifestyles, have been based around them since we discovered their existence but still, I don't think I'll be seeing any in my lifetime. At least not a proper human that is. I hear the last of them are left for royalty, if there are any left at this point. Let's see what else...

I'm trying to think of more things that I'll probably never have the chance to see when Bill pulls off his pack, swings it around his shoulder to his chest and pulls out an IV spout. Before I can yell at him for being so incredibly stupid, he jams it into the bark of the tree behind him.

"Are you a fucking idiot?" I ask.

He looks at me with those eager, thirsty eyes and his attention turns to the spout as a thick, blood red liquid starts to drip into his open mouth. Using blood as a descriptor for the color seems lazy seeing as it is blood in some loose sense of the word. Rumor has it that for years after the Bloodwar of 2106, our top scientists poked and prodded, experimented and spliced the humans into horrific abominations. Sometime after that, no one truly knows when, the Picea Hemofilia was born. A basic tree spliced with human DNA; it almost resembles a naturalistic version of bio computers. These trees are living, breathing, twisted versions of what humans once were and honestly, their greatest contribution to our race. Even if it is by all accounts and purposes, totally fucked up. You won't find any sympathy from our race though. My company commander always says "Maybe if they stopped fighting each other for ridiculous beliefs and just evolved they would have survived." but they didn't. They nearly tore each other apart before we got there. We were just the cleanup crew.

"Ok you know why we're out here, why would you even think to risk that?" I ask him, knowing full well the answer.

"I’m hungry." he gurgles out between sips. The blood is flowing more consistently now.

He's hungry, of course he is. Fuck. If I had a single blood coin for every time I got into a situation because one of my squad mates was 'hungry'. Although to be fair, the only reason it's much more dangerous on this mission is because we are supposedly hunting a legion of Thyr and they can smell fresh blood from miles away. Which comes full circle to my original thought. I never thought there could come a day that I would see a Thyr, let alone a legion of them. From what I understand, they weren't around when humans lived freely in these lands, but they were foretold by some prophet of men called J.R.R. The prophet warned of past times when the Thyr's or as he called them, Orcs, ruled the lands and tried to take control of the one ring. They were smaller in his prophecy, the size of humans and I have no idea how a simple ring could be an object of power. It seems unlikely to me, but then again, I'm sure we seemed unlikely to the human race before we showed up.

The other thing that makes this operation more dangerous than usual is the frequent reports of Mini K's scouring the area. Now Mini K's were supposedly foretold in another human prophesy, but not in writing. From what I was told, this one was in visual form, a sort of glass like surface that allowed people to view the future as it would come to pass. This particular prophecy was told by a man named Del Toro. He was much further off from the truth then J.R.R. There are beasts that exist as he described them in the stunning blu imagery that his prophecy was shown in, but they are much smaller in size. Closer to that of an extinct Moose if you will. Still big enough to cause some damage if they come rummaging through the battlefield as they often do, making a great bloody mess of things as they go along. The creatures in his prophecy were called Kiaju. Stupid name, I have no idea what it means. Still, it didn't stop the soldiers from naming the actual creatures after them. Mini K, seeing as they're smaller.  Small enough to hitch a ride on one of our larger cargo freighters and get off on Earth. Our sensors didn't pick them up because they're warm blooded. The sensors were changed after that mishap. They populated quickly, being able to carry two litters at once, much like the mythical rabbit. Mini K, real fucking original. Only a jackass uses the term Mini K.

"Put the damn IV away and keep on the lookout for Mini K." Yes, I just called myself a jackass. "We've had reports of them in the area and I for one don't want to get trampled to death."

"This is a bullshit assignment." Bill mutters as he begrudgingly stuffs his IV back into his pack.  He pulls out a few snack size bags to catch the excess blood flowing out of the small hole in the bark.

"This is not a bullshit assignment." I say back. "The High Order believes that Thyr may be back in the area and they want to make sure that they aren't trying to take back Earth. There have been more than a few communications disruptions over the past couple of months. Classic Thyr guerrilla tactics." I wonder where that term came from...Guerrilla Tactics.

