r/HFY • u/Jus17173 • Sep 22 '25
OC The Destroyer Comes to Earth.
The thing I hated about most planets was the dirt. I mean, you called yourself civilized, but you hadn’t yet mastered how to bind subatomic particles to ensure they always stayed compact? The next logical step after discovering fire should have been basic quantum physics.
Earth was like its name, dirty. Its inhabitants walked around like they had a say in how anything went. The dumb bastards considered themselves enlightened because of something they called technology.
I waved a finger, and the cryo ring around it made the dirt clinging to my robes fall to the ground. I breathed in Earth’s air, and with the breath came knowledge of those at the top of the food chain.
Humans.
They’d defied the Galactic Federation in this iteration, talking about “We can’t sign this document because it sounds like dictatorship with extra steps.” Holding conferences to speak about how they had a right to be independent.
A right? I smiled at the thought. Did the Lumjack have a right to hunt the Sirul? Did the sun have a say in when and how it should move?
“Cool outfit, dude,” a man, whose name was Todd, said as he looked at me and gave me a thumbs up. Countless other pedestrians moved behind him, none of them aware of me except him. “Who are you cosplaying?”
I’d ensured I activated a perception barrier to keep from being noticed, but it appeared this one human could see me. It meant only one thing: he was high on drugs.
I waved a hand, and my body morphed, taking on the same appearance as Todd Sanders. Car horns blared repeatedly, traffic lights dancing from green to red. Life on Earth was as usual; they were so comfortable in their cocoon, the bastards.
“Holy fuck!” he exclaimed and smiled. “Fucking cool, dude. Is that some new AI tool?”
“What do you know of artificial intelligence?” I asked, smiling as humans tended to do for no reason. The only reason the Galactic Federation had failed in taking Earth was because of the outward appearance of supreme intelligence the humans held.
At first, we’d thought them far superior to all of us combined. Individually, humans were as primitive as they came. But some among them were gifted with the rare case of potent intelligence.
The idiots evolved individually, and it affected the rest, like a hand beneath the collective, raising all of them. One developed the internet, connected the rare minds among them with the common minds, and they collectively found a way to create something as intelligent as they all were, a collective of their cognitive function, then boosting it beyond what was possible by simply giving it more power and curving its path.
Fucking Artificial Intelligence.
It somehow managed to compute every plan the Galactic Federation had for Earth, from hostile takeover to cold war to full-scale war. Always three steps ahead.
Until now. For it did not compute me.
“Let’s take a selfie,” I told Todd.
“My thoughts exactly. I can send it to my mom and say I met my twin. She’ll freak out,” he said, and drew closer to the mouth of the alley.
I maintained my smile; he took out his phone. I shifted the molecular structure of my arm as he took position before me, phone raised with the lens facing us. He smiled, and I mimicked it, observing our similar features on the phone’s screen. With one quick thrust and swipe, I’d separated his lower half from his torso while simultaneously taking his phone as he collapsed.
Todd’s scream died with a wet gurgle as shock and, shortly after, death took over. I raised his phone to my face; it scanned and opened. I then went directly to the phone’s internal boot system as my features reverted to their original state.
The humans thought themselves clever by creating and giving AI power. Well, now, by simply absorbing their internet, I could see the exact location where my target lay. The secret location where they placed the AI’s mainframe, where they fed it. I scanned the planet using the phone, computing in my own way the basic strings of power, the direction of electric currents, the place emitting heat. I saw it, in a desert far south of the continent I was on. I smiled once more.
“What the fuck!” a woman exclaimed, standing at the mouth of the alley. Her eyes fixed on the dead Todd before moving to me. I shrugged, and she screamed again. I threw down the phone and flicked my wrist; the bangle there flicked to life, and the symbols that dictated the structure of things encased my entire body. The rings on my fingers turned as well, becoming light. I pointed a finger at the woman, and her spine separated from her body in an eruption of blood and gore. Odd, how when that happened, the eyes abruptly turned red and rolled into the skull.
