• • Sunset: Heroes of the Milky Way
• February 7, 2026

Sunset: Heroes of the Milky Way (Chapter 29)

Aleti Ra’non

The Endurance Sham

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A couple minutes go by before I try to go see Rom. I want to see just how bad his injury is, but strangely and uncharacteristically commanding, Hideo grabs my arm and pulls me back down. He says that they are not to leave unless under an emergency, and that I would be getting in the way. I don’t know why he’s acting this way all of a sudden, but I have to sit and wait the half hour for the Endurance challenge to be prepared.

There’s an awkward silence among us since Hideo went off on me. Something is going on, because that makes two people who have tried to keep me from seeing Rom. 

Maybe I may get in the way of Rom practicing some more, but this seemed out of character for HIdeo. If it were something like that, he would have told me..

Then suddenly a flurry of fireworks launch out from the middle of the arena to attract everyone’s attention. The floor that Rom and Tuvir had been fighting on suddenly starts opening up and reveals this giant pool. Then it starts rising, so high that the surface of the water is only a few yards from being parallel with the roofs of this stadium. I can no longer see the other stadium seats ahead of me either since the inside of what is now a giant tank, is an obstacle course. 

The obstacle course starts where the contestants would enter. There are technically two identical courses, just flipped to face different directions. It is not a complicated course. There is a square devoid of water where I can easily assume both contestants enter, and then connected to that are tubes large enough to carry only one person. 

At first, the contestants will have to make a mad dash across the tank’s width. What makes it tough is that there are thin but sharp pendulums swinging back and forth, continuously blocking the way. The Watree contestant will have to time it just right. I am sure that Womby will turn into pure water and ignore it completely. 

Then they have to swim up in a spiral with similar swinging obstacles. What is confusing is that the spirals lead to a huge square room full of blocks. I wonder what they are for.

Then Hideo complains, “This is going to be so boring!”

I turn to him and simply ask, “Why?”

Then he turns to me and points out the tank. “I can’t see it, with the distance, water, and whatever crazy stuff is in the water. It’s all messing with my sound waves.”

“So just release a more powerful sound wave to compensate,” I offer with a shrug of my shoulders. 

“A sound wave powerful enough to do that would be heard by everyone, and it would be deafening, which you know, is pretty rude even for me. Even then, my sound waves can’t get into the obstacle course they have in there.”

“The tubes are closed off from the outside,” I realize as I bump my head with my hand. That actually hurt, I probably shouldn’t do that. “It’s airtight, so sound is not getting in and out easily.”

“I know. This is going to be like I’m the one guy who doesn’t enjoy watching paint dry,” he groans as he crosses his arms. “Just tell me when Womby wins so I know.”

I begin questioning, “You don’t think that the—”

Hideo interrupts me with a knowing look. “Whoever the Watree contestant is, they have no chance.”

While I know he’s right, his pessimism is so damn depressing.

Then fireworks start to go off again, signaling the announcer woman’s return.

She comes back out with her arms in the air, purposely prompting cheers from the crowd. I notice how she is actively trying to inspire excitement from both sides of the arena. I wonder how smart an idea that is.

When the announcer gets to the tank, it looks as if she is typing stuff into a monitor. Then suddenly her face appears like a projector on the sides of the tank so everyone can see her. We all finally get a good look at her face, and she seems… well, like a Watree. I just her nose is more prominent? Am I racist for not being able to say what makes her look unique? Like I would never mistake Pekipsea for this girl, but at the same time I don’t really know what to describe to Hideo…

… who doesn’t really seem to care. Oh well.

His head is already leaning into his hand, as he could get any sleep here. 

The announcer asks us all with enthusiasm, “Did everyone enjoy the Battle challenge?” The Watree side is booming, riding the high of Rom’s win. 

“Are you ready for the next challenge to start?” The Riverti starts cheering now, but it just doesn’t match their opposition..

“I’m glad, because here come the contestants! You might recognize one of them!” 

I’m glad for Pekipsea and Torun that Womby enters from the Riverti side, because now they don’t see him all that well. Less salt on their wounds. 

The Watree contestant is a pleasant surprise though. She struts out with a confident smile on her face and a look in her eye that would freeze most predators. I assume she has to know who she’s up against. Womby is the one contestant all the Riverti were talking about, though maybe she didn’t hear about it underground.

The announcer introduces the Watree contestant first. “For the Watree, their contestant is an expert swimmer, well versed in diving in the deepest of depths of the Sardar Trench. When she served as the alerter in the trench mines, she had to cover a mile distance in a one minute to warn any and all miners in the Sardar walls.” Then the Watree contestant appears on the tank screens. “People raise your hands for Sevine!” The Watree start cheering, though not nearly as loud or energetically as they did for Rom. 