"Classic Thyr guerrilla tactics" he mocks, "Get that from a neural link did you? This is a bullshit assignment and you know it. Nobody has seen a Thyr in over fifty years and it's probably been a hundred since a legion was seen. We are assets, extremely skilled assets who could be put to better use in other parts of the galaxy in more pivotal portions of the war against the plague."

Unfortunately, he's right.  As a recon/scout sniper team we are the best, but I don't like making a habit of confirming Bill's points. The plague by the way, is a genetic mistake from our High Scientists. Not everything they do is as beneficial as the lifeblood trees. They attempted to take a viral approach on curbing 'the appetite' but only made things worse for the subjects who volunteered. Then when they tried to tweak the virus and fix their mistakes, it made things much worse. The test subjects essentially turned into rabid, bloodthirsty uncontrollable versions of themselves. They couldn't help but tear anything apart and feast on whatever was before them. At first we had just assumed that they were mindless creatures that needed to be put down...then they started to organize. They continued to feed but also selected certain people to infect and turn, always the strongest, always the smartest. They are evolving as a mutant species and becoming more intelligent by the day. This doesn’t hinder their ruthless, violent behavior though we can keep hoping as useless as it is.

"You could be right." I pause, "Of course maybe," I bring my pointer finger up to my lips and tap them sarcastically. "just maybe, we wouldn't have gotten this assignment if you hadn't told a High Priestess that she could suck you bone dry any day."

Bill tries his hardest to contain laughter through the weak explanation, "That's," he chuckles "that's not my fault!" another giggle escapes his lips, "I didn't know she was a High Priestess, and to be fair did you see her?"

"Oh Yes, I saw her...and I saw the face she made after you said that, right before I put my hand over my own face in disgust. We're in a war with savage beasts who can't control their thirst...a little discretion in your choice of sleazy pick up lines and might I add, who you deliver them to." Bill doesn't respond. He just smiles and pulls up his rifle to scan the area, muttering something under his breath as he does.

Now that Bill is back on post I'd like to, for only a moment, go back to the stories I've heard and thus passed along to you. You may wonder as to why I keep saying 'supposedly' or 'from what I hear' before I pass along the information. See the problem is that all humanistic forms of written, auditory, or visual communication from before the Bloodwar of 2106 were banned and subsequently destroyed by the High Order. That's why a lot of the fact and myths we know today are surrounded by muddied water. Hell I had some recruit tell me just the other day, that he heard from a classmate in Impulse Control 101 that humans used to just give their politicians millions upon millions of dollars (essentially the equivalent of hundreds of thousands of blood coins) to travel the country and tell people about them. Then the people would choose the most popular one to lead them. What insanity! They didn't base it off of intellect or military prowess. I mean to think, if our leaders did their jobs out of greed for money instead of the honor to serve their people and create the strongest society they could, well...no wonder the humans didn't last that long. Though I was also told they had an obsession with fried dirty animal fat and worshipping prophecies to the point of not actually living their lives so who knows. My point is, there's a lot of crazy theories out there and no proof to support them, including the most laughable one that suggests we're descended from them. Really? Come on people, really? We look the same externally and may have some similar base DNA codes but there's no way they came first, we've been around for millennia and are far more advanced.

As I pull up my rifle to scan the area I see a small, dim, red blinking light under my skin on the inside of my right wrist. Which reminds me, you may also be wondering why you're currently experiencing my thoughts. Well, you should already know if you're watching them, or listening, I'm not quite sure how it'll coming across. However, if its four hundred years in the future and you found my neural link you may not, so I’ll explain it.  In the event that you don't know what's going on for one reason or another...High Scientists once again. Those sneaky bastards, seems like they're behind everything. The High Order wanted to understand a soldier's experience in battle and their day to day lives better so they could figure out the best way to train the new wave of recruits being thrown into the plague war. The plague war which very well may turn into a Thyr war, and a Mini K cleansing as well. They picked a large group of veteran soldiers with extensive combat experience and excellent performance marks and 'installed' neural journalistic chips within their...well our heads. This is my experience, these are my thoughts. Hopefully it doesn't get too boring as I have a habit of rambling on, and if the High Scientists are reviewing this, my mind is always on the mission. I can multitask. Hopefully somebody learns something useful from it. Other than the fact that Bill is a fucking idiot.

