It was safe to say that [i]this[/i] was the most important task Azdrei’in had been given in his life.

The Lunvalgan people had been searching for a new planet to call home longer than he’d been alive. Like the rest of his generation and the one that came before, all he knew was the inside of a spaceship. Many years ago, his people had fled from their home, Ashad’te, when the planet’s water supply had been irreversibly contaminated with a rapidly reproducing spore that killed any living thing that ingested it. The spore had spread across lands and tribes too quickly to combat, contaminating their resources and withering vegetation until all that was left was a desolate wasteland, barren of life.

Azdrei’in was too young to remember the catastrophe for himself, but he’d seen it in the memories of his elders. The once lush planet the Lunvalgans called home had shifted from green to gray, and more than three-quarters of his ancestors had lost their lives to the spore’s infection. Within the span of a decade, their entire race was nearly decimated because of a mutated bacterium, and those who survived the onslaught didn’t escape without consequences of their own. The Lunvalgans who pulled through soon discovered that the spore had wreaked havoc on their females’ reproductive capabilities. They never determined why, but ever since the cataclysm struck, fertility rates in half the population had dropped more than five hundred percent, leaving them with an alarming new issue: They were struggling to recover the numbers the disease had erased.

Overall, their once-great race was in exceedingly poor shape, and they were desperate to find a planet on which they could start over. Their leaders, the Eilix, hoped that by uprooting the survivors from their shriveling home world, they could find the resources they needed to truly recover, so they could recreate the flourishing society they’d established on Ashad’te. Thus, they had been traveling for generations, scanning the cosmos until they’d finally come upon a promising planet: Earth.

Azdrei’in still clearly remembered the day the Eilix had announced that their voyage was finally over. It had been a day of weeping and celebration, emotions riding high in everyone who thought they would live their entire lives and die on the spaceship before they found a new home. The only problem was that the new planet was already inhabited by another apex species.

Because of their already dwindling numbers, their leaders were cautious. Instead of confronting the Earthlings right away, they waited, delaying their descent until they knew whether the foreign race was hostile or benign. Unfortunately, after a year of observing the planet’s inhabitants, watching them conduct war on their own kind and spill blood over matters that could be resolved through intentional discourse, it was determined that they were savages and that landing on the world wouldn’t be safe for the weakened Lunvalgan people until they were eradicated.

The solution to this problem was the invention of Strizin, a virus modeled after the very disease that had killed their own people on Ashad’te. Using a sample of the spore that had been kept in a lab and a few Earthlings they had abducted to use as test subjects, Lunvalgan scientists created a biological weapon that would only target the species that currently dominated the planet, cleansing it of the violent race so they could move in without fear of being forced to fight for their place and risking the loss of their already small population.

Now, one year had passed since they had released the virus over the Earth, and the next phase of the invasion had begun.

Approaching the planet’s atmosphere, Azdrei’in leaned forward in his seat, entranced with the sight of the blues and greens before him. He, along with fourteen other Lunvalgan warriors, had been selected by the Eilix to explore their new home before the rest of the fleet descended. Dubbed the Yihai, or the ‘vanguard,’ the group’s job was to ensure that the Earthlings had succumbed to the virus and to nullify any other potential threats that they may come across while they surveyed the land. It was an essential role that he took seriously, but it would have been a lie to say that he wasn’t also excited to see a healthy planet with his own two eyes after he’d spent his entire life inside a metal ship.

As his craft made contact with the atmosphere, he braced himself, adjusting the controls as necessary to keep the vehicle on course. He had practiced landing in simulations as well as on one uninhabited planet, so he was skilled enough to bring the ship down safely on this one. His translucent white eyes flicked over the gauges with steady focus, and he traced the tip of one clawed digit against the panel’s glassy surface. For the most part, the craft was designed to stabilize itself as it dropped, so he merely kept watch for warning signs that he needed to take over control, in case something went wrong.

In this case, the ship operated perfectly, and Azdrei’in eased it to the ground in a graceful descent. As soon as it touched down, he could feel the beating of his two hearts increase with anticipation. He’d landed in the middle of what looked like an abandoned civilization. Tall structures sprouted all around him, reaching toward the cloudy sky overhead, and he craned his neck to peer up at their tops. The Earthlings who had lived here first may have been savages, but it seemed like they’d been innovative as well.

Unstrapping himself from his seat, he tapped the release for the door and stood up, climbing down automated steps until he felt an unfamiliar texture beneath his feet. In the span of a second, he was surrounded by a world of new sensations. The star providing light above him warmed his dark skin pleasantly. All Lunvalgan people were characterized by their dusky pigmentation, ranging in shades from gray to black. Azdrei’in was on the darker end of the spectrum with a complexion only slightly paler than pure black, but his coloring was lightened by a satin quality that gave off a subtle silvery sheen in direct light.

Enjoying the natural warmth, he took a moment to stand still, letting his pellucid eyes wander idly over his surroundings. Against his skin, his white irises contrasted starkly, as did his long white hair, which had been pulled back in a series of thin braids. Between both, a shallow ridge defined his forehead, traveling from the bridge of his nose to the back of his skull. It was a gendered feature that was more prominent in male Lunvalgans than in females. Some of his people boasted broad plating, while the crest could hardly be seen on others. Azdrei’in’s laid somewhere in the middle: easily visible but not so large that it dominated his face.

Deciding that he’d spent long enough in one place, he turned around to close the door to his ship by pressing his open palm against a scanner. Each of his five fingers was topped with a short claw, formed by an extension of the bones at the ends of his digits. The predatory feature was matched with a set of fangs behind his lips. On Ashad’te, his people had been the species at the top of the food chain and had therefore predominately consumed other animals. Since they’d transitioned to living on a spaceship, they had been forced to abandon their carnivorous habits and eat supplementary meals developed in a laboratory, but the tools they’d used to hunt were still there.

Once the door had been securely closed, Azdrei’in stepped back from the craft and turned toward the blocky structures again, drawing a laser gun from its holster at his belt. Although his kind was equipped with built-in weapons, they had developed more advanced technology to protect themselves as needed. In case there were any Earthlings that were still alive, he felt more comfortable with a firearm in his hands, so he could kill them before they got close enough to attack him.

Gripping the gun in his left hand, he reached for a communication device with his right and hitched it to one elongated ear. The mothership had flown close enough to the planet to keep in touch with the Yihai as they scouted out the terrain in order to respond quickly if any of them reported that they were in danger. However, right now there was nothing to convey to the Lunvalgans on the receiving end, so he merely left it in place as he strode toward the abandoned ruins of the Earthling’s civilization, beginning his exploration to ensure that the planet was ready for his people to take over.