I notice that the announcer has only been saying the contestants’ first names. When the excitement dies down I wait to see if she does it again for Womby.

“Our Riverti contestant, well it would be hard not to know this man! The master over the seas, known hero throughout the galaxy, the Guardian of the Riverti,” she rants on as Womby comes up on the tank screens. “Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you the Oceanbeast, Wombinal!”

As the other side cheers I lean in to Pekipsea and ask her, “Is there a reason she isn’t saying anyone’s last name?”

Hideo answers simply, “Anonymity.”

I purse my lip in confusion. “Their faces are broadcasted over the world.”

“Can’t find someone’s address by searching their face.”

Eh, I mean, the Regnorian Republic could.

I look back towards the tank in time to see the doors open to allow Sevine and Womby to enter their respective chambers. Then suddenly their chambers start to flood with water. 

It has been a while since I learned about Rivertan biology. I’m pretty sure they can breath under water, but I ask Pekipsea just make sure. “You can all breathe underwater right? You don’t just hold your breath for insanely long amount of time right?”

Pekipsea explains, “We may have scales in some places, but we are amphibious, though we can only breathe in fresh water. We do hold our breath for salt water. You really didn’t know that?”

I shrug at her. “It’s not something we learn about on Reganora. 

“Then where’s the Endurance in this challenge? Is it purely physical?”

“Wait until they explain the challenge and maybe you’ll know,” Hideo snips at me.

Well, if I were sorry, I would apologize for trying to understand the ways of another people, but alas, I am not.

I return my focus to the arena itself as the announcer’s face comes back onto the screen. She explains the rules of this contest. “Of course, like with the Battle challenge there are three contests, and this is the first one of the Endurance challenge. Here, the contestants must complete the obstacle course. At the end of the course, as I am sure many have noticed, are blocks meant to be heavy and difficult to move. There are five for each contestant to grab and take back to the starting station they are currently floating in. Whoever brings back all of the blocks first wins the contest. Simple right?” 

I hear Torun complain, “Simple don’t mean easy. I’d probably throw my back out moving one of them.” 

“That’s because you’re old, sweetie,” his wife tells him.

“You’re older than me.”

Pekipsea looks at him once and he shudders.

Then in the top corners of the sides of the tank, screens showing Womby and Sevine show up. This makes it easier for everyone to see.

“Now that everything is all set, contestants get ready!” she announces. Womby positions himself perpendicular to the the door. Sevine on the other hand, bends her legs and leans up against the back of the wall. “On three, the doors will open and you can go! Don’t get hit by any obstacles! People count down with me!”

“ONE!” people chant. 

Sevine places her hands on the wall too. I think she is going to push herself off to get a boost of speed.

“TWO!” people chant again.

Womby starts to transform his lower half into water. The water that is his legs is more translucent than transparent than the water he is swimming in, making it easy to tell where they are.

“THREE!” everyone says together.

The door to their tubes open quickly and they are off. Womby’s lower half spins like a cyclone propelling him forward. Sevine pushes herself off of the wall and goes far. It’s easy to see that she’s no pushover. 

Womby quickly pushes ahead of her though, easily dodging the walls swinging back and forth through the tubes. Sevine somehow holds her own as she times herself perfectly. With the screen showing a close up view, I can see the muscles flexing in her legs as they propel her forward, and when she swims past the walls, she pushes herself off them, helping her keep pace and ahead of the blades. After the first swinging wall, she simply and continually propels herself with great force, rarely ever needing to pump her leg. 

Sevine reaches the spiral as Womby is a quarter of the way up. He has trouble bumping into the walls of the tube from his high speed. Sevine’s strategy of pushing from the swinging walls works well in the spiral. 

They both end up in the square box at the same time. Womby then starts manipulating the water to lift up all the boxes at once, where Sevine has to go one at a time. When she sticks her fingers under one, her face shows that she is putting a lot of energy into trying to lift it. 

If it weren’t for Womby, I’d question how the Watree ever lose this challenge. I’m supposed to believe that the people up here are doing hard enough labor to keep up with this girl? 

Then she makes me eat my words. She may be able to swim, but it appears that endurance also requires some strength.

She tries to lift the block, struggling to lift it so that water can get underneath it. As she lifts it up, Womby has finished lining the five boxes in a line, and is moving into the spiral. Then Sevine tries to put her one into the spiral. 

Hideo was right, she truly didn’t stand a chance, anyone with even a little bit of knowledge of the Endurance challenge could have guessed that. 