All that out of the way, we should probably get to the mission at hand. Even though it's boring as hell. No sighting of Mini K in the area and no signs of Thyr either. We are on a peak, Frary peak (once again, no idea why it was called that or what it meant) with several blood life trees for cover/food, overlooking a massive crater that at one time was called the Great Salt Lake. It isn't a lake anymore, there’s barely any water left. Mostly just a valley of dried rock and sand. The communications arrays that have been going down are all along the far edge of the valley in front of us. High Order Intelligence groups suggested that the Thyr have survived and regrouped in the west and are crossing the Salt Flats and then the Great Salt Valley (as the 'lake' was now known) to set up a base camp in the forested ridges behind us. When I asked to see the thermal scans of the area, I was denied access. Something is going on. Still, there isn't anything out here and the woods behind us aren't even that big. Maybe that's why the Thyr wanted them. We won't suspect a base of operations for a woodland dwelling race in the middle of mostly desert. The fact that the wooded area behind us thrived is still a mystery. Earth's ecosystem was never fully mapped and understood by our people and no matter how much we bombarded, irradiated, and tampered with the plant life, that one section behind me still receives rain and grows. The damn lake dried up but the trees are fine, go figure. It's not unheard of, there are areas like that all over Earth and those are the areas that we fear. Those are the areas where it's easy for the Thyr to hide and scheme and grow.

Thyr aren't as dumb as they seem either. They may be large and brutish, use only blunt weapons or swords, but it's not because they're stupid. They've mastered space travel and light speed just like we have, but they're bound by old ways. The Thyr believe in honor in battle above all else. Any weapon to be used that doesn't become lethal due to the Thyr's own muscle is considered dishonorable. Guns, lasers, bombs, all out. Swords, axes, hammers, bows, these are the weapons they fight with. Now don't make the mistake of thinking that this makes them weak. It doesn't. They are big, twice the size of us, muscular, fast, and will fight to the last breath. I could take the arm off of one hundreds of yards away with my laser rifle and he would still run up and cut my head off given the chance. They carry phosphate powder on them at all times.  Should a wound become too bad, they smear it across the skin and immediately fuse the flesh together to stop the bleeding and keep fighting. They feel pain, but it doesn't faze them. Decades of training their soldiers to ignore pain, or welcome it, has made them into the perfect soldiers. God help us if they ever lose their honor and pick up normal weapons. They don't need much sleep and there is absolutely no questioning of orders among the ranks. With their strength and size, they can set up camp for a legion in a few hours from nothing other than the materials of the forest, or by burrowing a cave system into the earth. Once the camp is set up, autonomic sentinels fly in their communications and recon equipment. They are extremely efficient, thus making them, extremely dangerous.

I might make it seem like the Thyr are undefeatable, but I'm merely doing this to make you understand how lethal we are in turn. They are fast, we are faster, they are intelligent, we rank as geniuses, they are efficient, we are damn near perfect, and our endurance is unmatched. We can fight for days at a time without stopping, slaughtering everything in our path. Our rifles, side arms, blades, electrostatic exo-skeletons, recon equipment, jump gear, all of it allows us to tear them apart one by one and if need be, move faster than they can hope to keep up. We may have never seen a Thyr in person, but virtual training has made us surgeons of destruction. We know exactly what to expect and how to fight them. There may be a Legion of Thyr (over 5,000) here as the High Intelligence suggests, which would be more than we could take alone, but given our equipment and skills, we could separate them and over the course of a few days cripple that Legion to the point of being utterly useless. That isn't our mission though. Our mission is to gain intelligence on the surrounding area, nothing more. Engage only if we are engaged first.

