Day 12: The Seed of the Serpent
Date: Day 12 — 14:00 Hours Location: High-Security Xenobiology Lab, Tygerian Surface Base By: Captain Hedges
The war is over, but the dread is just beginning.
I was called down to the deepest sublevel of the base, past three layers of blast doors and energy shields. This is where we keep things that can kill us just by existing.
Standing behind thick transparisteel glass was Dr. Aris Thorne, our lead xenobiologist. He’s a brilliant Tygerian, but he usually prefers microscopes to blasters. Today, his fur was bristling with nervous energy.
"Captain," Thorne said, his voice tight over the intercom. "You need to see this."
In the center of the containment chamber sat the pod recovered from the Bio-Ship wreckage. It had opened up like a grotesque flower. Inside wasn't a weapon or a data core.
It was an egg. A massive, pulsating, bio-mechanical thing the size of a small car, glowing with a sickly green and purple light. Veins of living metal pulsed beneath its translucent surface.
"What am I looking at, Doc?" I asked, my hand instinctively dropping to my sidearm.
"We call it a World Egg Seed," Thorne adjusted his spectacles, staring at the readings on his datapad. "The invasion... the orbital bombardment... it wasn't just to kill us. It was to clear the ground. This was the real payload. It's a hyper-aggressive terraforming device designed to rewrite our planet's biosphere into a poisonous jungle suitable for them."
"So we just blow it up, right?"
"Look closer, Captain."
I stepped up to the glass. Through the translucent shell of the pulsating seed, I saw something coiled inside. It wasn't another drone soldier. It had a human-like torso flowing into a massive serpentine tail, with six arms crossed over its chest and a crown of crystalline bone fused to its head. It was sleeping, ancient, and terrifying.
"It’s a Naga," Thorne whispered. "A controller unit. A queen. If that Seed activates, she wakes up. And if she wakes up, she doesn't just command armies. She commands the planet."
The war isn't over. The enemy just planted a bomb in our garden, and it’s getting ready to hatch.
Product Identity & Legal The following items are designated Product Identity of Arthur Earl C. Hedges Jr. / The Adventures of Captain Hedges: The Tygerian Isles setting, Dr. Aris Thorne, The "World Egg Seed" artifact, and the specific Tygerian "Naga" concept. Monsters! Monsters! is a trademark of Ken St. Andre. © 2026 Arthur Earl C. Hedges Jr.
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