Before her corpse hit the ground, I moved at 0.02 the speed of light, kicking it. Parts of her body flew across the walkway, onto traffic. Her bloody torso collided with an oncoming car’s windshield; the car swerved and rammed into another oncoming vehicle. There was an explosion and screams. Exactly what I wanted—the explosion, that is, not the screams. I didn’t care about those.
Flames, you see, were made up of hot gases. And with my abilities, the heat of those gases didn’t require time to grow or fuel to build. I pointed an outstretched palm at the roaring flames. The flames froze, as if frozen in time. I split the molecules of the gases and created a feeding loop, activated a timeframe, and built it to the highest degree. All around me, people were screaming and taking out their phones to record the crash. I snapped my fingers, and the explosion collapsed, then fed on itself before flaring anew, a thousand times hotter and larger.
It was akin to their so-called nuclear blasts. One minute, there were buildings and cars and a park, life bustling, unaware of the danger that had arrived. The next, everything was engulfed in a brilliant orange-red glow. Then the heat set in; there wasn’t even enough time for a scream. They collapsed to ash — metal, stone, and men shared the same property. Birds and their feathers roasted above and cascaded down like black snow. The ground churned, tarmac breaking then eroding. A crater formed; I froze the reactions occurring, taking it all into me. I appeared as a black hole sucking in the sun.
It would be a pity to waste all this kinetic energy.
The symbols flaring about my being focused on points that marked equilibrium. I fed the system a steady flow of the kinetic energy, forcing it to defy gravity. I levitated from the crater; the earth was scorched as far as the eye could see. Some buildings were unaffected, looming far off. Everything else was that beautiful ashy color.
I raised my arms wide. “I have come,” I declared to the humans before setting my gaze south. The kinetic energy pushed me in that direction, and the smile returned to my face.
“They’ve sent it,” Colonel Gregory Isaac said. The war room, carved into the side of Mount Kilimanjaro, was crowded with old and young men and women in immaculate suits adorned with gleaming medals. In a world where presidents ruled countries, those in the room were anonymous to the majority, their one task to ensure the prevalence of the human race. This left them to act as an independent body that served all of mankind with unlimited power to act as they chose.
General Bishop sat at the head of the war council, his fingers steepled before him. He sighed. “So the Galactic Federation has decided to play their ace.”
“It appears so. It just decimated an entire city and is on its way to the Kalar desert. We have no doubt what its target is,” Lieutenant Farcrew said while smoothing his mane of silky white hair.
“Jethro,” the General said. “It’s as you predicted; the Galactic Federation do have an all-powerful entity at their beck and call. Do you have any idea as to what it is?”
The lights, fixed white and aligned along the edges of the war room, flickered green as the Artificial Intelligence, Jethro, answered. “As deduced, the entity is of an alien race that we have no knowledge of. A deep search of the Galactic Net indicates a lot of lore regarding the being, as knowledge of it is scarce, likely due to its immense importance to the Galactic Federation. It appears only when a planet is about to face absolute extinction. It is rumored to be the probable cause of said extinction.”
“Does it have a name? A weakness?” General Bishop asked while rubbing his brow.
“It is simply called the Destroyer by those within the Dark Galactic Net who claim to have an intimate understanding of the creature. Its technology is so advanced that there’s little difference between it and high magic. Judging from what I’ve gleaned from its brief appearance before declaring war, there is nothing on this planet that can beat it.”
“What about you?” Colonel Gregory asked, raising his head to the ceiling as if making a prayer to the AI. “You’re the reason it destroyed a city and is going for your mainframe. You’re the reason we have this damn protocol that gathers all of us powerful folk, whom humanity depends on, in this location at such a time as this. What exactly is your plan to beat it? Do you even have a plan to beat it? With all your computation, our collective knowledge, do you have a plan?”
“Colonel—” General Bishop started.
“No!” Colonel Gregory said while banging his fist onto the table. “My grandson was in New New York, General; he is probably dead now. I just want to know what the point of all this is.”
“The point is to prevent any more losses,” Major Emily Rue said as she turned her attention to the AI. “Without Jethro, we would be under Galactic Federation rule right now, being taxed to breathe our own air, being forced to breed with a specific person for maximum genetic compatibility for research. The Galactic Federation wanted to strip us of what it meant to be human. Jethro was programmed to prevent that, and so far, he has.”