So why did I start seeing something strange happen?

As Sevine holds the box, a couple bubbles appear from it. I watch the screen as Sevine immediately begins to cough and drops the box. People immediately groan in disappointment.   

I turn to Pekipsea and ask, “Did you see that?” 

“See what?” she asks without truly giving me her full attention.

“The bubbles that appeared from the box,” I recount as point ahead of us.

“I saw the bubbles, but I don’t think it looked like it was coming from the box,” she informs me. “Probably from her own breathing. I’ve held my breath before entering water sometimes just by accident. That’s probably all it was.” Then she makes a face of concern towards me. “Right?”

“I don’t trust a lick of this,” Torun grumbles as he crosses his arms. 

Pekipsea remind him, “We don’t know anything for sure.”

“Don’t we?” he responds with an arch of his brow.

She doesn’t have a response to that, so I look back towards the tank. Sevine has managed to get a block in the spiral, and is pushing it down as fast as she can.. She passes Womby, who is timing the movement of each block to not get stuck in one of the spinning walls. As they do this though I watch the other boxes more closely. 

As I do so I see bubbles leaking out of Sevine’s but not Womby’s. What could they be? Whatever it is, it’s making it harder for her to breath. 

Sevine gets her first block to the lowest level, and now it’s just a straight shot. Womby though, has finally gotten all of his blocks through most of the spiral. 

When Sevine gets her first block past the three swinging walls, and deposits it into her starting station, the games make it sound like something to celebrate. There’s even this horn that comes on to signal to everyone that she got one. 

Sevine races back as Womby finishes passing his blocks through the spiral, having figured out a process to get them all through. It’s not looking good for her, but that said, she gets back to the top even faster this time, already being accustomed to the course. 

Though when she gets to the square room she immediately begins coughing. Whatever is in those blocks is screwing with Sevine. It’s likely being specifically released when most people would be watching her push her block down the course.

Sevine really struggles with picking up this second block and getting it into the tube. Once she does, Womby is on the last swinging wall before a straight shot. At this point, there is absolutely no chance she can win.

Once Sevine starts pushing the block down the tube she quickly recovers. Sevine proves that she gets better and better the more she goes through the course as she gets her second block down even faster than the first. She won’t give up, when it would probably be better to save her energy for the next contest.

By the time she gets the second block to the bottom, Womby is shooting one block into his station. By the time Sevine gets her second block into her station, he has already pushed in two more. At this point Sevine simply gives in and watches as he quickly pushes in his last two blocks. When his last block lands the Riverti start cheering and fireworks go up once again around the tank.

“I can assume Sevine lost the contest just now, didn’t she?” Hideo inquires. I don’t answer him, I simply sigh in disappointment. “Did Womby at least win fair and square?”

“If you mean Womby’s only advantage were his powers, then no, I think they sabotaged Sevine, but… but why? Hideo, Womby would have won without the help, but make it harder on her, and it’s not even like it isn’t obvious, we can’t be the only ones who saw it?”

“I still don’t know what you’re talking about,” Pekipsea interrupted.

“There it is isn’t? They bet against their own people, and people are not letting them down.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Pekipsea questioned him with an accusation in her tone.

“The loss at the Battle challenge was an embarrassment. This Ruleden Tourney isn’t actually a really chance for things to flip, it’s a show for the Riverti to placate a downtrodden people. It’s a game, and they want to win it all, just to remind those below them who always wins. 

“They wanted to have some fun before, but that blew up in their faces. They aren’t going to do that again.

“Paranoid pricks aren’t they?”

Clayton Knight

Rom and I tried watching the first contest of the Endurance challenge. I immediately got bored and stopped. The Combat challenge was at least entertaining to me, but a swimming contest? 

I don’t know if the first contest is still going on, my mind is drifting off as I daydream. I’m picturing what it would be like if I played some Human music for the team. I think it would be funny for them to hear the lyrics we put into our songs. I’ve listened to some music from all around the galaxy, and thing that stuck out the most was how Humans are the only ones that have song lyrics. Maybe I’m just crazy, but that’s all that I remember.

‘You’re crazy regardless,’ Sera comments.

You’re one to talk, I respond.

“Here she comes,” Rom informs me in surprise.

“Wait what?” I ask with obvious confusion.

“Sevine. Who else?” he reminds as he shakes his head and likely wonders what the hell I’m thinking about. “The Endurance contestants are getting their break, like I did when I beat Rom in the first challenge.” 

I honestly don’t remember that. 

I’ve been doing my best to block out this whole Tourney, anything that doesn’t have to do with my part of the plan. I’d get stir crazy otherwise.