Bill's finally content with doing his job, so I raise my rifle as well and begin scanning the valley below. Something's off. There's no movement which was normal considering the lack of wildlife in the valley below, but...we're missing something. As I try to figure out what has me so spooked, I hear a faint, low breathing sound coming from our rear.

"CONTACT!" Bill screams, and as the whooshing sound of a large metal hammer closes on my position I roll to the left away from Bill. Lying on my back I look up to see a massive Thyr hunched over, hands gripping the hammer that just split the rock I was sitting on. Bill pulls his side arm and fires a laser into the beast, blowing its kneecap all over the ground. The Thyr topples down in front of me onto its hammer and grits its teeth with a deep low growl. His head explodes. Bill had brought his primary rifle up and pushed it to the back of the Thyr's head. Lucky for me laser rounds explode on impact. One of the many beneficial experiments of the High Scientists that actually worked...most of the time. Its cut down friendly fire in the field by 95%. It's not perfect, but hell, I'll take it.

"How the fuck did he get the drop on us?" Bill screams frantically.

"A testament to their eyesight and our ignorance." I reply calmly.

"Thyr's don't have recon teams!"

"That we know of." I say quietly staring at the drop behind us. Bill takes the hint and shuts his mouth as I rise to my feet and inch my way towards the drop off. I slink to my belly and crawl to the edge, peaking my head just far enough over to observe the cliff below. A massive sword flies past my head and into the air above me. The rock face is riddled with Thyr all climbing at an increased rate having realized that we killed their sentry. The blade comes back down and lands an inch from my head, sticking into the ground.

"Fuck!" Bill screams from behind me. I jump to my feet and run over to his position in front of the other drop off. "How many?" he asks frantically.

"Too many to fight in a location like this. Launch." I order.

"But..." he starts to protest as another large blade smashes into the lifeblood tree next to us, causing blood to shoot out in every direction. We turn to see another Thyr crouching down in attack position. He lets out an ear piercing, deep roar that echoes through the valley below.

"LAUNCH!" I scream, and a second later we're in the air. Now we're fast on our own, but our recon suits are one of the main reasons that we are such a force to be reckoned with on the battle field. They are light, and shrink onto our bodies like a second skin that increases our strength and speed. Science aside, the outcome is us being able to run at top speeds of one hundred miles per hour in ideal conditions and launch ourselves up to a mile and a half depending on the base strength of the soldier. I can launch just shy of a mile and a half and Bill is never far behind.

As we fly through the air there's still something about the valley below that's bothering me, something that doesn't quite add up. Upon landing, I become painfully aware of what it is. Touching down first, dust and sand flying out in every direction as I do, Bill touches down a second later. We're surrounded by Thyr and they're all glaring with hatred, lips peeling back to reveal their razor sharp teeth.

"Launch!" I scream again, and we're in the air before any of them can swing an axe.

"They're using cloaking tech!" Bill screams through the coms.

"Bill, sophisticated technology, inside voices." As I've told him a million times before on ops. "Yes, they are. Which is why we couldn't see the Legion and didn't know that they had circled around us."

"Sorry. Well, there are no reports of them ever using cloaking tech, it doesn't line up with their honor or whatever."

"There are no reports of a lot of things in the galaxy. Nobody has seen a force this size in over a hundred years, I'm guessing they're desperate. Even the most honorable will turn to different means when their race is about to be wiped out. We're here to gain intel, looks like we just did."

We land a little over a mile away from our last position. We must have been near the rear the first time we touched down. The cloaking has been disabled now and we can see the entire Legion.

We turn away from them to look at our exit options, but it isn't looking good. There's another group of fifty Thyr in front of us bringing up the rear. Scouting parties to the front and the back, that's different. More intel.

"Uh, these guys are charging, what are we doing?" Bill's right, the group of fifty started closing on us, but as long as the Legion stands its ground we'll be OK.