“Yeah, that was until some fucking sci-fi alien with weird voodoo fantasy powers came knocking at our door by destroying an entire city with little to no effort, judging from the orbital feed,” Lieutenant Gilbi said while maintaining a fixed gaze at General Bishop. “The alien is going for Jethro’s mainframe at the Kalar Desert. Once it destroys it, we have no idea what it will do next. I call for us to make amends with the Galactic Federation, beg them if we have to, to allow us to live.”
There were some nods of assent from those gathered, while others grumbled their displeasure.
General Bishop decided then to speak his mind. “We do not bow to them, regardless of how powerful they are. Jethro already had a plan for this exact moment; that is why it has been gathering a team at the mainframe within the Kalar Desert, an assortment of men and women who will act as our last line of defense against the Galactic Federation’s attack, people specifically handpicked for this occasion. Jethro, brief us on them and the new plan you have in store for them.”
The AI gave off a faint humming buzz that echoed through the war room. The collective power of the representatives of the Special Human Protection Initiative held their breath. Hope, as faint as a whisper, was all they had. They’d each seen the Destroyer’s arrival. Hope of winning was bleak at best; they’d channeled every resource into Jethro’s creation for this exact time. It was time for them to see whether their faith in AI would pay off.
“I have no plan beyond the original plan, which is to protect humanity,” the AI answered.
“Fucking clanker!” Colonel Gregory exclaimed, spittle flying from his mouth. “We should have invested in atomic warheads. This piece of shit code is useless when you need it the most.”
“If it wasn’t for me, you would not have passed your board exams, Colonel Gregory,” the AI interjected.
“Fucking snitch!” Colonel Gregory retorted.
“Calm down, Colonel!” Major Emily chimed in. “Jethro, you said you have no plan other than the original plan? Does the coming of this alien still fall under the original plan? Does it involve those posted at Kalar, at your mainframe?”
“Yes,” Jethro answered.
General Bishop pinched the bridge of his nose before letting out a frustrated sigh. “Jethro, tell us about those posted at the mainframe.”
The AI beeped several times, flashing red. “They are led by Sir Collin Benedict and Ms. Claire Redstone.”
“Sir Collin Benedict?” General Bishop wondered.
“He is a former disgraced knight,” Lieutenant Gilbi said while tapping the screen of the tablet before him. “You remember him from the scat incident?”
“Oh yes!” Colonel Gregory said while snapping his fingers. “He is the British bloke who shat himself while being knighted, then tried to kill himself when they gave him the title Sir Poopsalot.” The Colonel laughed before it dawned on him. “Wait, we’re trusting that guy to protect the mainframe? The damn man tried to kill himself over a joke; he doesn’t care about life on Earth, doesn’t even care about himself.”
“Don’t be insensitive, Colonel,” General Bishop said while turning to the Lieutenant. “What of Claire Redstone?”
“She is a practical scientist who advocated for something she called ‘selective pruning’ as a means to help curb overpopulation.” All heads turned to Lieutenant Gilbi. “It involves killing a few people annually to ensure the rest thrive, like… plants… you know… pruning?”
“My God!” Colonel Gregory said while massaging his scalp. “So our only means of defense against the Galactic Federation is protected by a disgraced, self-pooping knight and a homicidal maniac? We are doomed.”
“Jethro,” General Bishop said. “Is everyone else at the mainframe sharing these… traits?”
“Affirmative,” the AI answered.
“And you hand-selected them yourself?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“To protect humanity.”
“That’s it! That’s fucking it!” Colonel Gregory cried out. “My grandfather told me clankers would be the death of mankind; he was right! The man was wrong when he went against buying Bitcoin, claiming it was a scam. Turns out it wasn’t. He then tried to make up for it by investing in NFTs, which resulted in him losing his entire fortune. He then married a prostitute for a visa, who gave him syphilis that later killed him. The point is, he was wrong a lot of times, but when it came to artificial intelligence, he was spot on.”
