Recording of Malody Ginnis remembering the Kraik Massacre at Eldritch; Logged with the Mothership Council - December 16 10 Y.L. 

Date of the events spoken of in the recording: Sept 12, 9 Y.L.  

In the early weeks of Autumn they came.  

The weather was still warm in the daytime, but when the sun went down, we needed a fire to stay warm.  

That day, the heads of the grasses in the Esle Plains were starting to turn brown.  

A few of us were clearing some of the grass to make space for more shelters.  We decided to wait until we had the area clear to set up barriers.    

First, the great birds circled overhead, curious.

We logged their presence, but they did not seem aggressive. Almost shy.

A couple of them flew low, alighted.  

Then stepped closer, stretching their long necks closer towards us.  As they they were trying to understand our scent.  

We thought them harmless.  

They didn’t approach and we hadn’t seen them attack us or anything else in the Plains.  

The only strange thing in hindsight was the silence that fell when their raw, hoarse cries echoed over the Plains.  

Even crickets stopped chirping.  

In the middle of summer, we heard no birdsong.

Our small little outpost had not yet even put up enough barrier posts to close the gaps where they hopped and step through freely.  

Everyone began to ignore them and the work to build up the outpost went on with their watching presence.  

Until Larel’s scream cut across the conversations and the sound of hammers against wood in the background.  

She came running towards us.  

We didn’t understand what we were seeing.  

Blood on her shirt.Her arm missing and blood streaming from her forehead.

Pain and fear etched on her face Her stumbling, half slumping run toward us.  

The Kraik swooped in and grabbed her by the neck.

Her blood rained down on the ground before us.  

Reynolds grabbed his laser rifle and began shooting.  Around the camp we heard other screams and then chaos. Wen shouted at the folks around her and they began posting barriers in front of us.  

The Kraik came at us from all sides.  

We had to post barriers that would connect the force fields while they were picking us off.  

One by one.

I picked up a laser rifle and took a few of them down.  But they were fast.  

Faster than they looked, with their large ungainly bodies and bloody talons.

By the time the force fields were all in place, they had eaten about 10 of us.  

When we counted the bodies of their fallen, we had only taken 3.  

We called them Red Kraiks because of their blood red beaks.  Their feathers and legs were a sooty black.  At night they are virtually invisible unless you have heat visors on.  

They usually hunt alone, unless they have younglings with them.

But when the prey is plentiful - or there are a bunch of idiots not taking the proper precautions recommended by the Mothership - they have been known to hunt in packs.  

I never forgave Wen for that day.  If she hadn’t laughed at the analysis given by the Mothership and goaded us into leaving Cathay, Larel and the 9 others that died would still be alive today.  

We were so convinced that we were going to dominate this place like we had dominated Earth.  

The Founders Sect and the Mothership factions were scaredy cats, Wen said.  

After we secured the outpost and the Kraiks had gone for several weeks, I left the outpost along with at least 5 others to head back to Cathay.  

When we arrived, we realized a few weeks later that we brought death with us in the form of the Esle Plague.  Me and Bel were the only to survive from the trip.  

I didn’t volunteer for another outpost expedition until Vieta.  And only when they agreed to let someone else lead it responsibly.  

Wen Bechard nearly got us all killed, but you could never say that in front of the other AGP members.