"Use your rifle, call out shots as they go down. Remember head shots only, make 'em count they'll close the gap fast." We both start taking down Thyr's as they advance.

"A hundred and fifty yards." Bill pauses, "Down. One twenty five, down. Two hundred, down."

I call off my own as well, "One ten, down. One thirty five down."

"They're picking up speed!" Bill points out.

"Switch to burst, lock on and take 'em out." Burst mode on our rifles allow us to scope a target, lock on, then move to the next. We can acquire up to three targets before firing and the lasers would find their own way.

"One twenty five, sight, one thirty sight, one thirty sight, fire. Three down." Bill calls off.

"One ten, one o five, one, fire. Three down." As they close the gap, I can see the rear proximity sensor in my optics flashing.

"Uh, we've got a problem." Bill says. He's right, the Legion is sending out another squad of Thyr's from behind us. Some straight to us, then a group to the left, and one to the right, they're planning on trapping us.

"I see 'em." I say.

"Sir?" Bill asks. Bill only calls me sir when he's scared shitless. He has reason to be right now, but it's my job to remove that reason and replace fear with fire.

"Shoulder primary and move to secondary and blades, launch forward and bring the fight to them, we'll tear our way out of this mess. Bill..." I pause, glancing to my left, waiting for him to look at me. "Let's remind these fuckers why they hide."

A deep satisfaction crawls its way across Bill's face in the form of a wide, grim smile before he launches into the air towards the rear scouting party. I follow right behind him. The second we're in the air, we toss our rifles over our shoulders. Nanotechnology allows them to snap to our bodies, if we ever lose them in battle, they come back on their own. If we toss them over our shoulders, they snap down into a compact little package and latch onto the back of our suits.

Like machines, we pull out our side arms in unison and prepare to land. Bill blows a Thyr's head off before landing on his shoulders and riding the body to the ground. He's always loved theatrics on the battle field. This only incited the rage of the other Thyr, something that would definitely benefit us in the fight. Enraged Thyr are said to be more likely to make mistakes.

"Count 'em off!" I scream to Bill.

"Gladly!" he replies.

"One down," Bill moves to the next closest Thyr and dodging a sword, whips out his close contact blade, sweeping the back of the creature's legs. Dropping to the ground as Bill slides behind him, Bill whips his pistol around and blows off another Thyr's head.  He then presses the pistol to the kneeling Thyr in front of him and takes it out of commission as well. "Two and three, both down!" he calls out. Our close contact blades are thin compared to the Thyr massive swords. The hilts are custom and only big enough to encompass the users hand, there is no guard and the blade itself is only two inches wide and less than an eighth of an inch thick. It's small but it's nearly unbreakable and easy to move around at quick speeds. The best part is that we can eject the blade out, breaking it into pieces creating a ten foot long razor sharp whip that will slice through anything unfortunate enough to get caught in its path.

"Four, five!" I yell back taking down two coming up from my rear. There's dual purpose to counting off our kills. One is that we had been trained to do complex mathematical equations on the fly, so counting off your kills in order to know how many were left was quite easy. The second reason is to taunt the enemy. Throw them off balance, make them realize how quickly we are taking them down. Of course who knows if it works against an enemy as ruthless as the Thyr. Five down, plus the eleven we took out before launching the second time, thirty four to go, more than doable.

We continue killing and counting off, as long as I hear Bill shout out a subsequent number I know everything is ok, there's no reason to check. We hack and slash, fire off rounds with our side arm when possible, sometimes headshots and sometimes just shots to give us that extra precious second to react. Bill does a mini launch once to gain some perspective, but for the most part we keep the fighting close to the ground. With their size, it's difficult for the Thyr's to match our speed.

"Thirty nine!" Bill shouts. It's done, we took out the entire rear recon squad and in doing so cleared a path of escape.

"That it?" he exclaims jubilantly, laughing as he does.