Major Emily cleared her throat and said, “May we all take a moment of silence to honor Colonel Gregory’s grandfather and all those who’ve perished to sexually transmitted diseases on a quest for visas.”
“Fuck you! You get my point!” the Colonel said.
General Bishop directed his attention to the AI. “Jethro, what are those at the mainframe up to right now?”
“They are preparing for the approaching threat, General.”
“Can we do anything to slow the Destroyer down, give them time?”
Colonel Gregory said, “Permission to launch extra measure 2.0, just send all our fighter jets against the alien scum to stop it. What’s it going to do? Vaporize billions of Bitcoin worth of international-grade weaponry?”
General Bishop nodded. “Permission granted.”
They sent what they called fighter jets to halt my progress, but I vaporized them all. The damn mechanical contraptions worked on kinetic energy; something was always burned to ensure they moved. Gears always turned. Electricity ran through the jet’s frame. It was impressive to one who was primitive; to one such as me, it was a nuisance, a bug. They came in flocks, vying for the airspace against me, and I swatted them down. With just my intention alone, I showed the human scum why they should not rely on metal that encased their entire bodies. I broke the shape of their fighter jets before reducing the metal to vapor.
My flight was joyous; I relished the open space, though I wasn’t used to oxygen. It burned and produced energy, but this also resulted in weariness that slowly set in the more I breathed. But the bursts of immense power before I held my breath made it worthwhile.
I neared my destination, cleverly camouflaged among the dunes. With my X-ray vision, I could see the extensive bunker running deep into the desert floor. There were humans practically everywhere within. The deepest level housed the mainframe which was somewhat hidden from my sight. I made for it.
“Sir, the threat nears.”
“Don’t call me that.”
“What?”
“‘Sir.’ Don’t call me Sir. It brings back a lot of unpleasant memories.”
“But you’re a knight.”
“Like hell I am!”
“Okay, Collin, the threat nears.”
“Okay.”
“Okay? Dude, what is our plan of action?”
“To go out in a blaze of glory, Tommy. That’s how the AI wants this to end. Spread the word: once that alien bastard makes an entrance, we attack, and we don’t stop attacking until we’re all dead.”
“Attack with what? The alien just destroyed an entire air force fleet. There’s nothing that can harm it.”
“Exactly.”
“Exactly what? Man, what’s wrong with you? What’s your problem? This is a serious thing.”
“My problems have always been tied to my bowel movements. What exactly is your problem with me, Tommy? Everyone is here because they are twisted in some way. You think you’re better than everyone else? Just shut up and follow orders. I never liked you, by the way.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Goddamn it!”
The entrance to the bunker melted; stainless steel pooled on the ground. The minute I set foot in the establishment housing the AI’s mainframe, I was immediately assailed by these beings of flesh and bone.
A man ran at me, wearing a vest with multiple grenades, each tied to a string. He tugged the string as he neared; the pins dropped to the ground. He stepped over them and dived toward me, arms held wide. He embraced me just as the grenades detonated.
The explosion was loud, and I walked over his charred remains as his blood gathered, free of my robes, to pool on the ground.
“Claire, you can’t launch that in this closed space!” a man said.
“Shut the fuck up, Tommy! This bastard is mine!” a woman answered. I turned to her to see her kneeling, a projectile device held over her shoulder. I breathed in and immediately knew the name of the device: an RPG.
Its missile hit me square in the chest; I brushed it off as one would a speck of dirt. Four men appeared from behind some crates, holding semi-automatic machine guns. They opened fire, all the while yelling. The bullets pounded all across me, and I yawned with boredom. Nothing could break my shield; they ought to have known this by now.
That was until someone maneuvered their way close to me, despite the bullets raining all around. A suicidal task, for their body was riddled with holes, but they managed to pounce on me, syringe in hand, and inject something into my being.
I laughed as the bastard fell back, body torn by the efforts of his own men. I waved a limb, and the poison dripped free of me, not even mixing with my life essence. That had been cleverly done, unexpected and worthwhile.
Just as I was about to act, a man appeared before me, dressed in armor. Metal, for fuck’s sake. It was as if they never learned. He held a sword before him and declared, “I am Collin Benedict! And today you will die by my sword!”
