The wild animals fled. Hell, if I could, I would run behind them and fight them every day than face the...thing that Jay had become. His platinum skin had changed to a dark silver one, as well as his pitch-black hair into white. Everything on him was the same, his violet eyes and his statuesque build, but he now seemed like a whole different person.

“What do you want to know about my rank? Isn’t it clear enough that I’m a Prime? Oh, right. I forgot. You’re human. Maybe your tool can help you by explaining these things to you.” He smiled, but I think he just wanted to taunt us.

“We don’t know what a Prime Officer is, or who are you, or what your species are. We, me and Silver, we just came here looking for something and instead we found you inside a cryo pod. So can you please explain to us, what are your motives, and what a Prime Officer is?”

He sighed, but never leaving the body of his dead trophy. It fitted him like a throne fitted a king’s butt, and to be honest, he was kinda the king of this place. He could kill us all in seconds, if I wasn’t careful on how to handle him.

“Okay, okay. It seems that I’m way too far off my planet so that you know about our ranks out here. Well, a Prime Officer to our people is a big, badass soldier who controls other soldiers in battle. It’s kinda like the greatest rank a soldier can achieve.”

“So, you’re a General or an Admiral of some sort. I get it. And, what are you doing out here? This planet, Earth, is abandoned.” At the moment the words came out of my mouth, I saw his expression change. His arrogant sneer and powerful smirk faded off his face.

“Abandoned? I don’t understand. When did you monkeys abandon your own planet? I thought you were still swiping from one tree to the other.”

I squeezed my hand into a fist, tried to get past his insults. I was seriously ready to punch him in the face, though. “We have left this planet for a hundred years now, and expanded all the way to--”

“Oh, shit. How long was I asleep?”

Yes, I was certainly punching him in the face when I would get the chance. “I don’t know. A hundred years, give or take. At least, that’s what...that’s what we estimate.” I felt Silver behind me get restless. If I told him the truth, that there was another Jay, a silver-looking one, other than him, he might got violent not believing us. For him, we were strangers.

“Fuck. One hundred years? That’s a lot. That’s a fucking lot.”

He finally got off the dead beast and moved closer to me. He checked me from top to bottom, probably trying to decide if I was useful or not. He nodded to himself and smiled again. “Tell me, human. Did we win the Magna Bellum?”

Again with those wars. Magna Bellum, Latin for the Great War. What was this Great War he kept talking about? “I don’t know. I don’t even know what species you are.”

As soon as he heard me utter those words, he got serious once again. “Do you dare not recognize the great...the great…”

He was amnesiac as well. “Don’t worry, it’ll come to you. You must have hit your head pretty badly after crashing on Earth.”

“I’m not a puny little human like you to hit my head and lose my memories. I could pierce through stone walls with my head and still not feel a thing. No, someone messed with my head.” He stopped to think, but I didn’t like the direction this conversation took. “You. You’re the only one here. It makes sense now. You want to trick me into believing you don’t know about my people and me so that your experiment is successful.”

Satisfied with his own deduction, he turned his back on me, laughing. My whole body was trembled, too much to hide it. But, in the end, was there something I could have said to change his opinion? He would kill me, and there was nothing I could do about it.

“What’s your name again human?”

“Eladia,” I answered immediately.

“Eladia...it has a nice ring to it. Well, Eladia you’re lucky I fought those puppies or else I would have to kill you. Now, I’m bored again, and you seem too fragile for my tastes. I’ll let you go, but by the time I wake up again, I’d like for you to have returned my memories.”

A deep relief left my chest in the form of a sigh. The huge man walked away from me, got to the other side of the spaceship, lied against a wall and tilted his head to the side, getting ready to fall asleep. In a matter of seconds, the dark matter that covered him before, slowly started to wash away.

“Quickly, Silver, scan him,” I uttered amidst my confusion.

Just like before, the dark matter vanished into nothingness, the same way the water evaporated. His hair slowly changed back to their safe, black color, and fortunately, by the time the thing that had covered him vanished, he was back to his usual, stoic and cryptic self.

“Eladia, it’s amazing. It’s as a different organism exists in those dark particles. If I could make a wild guess, then Jay’s species are symbiotic organisms. Dark Jay works the same way a parasite works, and Jay is the host. The only thing is that they also share personalities and memories.”

Silver talked as fast as she could, afraid that by the time Jay woke up, he would be as hostile as his dark counterpart before him. Yet, I didn’t sense the same blood lust coming off him. Not that it would matter, but this Jay looked different. Logical and safe.

I turned and saw the other human, my feral cousin. “What did you learn about him? Can he be of any help to us?”

Silver made a sound that greatly resembled a laugh. “Him? He’s harmless. Before, he thought you were going to harm Jay, so that’s why he attacked you. But after I talked to him, it seems sentient enough to communicate.”

As I checked him out I noticed that his eyes, a bright mix of brown and green, tried to understand me as well. He must have been aware we were talking about him. It would be better if I introduced myself. I stretched my hand and pointed at my chest. “Eladia. Human.” Then, I pointed at him. “You? Your name?”

His eyes brightened up after I was finally interested in him. “Zan...Zan.” He pointed at himself and continued uttering his name; in the end almost chanting it. Silver laughed and truth be told, I felt somehow better myself.

“Zan it is then. Keep talking to him, Silver. We might need him to lead us to the relic, when and if we finally find it.” A pinch ached my heart. If. Would this all be for nothing if we didn’t find anything after all?

“I would love to. He’s great. It’s like I’ve just gotten my first pet!” Silver said.

I hit my face with my palm and shook my head. “He’s every part human as I am Silver. Don’t do anything inappropriate to him.” As I turned to see Jay, I heard Silver changing. “And no physical experiments. Just scan him or ask me anything you want to know about him. Is that understood?” I told her, not even turning. I only began to go on after I had heard her changing back.

Jay was sleeping soundly, probably trying to recover his powers. But still, for a man like him to move so fast, and come toe to toe with those animals; it seemed impossible. He moved like a shadow, his hands striking like thunder, his feet stomping their way through every obstacle. This is an Originator for you. I had heard rumors about them being able to win a whole battle by themselves, but I never believed it to be true. Now…now I wasn’t so sure anymore.

I took two steps to the front, towards him, and I could hear his breath whiz. For all that mattered, Jay was a gorgeous man. Strong, powerful, awe-inspiring and even sacrificing himself to save a bunch of strangers. And yet, his eyes had that cold feeling, the feeling that he had seen too many horrible things in his past. For a moment, I almost wished this man never recovered his memories, but the scientific interest of his past was too great to hope for something like that.

I just had to keep following him until I found out more about him. And of course, he might helped me find the Nusae relic...if it existed.

I sighed, turned my back to him and walked towards Silver. But then, I heard him coming to his senses. My heart beat faster. I hope he’s back to his usual self.