In the ruins of an ancient city of pillars, an alien octopus pointed eight dangerous looking ray-guns at a white-bearded hermit. "You best be giving me that there data-cylinder, Gavrilo, or I'll vaporize you right where you stand, I done swear it!"
The hermit was on his knees, clutching the data-cylinder close to his chest. His mouth was wet with blood from the beatings he had already taken, and though his eyes shone with the fiery glow of a red sun, his assailant seems unworried. "Damn you, Pete! I should never had told you my secret name."
"Split milk and all that, partner," the alien octopus sneered as he used the barrel of one of the ray-guns to push back the brim of his ten-gallon hat. "Shucks, we both knew it would come down to something like this. I reckon I just popped you one before you had the chance to pop me. Ha. Now..." all eight ray-hammers of the ray-guns clicked back in series, "...that data-cylinder, if you do please."
The hermit's eyes burned a long moment, casting an gaze around the pillared city and the lone rocket-ship they had come in. But the light died out from them. As his shoulders slumped, he finally rolled the data-cylinder toward the octopus.
Cephalo Pete holstered one of the ray-guns and picked up the data-cylinder with a gloved tentacle. Manipulating the buttons on the side with dexterous suckers, he was able to activate the cylinder, filling the air between the two with a three dimensional map of a distant star system and a very specific planet marked with a red X.
"At last," he said with relish, "the hidden grave of King Argentum!" With satisfied glee, he turned off the map and tucked the cylinder in a pouch on his belt. He glanced one final time at the dejected hermit and tossed him a laugh. "Ha! Don't look so glum, Gavrilo. All your worries will be wiped clean away once I use the silver skull machine!"
Gavrilo looked up, the defeat in his eyes poorly hiding a growing hatred.
"Don't you follow me none," Cephalo Pete warned the hermit as he backed his way to the open ramp of the rocket-ship. "I see you try to come after me before I done made warp speed, I'll use the ship's space-lasers to fricassee you right outta outer space!" He kept half the ray-guns trained on the hermit for good measure as he climbed aboard the vessel and closed the airlock.
Gavrilo only had a moment to see Cephalo Pete give him a wink and a mock salute from the pilot's portal before the rocket-ship blasted off into the sky. It trailed fire and smoke behind it as it raised higher and higher into the clouds and, just before it shrunk to an imperceivable dot, it winked away into warp speed with a green flare.
Gavrilo raised both arms into the air, threw his head back, and howled in frustration. So close! So close to fixing everything only to be backstabbed!
He curled into a fetal ball, weeping. Alone on this dead planet amongst the pillars of this dead city, he wept. For hours, well past the sunset, there was only darkness and his sobs.
Some time late in the alien night, the hermit realized he was no longer alone. Perhaps the eight-armed coward had come back to finish him off. Gavrilo stood up, and flung his mud-splattered blue cloak over one shoulder, revealing the faded blue-and-gold suit of his super-civilization. He rose a foot in the air, a pale white glow of science sorcerous power flaring out from him. Lightning arced out from his palms, ricocheting off the remains of the marble pillars. The very air around him groaned, as if reality could not contain the sheer power being concentrated in a single spot.
"Come out from the shadows, damn you!" the hermit wizard challenged mightily!
From behind a nearby pillar stepped out the Super Wizard From Space. He wore the same blue-and-gold suit, though his was clean and well maintained. The small ethereal crown hovered above his head, ghostly white, its light outshone by the hermit wizard's outbursts. "Hello Gavrilo," the super wizard greeted him, holding a hand in front of him to shield his squinting eyes.
"Oh," the hermit wizard said, floating down to the ground. The power faded from him, the light faded from him, soon he was just a sad old man again. He frowned under his unkempt white beard, and the many lines under his eyes seemed to age him a thousand space-decades. "It's you. How did you find me?"
"I asked around. It wasn't too hard. Most people are willing to tell me what I want to know. And everyone remembers you." The super wizard shook his head, disappointed. "You know as well as I do that once one of our super-race tells anyone our secret name, our powers are completely useless against that person.
"And you've traded away your name so much that there is not a sentient being alive that doesn't know Gavrilo, the Hermit Wizard From Space."
Gavrilo gave an angry bark and waved his hand. "Bah! If you've come to throw my mistakes back in my face, you can just leave. I don't need you of all people reminding me of bad decisions."
"No, friend," the super wizard said, walking up to him and placing a hand on the hermit's sad shoulder, "I've actually come for your help."
A curious, suspicious look was the only reply.
"Our race is part of a tournament. A cosmic tournament of space-champions, but I haven't been informed. I've been ambushed once already, I need you to tell me what you know before I am unwittingly trapped again."
There was a long silence, then the straggly white beard scowled. "And what will you do for me?" the hermit wizard asked.
The super wizard took his hand off Gavrilo's shoulder and seemed both unhappy and unsurprised. "I know about the silver skull machine."
Gavrilo's eyes widened with eagerness. He grabbed the super wizard's golden collar and cried with hopeful excitement. "What? What do you know?"
"I know King Argentum was a magical giant, gifted with a silver skeleton that worked like a reflective antenna. His every thought was broadcast outward, allowing his whims to become realities. This allowed his numerous normal-sized worshipers and citizens to become a wealthy, powerful civilization.
"But King Argentum was executed by an invader from space, and without his assistance, the civilization declined to near collapse. In an attempt to save themselves from extinction, the smartest of their scientists dug up their dead god's silver skull and fashioned a machine powered by the giant bone's latent reflective magic.
"A time machine. Big enough for a single passenger in the cranium cavity. Who would travel to the past and warn King Argentum before he was killed."
"How can you know all this?" demanded Gavrilo. "It took Pete and me space-years to piece together the entire space-legend! And more space-years after that to find real proof!"
"I was that invader from space. I killed King Argentum."
Gavrilo let go of the super wizard's golden collar in speechless shock, taking unsteady steps backwards. He had heard what fearful species call this man, but until this very moment, when he looked into cold unforgiving eyes flatly admitting to space-deicide, he never truly believed it himself.
There was a uncoiling anxiety in the pit of his stomach.
But more so, there was a straggling hopeful need.
"Take me there," the hermit wizard said.
"What?"
"The hidden home planet... the final resting place of King Argentum... the secret location of the silver skull machine! You've been there before! Take me there!" demanded Gavrilo, getting more animated by the moment. "With our science sorcerous powers, we can still reach it before Pete can use it! Take me there and I'll tell you everything you want to know about the cosmic tournament!
"Every Super Wizard From Space knows the name of every other Super Wizard From Space. You know and I know that you are as powerless against me as I am to you. You can't force me to talk.
"Take me there, or you'll learn nothing from me!"
The super wizard seemed grim, but after a long thoughtful moment agreed with a single silent nod. A pale light cocoon wrapped around him, a star-light shield to protect him from the rigours of space travel, and he rose into the alien sky with growing speed.
Gavrilo's heart leapt and, with a grin, he wrapped himself in a similar light cocoon and jumped into the air, following.
The two Super Wizards From Space cleared the atmosphere and drifted purposely into outer space. Once they had cleared the gravitational well of the planet, Gavrilo watched his companion bring his hands in front of him and grasp at the nothingness in front of them. Then, with a green flashing burst, he tore open outer space, revealing behind it a swirling green warp tunnel that reverberated with unnatural pain. A gesture to follow was given, and they both plunged into the tunnel.
From a hidden orbit on the exact opposite side of the planet, a spy peered over the horizon and observed it's target depart. Moving deeper into the relative safety of the world's umbra, the operative began a complicated eight-figure dance, transmitting to it's fellow drones that their prey was on the way.