How does one become a great actor?
Memorise lines? Make fake expressions? Pretend to be something you are not?
No. The answer is none of the above.
Good actors pretend to be characters… great actors become them. Rokan stood trembling in the middle of the command deck with his body language clearly displaying fear and terror.
In this moment he was not a god stage cultivator nor was he the leader of one of the most powerful noble houses in the entire Earth Federation.
He was 'John'.
A mysterious fugitive who had disguised himself and was now being brought before an inquisitor. The Federines version of government attack dogs, brutal aliens who would hesitate to kill men, women, or children if their higher up commanded them to.
It would take little effort for the alien on the other side of the screen to simply speak a few words and order their starship to be destroyed in a barrage of plasma fire.
Killing everyone onboard.
Well except for himself of course.
"I… I am not the human… but… there… there are circumstances behind my disguise… please… I beg…" Rokan stuttered nervously as he took a few steps backwards.
His back was already closed to a nearby wall, so his head slammed hard against its metalloid surface.
The device that he had attached to the center of his chest began to throb ominously. He could feel a faint tingling sensation running across his body with the source being the small disc shaped structure.
"John… I'm sorry but…" Captain Mordred's voice trailed off as he gestured using his right paw.
Three of the crew members in the room stood up and pointed plasma rifles directly at John. Their fingers were mere inches away from the trigger.
"You have to. It is the only way that any of us are going to survive," Captain Mordred explained sorrowfully as it pained him to make such a decision.
But the needs of the many would always outweigh the needs of the few.
"Tick… tick… I'm getting very impatient," the Inquisitor jeered mockingly as he leaned forward in his chair and waited to see what would happen next.
This was all an amusing game to him.
Rokan could see the twisted glint sparkling in his eyes and had to fight down the urge to teleport over to that starship and wipe that damn smirk right off the Inquisitor's face.
'John' stood silently for a moment, and no one knew what he was thinking.
Finally with clear reluctance in his movements, he slowly removed the heavy cloak that he wore.
The body that lay beneath his thick robes was… strange.
He had a humanoid physique, but his skin was a bright cerulean blue colour adorned with markings and intricate patterns that resembled tattoos.
Small wriggling tendrils of silvery grey veins spread across the top half of his body and his lower half was completely naked revealing a smooth patch of hairless skin with no visible genitalia.
'John' removed the mask covering his face to reveal an oval shaped structure with perfect contours, sharp angles, and a pair of button noses.
He had three eyes each with pinkish- red pupils and white irises. His mouth which was unnaturally small could be seen on the left side of his cheek.
"I told you… I'm not the missing… human," 'John' whispered fearfully as he hurriedly grabbed his clothes and tried to put them back on immediately.
"Hold on just a moment," the Inquisitor raised up his right hand and 'John' stopped with one of his legs already inside the heavy cloak.
"What is a Voltrak doing so far from his home world?"
'John' nervously looked down at the floor and took several deep breaths as if he was collecting his emotions before speaking.
Truthfully now Rokan was in a bit of a pickle.
Voltrak? What in god's name was a Voltrak?
Fuck… he knew he should not have used a hard light projector device that he had stolen from a shady crime boss during his first week in the Federines.
He could have just used a standard issue device from the Imperial Army to mimic a normal species like a Mendolesa or something else with a similar build to humans but no…
He had to get cocky.
"I… I was banished…" Rokan lowered his head and muttered with his voice no higher than a whisper.
Judging from the Inquisitor's tone of voice he was curious about why a Voltrak was away from their home planet which indicated that the alien race that he had disguised himself as did not do a whole lot of travelling.
If he was associating himself with smugglers and was hiding his identity, then there was only one possible explanation.
Criminal or exile.
"Banishment? Yes, I have heard of the rather… barbaric practices of your people," the Inquisitor leaned back in his chair and pulled up a holographic projection.
On the screen all the information about the Voltrak race stored in the central database appeared in the form of a long essay. The Inquisitor used the tip of his finger to quickly scroll through the screen and scan the information.
His enhanced memory and processing capabilities allowed him to perfectly absorb all the knowledge that was available on the files.
"Hmm… yes… that makes… sense…" the Inquisitor sighed in frustration as he closed the window and raised up his fingers to his temples to massage them.
Another dead end.
After weeks of searching, he would once again be sending a message back to the central hive about his failure to locate the wanted criminal.
The entire Federines government was turned upside down by one human.
The Inquisitor scowled angrily as he vented his frustrations by slamming a closed fist against the side of his chair. The metal immediately dented, and a harsh noise echoed through the room.
"A pity… but so be it…" the Inquisitor growled darkly as he waved his hand in a dismissive motion.
'John' quickly put on his discarded clothes and soon his appearance returned to the same as before with a heavy cloak and a mask concealing all of his features.
"Thank goodness you weren't the human…" Captain Mordred let out a sigh of relief and whispered under his breath. His voice was so soft that only Rokan could hear him thanks to his enhanced senses.
The small furry alien nodded his head and the three crew members who had their plasma rifles pointed directly at 'John' stood down and returned to their chairs.
"Mr. Inquisitor… there is no one else onboard our starship who matches the description of the missing human, but I promise that we will be on the look out for any signs!" Captain Mordred spoke up with a sense of forced patriotism in his voice.
"We are always ready to do our duty for the good of our glorious government!"
"I'm afraid that won't be necessary," the Inquisitor tiredly groaned but there was the faint hint of a smile dancing along the edges of his lips as he playfully revealed what he had in store for the smuggler and the rest of his crew.
"Per Federines protocol… individuals engaging in criminal activities may be directly eradicated without trial if they are deemed to be a national security risk."
"What? But we…" Captain Mordred's voice trailed off as he finally realised that the Inquisitor had never planned to let them go.
"Ahh… that's the look I was waiting for," the Inquisitor's smile grew wider as he turned to his subordinate on the far-left side of the command room.
"By the authority invested in me by the Hive… I declare your vessel to be a threat to the continued safety of Federines citizens and the national interests of the government."
"Goodbye."
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