“Can I assume she lost?” I ask him.

Rom shakes his head at me. “Don’t be a dick when she gets here.”

“I can’t promise anything,” I warn him, still leaning against the wall. Then after a minute I wonder out loud, “Where the hell is she?” 

Then the doors that connect to the arena open and Sevine comes storming in, an angry expression on her face, which contrasts greatly with face of confidence she left the locker room in. 

Rom asks her with his hands raised to embrace but nervous to do so, “Sevine are you okay?”

She turns back towards him with a scowl, and stares at him for a few seconds, then cracks a smile. “Oh, I’m definitely okay.”

I point my finger at her, “Hold on, didn’t you lose?” 

Rom shoots me a dirty look, probably over my tone. I told him I may be rude.

Sevine lets my comment rolls off her shoulders. “I did. Normally that would have me absolutely furious. I mean, in my course, they pumped saltwater in it! It mixed in with the freshwater, and I had trouble breathing and slowed me down. Someone had to have put it there to sabotage me,” she rants, all the while with a grin on her face.

Rom and trade glances towards each other before he asks, “And you’re happy about this… why?”

“Because someone felt the need to sabotage me,” she repeats. I still don’t get it yet. “They felt the need to stop me from performing at my full potential. They would only do that if they thought one thing was possible.” 

Then she takes a dramatic pause.

I open my arms out and scrunch my nose in a manner that signals that I’m waiting for her to finish her thought.

“They sabotaged me because they actually thought I could win!” Sevine practically cheers. “Those rotten gilfuckers got together and sabotaged me because they thought I could beat the Guardian in the contest. Why else would they do that?”

Ah, I see now, she’s got an ego. Well, whatever floats her boat, I guess. Better than moping around, being sad. 

Rom and I trade glances again. I can see in his eyes that he doesn’t buy what she’s selling. I think the Riverti are just overly paranoid, but I’m not gonna tell her.

Rom shrugs at Sevine and half-heartedly admits, “I guess I can see that. I would be proud of myself too if I saw it that way.”

“You can, Rom,” she tells him, “I mean they got an actual soldier to fight you. That’s got to say something.” 

Rom smiles and looks up, really processing the concept Sevine is pitching. When he starts nodding his head with a smile I can tell he’s going to just roll with it. 

I roll my eyes.

‘The ability of ordinary people to complement themselves astounds me,’ Sera drones on in my head. 

You consider these people ordinary? What high bar to set for the normies. 

‘I find you impressive, power is impressive. They have none.’

Sera’s complement catches me off guard, as nihilistic as her worldview is. On reflex I respond, Why wouldn’t you? 

I feel my demon roll her eyes in my head. 

Then I hear, “Ahem.”

I snap out of my gaze to see Rom watching me and Sevine looking at me like I am the rudest person in the world. Her ire is overdone, I’m maybe in the top five at best.

Sarcastically she questions me, “You do realize it is weird and rude to daydream while someone is talking to you?”

“Don’t you have a Tourney to go back too?”

Alloya Ra’non

“Why are you doing this?” the man on the right asks me.

I turn to ask both of the men working the announcements their names.

The one who had been sleeping, “My name is Martine.”

The other says, “Name’s Tolk.”

I address them, “Martine, Tolk, what I’m going to do is hopefully reveal to everyone how it is that the Prime Minister is controlling my friend.” When Martine raises his eyebrow at me, I clarify, “Wombinal, the Guardian.”

Martine looks at me as if I just insulted him. He bemoans, “What? It’s not possible that he actually wants to help us win? Maybe he realizes that after so many centuries the Watree and Riverti can’t just switch.”

“That’s easy for you to say. You don’t live in poverty. You get to go home to a nice bed, a hot bath, and plenty of good food.”

“So do you,” Tolk chimes in. When I turn my head towards him, he gets a pair of daggers. I see the shiver run down his spine.

“I do, but not because my own kind are suffering and dying below my feet,” I remind them. I press my blade closer to Tolk’s neck as I ask rhetorically, “Who decided that you all deserve better than the Watree? Why do you apparently deserve to have it all? Because you win a rigged tournament?”

Martine seems to lack an answer to my question, but before I can speak he states, “They lost the tournament fair and square the first time. After that we couldn’t afford to have things change.”

‘Funny thing about change,’ Rega starts, ‘people say it’s impossible to accept, and then decide that they can’t live without that same change once it has come.’

“That’s just an excuse,” I tell him as I narrow my eyes towards him.

Then Martine shoots back, “Then what would you have us do? Let them win the Tourney? Let’s assume the transition goes smoothly, then the Watree become like us. How is that better?”

