AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION

I never wanted to be no hero. But after growing up in the life and getting everything I could out of it, I came to realize that being an enforcer in the Darkspur Cartel just wasn't for me. So I decided one day to pack it in. Second dumbest decision I ever made, right after joining up in the first place.

The fact that I'm alive to write this proves I made the right decision, I think. Maybe if a few other like-minded Krogg follow my example, we might just help turn the rep of our whole species around.

I'd been part of the Cartel almost as long as I can remember. When I was just a Kroggling I remember seeing the big, black spaceships with the tinted windows landing and taking off from the private spaceport outside the run-down industrial town where I lived, and dreamed of something better. I knew even then that if I could just talk to the right people, do the right favors, maybe even hurt or kill the right lunkheads, I could get their attention.

But in the end, it was almost an accident that earned me my stripes with Darkspur. I was working for a construction crew, real legitimate work, and eating my midday meal down to the spaceport every day. Even grown up, I couldn't let go of that dream. I was heading down to watch the ships one afternoon when I ran headlong into an old Krogg who was out of breath, scared as hell, and leading a pack of a half-dozen Darkspur enforcers on a wild chase.

Colliding with me was the last mistake that old Krogg ever made, I'm sad to say. I wasn't stupid. I knew this was my chance to impress the Cartel, and I took it. I grabbed that old Krogg by the scruff of his collar and without even asking what he was running from, drove my fist into his face. I knocked out three teeth with the first punch, and the rest with the next few blows. By the time the enforcers caught up with him, I was kicking him in the gut and he was coughing blood onto the ground, begging for mercy the whole time.

I think about that old Krogg a lot these days. The way he ran scared. The way he went down like a sack of bricks under my fists. The sound of breaking ribs when my boots drove into his side. The spatter of blood when the enforcers took over and finished him off with a plasma blast to the back of the head. Yeah, I think of that old Krogg, and I ain't proud.

This book ain't about teaching you how to join the Cartel, or how to be a thug. It's just the story of one Krogg who rose through the ranks and then got out. So don't read too much into it. And whatever you're thinking, kids... don't try this at home.

- "Smiley" Yulgogg

[Readers who keep up on the galactic news services may recall that the pseudonymous author of "Darkspurned" was found floating in the Halon Ring a few weeks after the book's publication. The corpse was not wearing a space suit. Still, the tome is a damned popular read among the Cartel's finest.]