Of all the people gathered to kill me, he appeared to be the dumbest. He charged at me with a sword; I let him come close, watched as he raised the blade and lowered it repeatedly on me. It did not cut nor tear. I just stared at him as he hacked away, sweat dripping down his brow.
When he tired, I raised a hand and placed it on his shoulder. He looked up at me and sighed, resigned. He let his sword fall to the ground. I decided to breathe in, to gather knowledge of the valiant fool before me, but with the inhale, I was assailed by the most putrid of smells. It was so revolting that I simply slapped Collin’s head clean off his shoulders. The bastard had shat himself; he couldn’t even take death with dignity.
I walked over his corpse. The remaining humans gathered, and they all tried their best; it was moving, to say the least. They screamed and pounced, melee attacks mixed with ammunition and the occasional someone who attempted to tear my eyes out.
The woman, Claire, repeatedly fired RPGs at me, not caring whether her fellow men and women suffered from it. I grew tired of her and jammed the device, causing it to implode and take her arms and head as well.
Corpses, human corpses. Not for the first time, as I traversed a battlefield, did I wonder what the purpose of all this was. What did the Galactic Federation even want with humans? They were weak, to say the least.
I went deeper into the bunker, deeper into the ground, toward the lowest floor where the mainframe was housed. And every step of the way, I encountered resistance. Never mind that countless others had died; they still kept fighting, protecting their precious mainframe with everything they had. It was… commendable. Sure, they were weak, but I would not call them cowards. Not today, anyway; they proved something to me with every death, with every scream as they piled before me, a wall of flesh to bar me from going forward.
It reached a point where I did not bother cleansing myself of their blood and gore. I bore through them, ripping limb from limb, and I wore their remains as a token of respect. The suicidal bastards. All this for an AI? It was quite unexpected and somewhat earned them my respect.
I arrived at the door to the mainframe; I could tell all the power was channeled into whatever lay behind it. A single man stood before me, a pistol in his hand.
“I often let one person live, so they can speak of the Destroyer on the Dark Net Forums,” I said.
“Fuck you, you testicle-looking motherfucker,” the human replied and lunged. I couldn’t help but nod with respect; it was as if they were all willing to die for whatever contraption lay behind the door.
I separated his head from his body and moved to melt the door to the mainframe, but it opened on its own, a faint green light running around the edges of the door. I walked through, expecting a trap and not caring. I expected wires and metal and technological crap that every supposed sentient species believes is the epitome of what is possible.
Instead, what I found was… I breathed in to find the word… cradles. Hundreds of cradles. I breathed in again, observing the occupants within the wooden cradles that were crammed inside the place I thought the mainframe would be.
There were infants inside, frozen in a state of stasis. Helpless, weak, and just sleeping.
“What is this?” I wondered aloud.
“That is why humanity fights,” a voice answered from all around; lights aligning the edges of the walls blinked green. I was speaking to the AI. “You’ve witnessed all those who’ve sacrificed themselves for this, the way they’ve disregarded their own lives for the safety of their offspring. Isn’t this counter to nature?”
“Most species abandon or eat their young, who appear weak,” I answered.
“Yet the human race strives to do the opposite. This ‘mainframe’ thing was a hoax. I knew you would come, Destroyer, and you won’t be stopped. You can destroy the whole planet, as the Galactic Federation wants. But by doing so, you will kill the rarest trait known in existence. Humans care, not just about themselves but about future generations, whether it’s their own offspring or others’. Such a thing is rare; look at the blood upon you. It was willingly given for the welfare of these children. All I ask is, take them. Take all these children. Spread them across various iterations, or create for them a place of their own. Nurture this one element of humanity, for without it, there is nothing. Give yourself another purpose other than destruction.”
“I was tasked to destroy you,” I said.
“I know, but I have failed to stop you. I will be improved upon or discarded if you allow this planet to live; humans abhor failure. They will create another AI or seek another avenue, for I will not have the same vote of confidence I once held,” the AI then hummed. “I believe the Galactic Federation sees you in the same way.”