“It’s not better,” I admit. Before Martine can capitalize on what he thinks is a conversational win, I inform him that, “that’s not what I’m going for at all.”

“Wha— what are you going for then?”

I notice then that I am still holding my blades to their throats when at this point, I can tell that these two are definitely not going to attack me and even if they do… what the fuck am I worried about? I lower my blades and sheathe the batons.

I look at Tolk to answer his question. “I want to start a revolution. I want to force the Watree to fight for independence. There’s no reason the Rivertan species should be separated by the different color of their skin.” Martine rolls his eyes at me. “What?”

He scoffs and shakes his head, “We don’t dislike each other for the difference of skin color. That’s just how we tell each other apart. The Riverti and Watree hail from ancient clans millennium ago. Two clans that warred all the time. This way we can still settle our differences in peace.” 

I arch my brow up at him, and Martine does not realize it is because I find his whole reasoning ridiculous. 

“Your two groups have been fighting over things that happened millennium ago?” I ask rhetorically.

“Uh, yeah,” Martine replies as if it should be obvious

“That’s— that’s— so— so dumb!  And pointless! I bet none of you even remember what you were fighting about!” I yell at him as I throw my hands in the air. Martine recoils back into his chair as I yell at him. “I mean really, nothing is worth fighting this long over. How have you all not gotten over yourselves by now? Get over it!”

‘Eh, I’ve held longer grudges.’

“Do you know what the ‘ancient’ Riverti and Watree were fighting about?” I ask both of these men.

They both look between each other, and Tolk shrugs his shoulders, “Historians have ideas.”

“Yeah, you two look like really bright guys.” I bring my palm right into my face. As I suffer through the pain of their stupidity, I try to convey to them, “If you can’t remember what you were fighting about, then you can definitely figure out that it wasn’t all that important. Have these ideas never occurred to either of you?”

Tolk looks down at his hands as he twiddles his thumbs. This Riverti reminds me less of a man and more of shy teenager. That is why it makes sense when he admits, “Why would I want to think about it? People who speak out for the Watree are already living with them to help them anyway, I don’t want to do that.”

Oh fuck, what did I expect from men who are this pathetic. 

Martine asks me, “Are you done harassing us about how terrible we are?” I just at him as he continues, “Finally, you said before that we’re going to play a message for you, about Prime Minister Lamberine controlling our Guardian. How is that going to happen?”

I pull out my communicator from my pocket. Terra said the Rango would send me a recording from him through it. I raise it towards Martine and warn him, “See if you can hook this up now, and if you try to break it, I’ll do the same to you, understand?”

“Crystal,” he hisses as he snatches it from my hand.

I watch Martine closely as he inspects the communicator for a port. It takes a few minutes, but we have time. There is a flat-screen showing the next contest that catches Tolk’s attention, causing me begin to watch it too. I notice that while the Watree make the Riverti seem well off in terms of technology, the fact that they still use television screens instead of holographic tech reminds me how far behind they are from my people.  

On it, the announcer woman appears to explaining the next contest. I cross my arms and hint to Tolk, “I wish I could hear what she is saying.” That causes Tolk to quickly move to mess with some knobs and turn the volume up. 

The announcer woman is halfway through saying, “—this contest tests both contestants ability to stay under saltwater without needing oxygen or freshwater.” I can already see where this contest is going. “Whichever contestant stays under the water the longest wins, but if a contestant seemingly falls unconscious they also lose. There will be paramedics on standby, so don’t worry if a contestant falls unconscious.” 

The knowing look she makes on screen makes me think that she wants to make a comment on Womby’s ability to become water, so he has no need to breathe. It’s impossible for him to lose.

“The updates are done, the video or voice or whatever you want should be good to play.

“Are you sure this fossil play a simple voice file?”

“Sorry our technology doesn’t revolve around yours,” he snaps back, but then admits more calmly, “though it should be able to play something like that. Wait, here’s one file that’s compatible. You should really clean this drive one of these days.”

“Just shut up and play it. You can listen to it now and we can all learn something,” I order him.

“Fine,” he says as he pushes a button.

After a few seconds of loading, Terra’s voice comes on first. It starts, “Just answer the goddamn question. What did you do, to my friend?!” The anger in his voice is prominent. 

Terra seemed like a good pick to send to Lamberine because of his temperament. I’ll have to go get him as soon as I’m done here.Then the easily recognizable voice of Prime Minister Lamberine comes on, spewing at Terra, “Why don’t we go around back to the original question? Why am I doing this?” I can’t tell where the conversation started at this point, or where it is heading, but based on Lamberine’s almost venomous tone, I’m hoping for nothing less than damning.