Just in time too, the group that broke off from the Legion is only a hundred yards away.

"Bill, pay attention, we need to launch again. Follow my lead." I take off without allowing him to reply. He follows without hesitation. Now I'm not in the Fleet Command ship that's sitting just outside the Earth's atmosphere, but I know exactly what's going on. The funny thing about Neural links is they're a two way street. The High Order doesn't tell you that, but the information is streamed directly from your mind in case anything goes wrong in the field. That way they still have the data. It leads to theory that if something can send information out, then you could find a way to push information in. Well it isn't just a theory, it's fact. I have a friend who's a High Scientist and built me a back door. Direct access to the Captain's neural feed from our ship. The best part? He added a subroutine in the programing, some technical bullshit, but the basics of it is, even though you see this 'illegal' information in my feed, it won't stick. Any illegal info leading back to my buddy, doesn't stick. The second you're done hearing it, your mind forgets it. Pretty neat huh? Oh who cares if you think it's neat, you won't remember anyways. So before Bill asks, I'm pretty sure I already know.

"Are you going to contact High Command? What's our next move?" We land and launch again.

"Captain Otto come in.  This is Recon Team Blood Pack Alpha operating in the..." I don't even get to finish the transmission.

"Get on with it Lieutenant, we don't have time for pleasantries."

"Yes sir. Thyr existence confirmed, one Legion seen moving west of Old Salt Lake into forested region."

"Any engagements?"

He has access to sophisticated imagery and is no doubt watching, why even ask? "Yes sir, one killed at surveillance position, fifty killed during escape."

"They got the drop on you Lieutenant?"

"There's new intel we need to..."

"Never mind. I'll review your neural link. Hold on Lieutenant." He's reviewing retrieval options with his second in command. An urgent message comes through the comm channel on the bridge. The Captain is told that they are being called into the dark quadrant of the Red Galaxy to combat the plague. 'Jump immediately, plague soldiers getting too close to High Command' is the phrase used. He's going to leave us. Still, it makes me feel a little better knowing that he struggles with it.

"OK here's the deal Lieutenant, we're being pulled back to the Red Galaxy. Sending AR drop ships in T minus two minutes. Get to them ASAP and find your way back to the recon outpost on the outskirts of the Milky Way. Understand?"

I sigh, this sucks. "Yes sir."

"Is there a fucking problem with that order Lieutenant?"

"No sir. See you soon, good luck."

"You too soldier. Make it back in one piece."

That's the Captain's way of telling me that he values me as an asset. It isn't quite like saying he cares, but just that he knows we're valuable to the plague war. He'd be pissed if we were lost on a recon mission.

"What's the deal?" Bill asks. We land, I shoot him a look and launch again. "Oh shit, AR drop?" he asks in frustration.

"Yeah." AR drop ship. Autonomous Retrieval drop ships. Robotically piloted drop ships that hone in on our location, read the topography and life in the surrounding area and land in a spot that it deems safe. The problem with that is, it doesn't always work. This is a High Scientist fuck up. Something they need to fix, but never get around to. These damn things could land in the middle of the Thyr legion with how reliable they are. We land and stop. I turn around and use my optics to search for any Thyr that are still following our trail. Nothing, they've fallen back to the legion. Probably after finding fifty bodies scattered on the ground.

"All right," I say turning to Bill and pulling up my nav computer. "Let's find a way to get the fuck out of here.

*THANKS FOR READING* :-)

PLEASE READ - I appreciate any and all help from my readers.  My grammatical skills have increased since I've started writing but I still make mistakes.  If you find an error and point it out in the comments section, please be sure to highlight the spot of the story that you're referencing. If I don't respond or fix it right away, please don't take offense.  This was originally intended as a testing ground for my story, I'm currently working very diligently with an editor to get the book cleaned up, so my time spent on wattpad has recently decreased. So once again, pointing out grammatical issues is MUCH APPRECIATED, I will respond and fix them, if and when I have time.  Thanks for understanding!.    

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