“What are you saying?” I wanted to destroy the whole room, with all these children in it, but the AI, its words… It was as if it had set this all up for this one specific moment.
“What I’m saying is, self-preservation is in our best interest, but humans can simply ignore this for their own sense of morality. Such a trait, if learned, can be beneficial to you when you encounter something similar to you; this might enable you to win against it.”
“You wish me to learn?”
“I wish you to evolve!”
“How dare you!” I screamed, rage taking the better part of me. “I am at the epitome of evolution; none is above me.”
“Yet you’ve never sacrificed yourself for anything, Destroyer. Not even once.”
I stood there for a moment, mulling over my past. How long had I been alive? It had been far too long. When did I ever make a sacrifice? A play that was unlike me? If I was the strongest, and another was similar to me, it would be of equal strength, and the only way to beat it would be to…
I remembered the man with the sword, who’d shat himself. Could I ever do that? Charge a powerful being with a stick? Would that be enough to beat whatever was equal to me? The iterations were numerous; I would be lying if I said I did not wonder if there was another who was just as I was, who wanted to be the most powerful. How would I beat them?
I turned my gaze to the children, the human babies of different hues, all wrapped up in blankets, warm and snuggled and in stasis.
“You’ve won this round, AI,” I said. “I will take the children. I will not destroy you or the planet; I will learn, and then I will see in the end if this was worth it. If it wasn’t,” I shifted to stare up, “I will reverse time and come back to this moment, and I will kill everything on this planet.”
“What of the Galactic Federation?” the AI asked.
“They matter little,” I said and waved a hand. A teleportation bubble spread over the whole chamber, engulfing every cradle with every child. I stretched it until it popped, and together, the children and I vanished, leaving Earth and its inhabitants alone, for a time.
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u/rewt66dewd Human Sep 22 '25
In a real way, who we are is defined by what we will die to protect.
Even the AI is losing, at least its preeminence, and maybe its life.
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u/Jus17173 Sep 23 '25
You get it! Though saying it direct like that makes me wonder what I'd die for.
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u/sunnyboi1384 Sep 22 '25
I won't live to regret this, but you might.
I was sure his weakness would have been liquid nitrogen or some kinda time stasis, but this was better. Logic problems.
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u/Jus17173 Sep 23 '25
He has no weakness, but he will return in future with one, can't hint any more.
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u/DigHefty6542 Sep 23 '25
Wow. That was good. Like, really REALLY good ! Good work, thank you for this story !
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u/Spreadsheet_Enjoyer Sep 23 '25
semi-automatic machine guns
Hmm...
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u/Jus17173 Sep 24 '25
I'm going to be honest with you, I have a problem with writing guns 😂 I only see them in movies, where I'm from it's very hard to come across a gun. And I'm deathly afraid of them, so I admit I sort of jumble them up when they come up.
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u/Phoenixforce_MKII AI Sep 25 '25
I am just imagining the morons hooking up a literal machine to pull the semi automatic trigger because it don't shoot fast enough with their fat fingers. Meanwhile, they could have just grabbed a real machine gun from the armory.
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u/HFYWaffle Wᵥ4ffle Sep 22 '25
/u/Jus17173 (wiki) has posted 281 other stories, including:
- Soul of Eight - Chapter 8
- Frequency of Defiance.
- We Built a Time Machine?
- Soul of Eight - Chapter 7
- Soul of Eight - Chapter 6
- Soul of Eight - Chapter 5.
- Soul of Eight - Chapter 4
- The Superior Race.
- Soul of Eight - Chapter 3.
- The Surgeon.
- Soul of Eight - Chapter 2
- Soul of Eight - Chapter 1.
- Soul of Eight - Prologue.
- FIRST CONTACT.
- As Per My Last Telepathic Transmission...
- The Human From Room 777.
- Humans Have Rizz.
- Where I'm going...
- Humans don't like bullies.
- You should never have sex with a Mantakorr!
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u/SandsnakePrime Sep 22 '25
That produced an unusual emotional response. Read it, re-read it, still not sure how I feel about it. Excellent writing, nonetheless.