

OTHER WORLDS THAN THESE

GABE SLUIS

Copyright 2013 by Gabe Sluis

Smashwords edition

Published by Gabe Sluis at Smashwords

Third Edition

Copyright Gabe Sluis 2013

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locations or persons, living or dead or undead, is entirely coincidental.

Thank you for downloading this free ebook. Although this is a free book, it remains the copyrighted property of the author, and may not be reproduced, copied and distributed for commercial or non-commercial purposes. If you enjoyed this book, please encourage your friends to download their own copy at Smashwords.com, where they can also discover other works by this author. Thank you for your support.

Table of Contents

Part I

Part II

Part III

Part IV

Part V

Legend Of The Dark Star

Part VI

Part VII
Part I

It was a dream that awoke Aros on his final day on Tellus. He sat up in the early morning darkness of his nearly empty unit. For the past year, Aros had been assigned to a Headquarters position. Instead of living in officer's quarters near the United Tellus Space Service Command Headquarters, he had a small flat a short rail ride away.

His alarm buzzed softly as he finished dressing in a new uniform. With an assault pack on his back and a tough case in his arms, Aros stepped out of his single unit. He paused briefly to look at the name on the outside of his door. It read, "LT. Aros Drogen."

The rain continued to fall when he reached the street. Aros took a moment to look around and breath in the sweet air. The morning was progressing, but the thick clouds and moist humidity kept out the bright light.

At the rail station, the other passengers immediately noticed the tall, dark haired young man in the dark blue of a Space Service uniform. He was out of place among the everyday man, who caught the early trains into central Camlon for jobs that didn't pay enough to afford personal cars.

Aros sat at an inward facing seat. His pack rested between his legs and tough box on his lap. He closed his eyes and reviewed his new orders in his mind. The message had been delivered to his scroll the Friday before: Report to Headquarters Monday morning for reassignment Off-World.

Most orders like this meant assignment to a picket ship or some sort of station defense. But Aros knew what he would really be doing. After all, working as staff at the Headquarters of UTSS had its advantages. He had made sure to be noticed by the right people and all the right doors were opened. He would be taking temporary command of a new ship.

This particular ship was smaller than the standard destroyers or picket ships. It was small and fast, but most of all, brand new. Two identical gunships had recently been completed, built with the specific design to augment the Prime Meridian, the Services only great ship. Custom designed from the beginning of construction to provide a seamless fit, the two gunships were finally ready to enter service. The primary purpose of the two gunships was to offer a detachability option for combat missions. Secondly, they were to lend their powerful engines, augmenting the maximum speed that the Prime Meridian could achieve. Now, the final phase of Tellus's first and only great warship was soon to be complete with the unification of Aurora and Ushas. The former of which, Aros would be commanding on its way from Tellus to the link up with her mother ship.

The final stop on the line brought Aros to Space Service headquarters. He walked across the platform to the security entrance, handing off his tough box. He followed an escort to an internal tram, which would take Service personnel to the spaceport. Taking a seat in the nearly empty tram, Aros pulled out his scroll, a personal data device, and opened up the Space Service news. Ignoring articles on promotions, a speech by the Grand Marshal, and a fluffy piece on life aboard a picket ship, Aros stopped to scan the news of the Prime Meridian _'_ s return from her first extended mission. She was due to resupply at Palus Somni, the instillation located on Sulva, in the near future.

The only other person on the car interrupted Aros's reading.

"So you're taking the other one up, huh?"

Aros turned around to see a man wearing a uniform of similar rank and color. The other officer was tall and fit looking, as most military men were. He had a shaved head and a light complexion.

"I am."

"Ever been Off-World?"

"Yes, I spent some time on the North Station. You?"

"Third time. But I've never been to Sulva. I used to look up at it as a kid and imagine what it would be like watching Tellus rise, rather than the other way around." A pause, and he extended his hand.

"I'm Lieutenant Max Veldt."

"Aros Drogen."

"Aros?" Veldt said, taking his hand. "What kind of name is that?"

"An old one."

***

The tram slowed and came to a stop. The doors slid open, announcing the arrival to the hanger entrance. LT Veldt gave Aros a head nod as he exited to start his work. The tram moved again and this time Aros reached his stop. The hangers shape was a large circle with four domes, one over each quarter. The Aurora was sitting in a different quarter of the hanger than the Ushas, which required different stops for the two officers.

After walking through another security checkpoint, Aros got his first view of the new gunship. Aros's eyes were drawn to the smooth curves and flawless light gray color. The Aurora was without viewports and the only breaks in the exterior were for thruster and sensor. As Aros began to circle the ship, a Chief met him at the stern.

"Good morning, Sir. I see you have started your walk around already."

"I have, Chief." Aros said. "But, if this a gunship, where are all the weapons?"

"That's a good question, Sir. I'll let your specialist explain." The Chief then spoke into a hand-held, "Cress, come out back to the main engines."

A few moments later a blond man, a few years younger than Aros, came back and walked up to the Chief and Aros.

"L.T., I'd like you to meet Tech Specialist Crescent."

"Nice to meet you, Sir."

"Same. So, you know everything about this ship?" Aros asked.

"Yes, Sir. I've been assigned to her since she was just a frame. They figured if there was one guy who knew everything, from the very beginning, about this ship, it would, uh, be a good thing. And that guy is me." Crescent stood with his hands behind his back, shoulders naturally in a half shrug position, never looking relaxed.

Aros smiled. "Lucky you. So, I was asking the Chief here about weapons."

The Chief excused himself and Aros got an informal introduction to his ship.

"Both of the S-28's have twenty-six launch tubes. Ten on each main stabilizer, four on the nose area and two are rear facing. Twenty-two of these are the standard eighty-millimeter, type one, and the other four are the big type two missiles. When armed and ready for use, the armored skin of the hull retracts, exposing the tubes."

Crescent pointed to the outline of one of the retractable areas, and continued. "But when not needed, the skin covers them, making it look like there is nothing there. This serves two purposes, keeps the ship looking sweet and innocent until it's needed. The other is that when it's attached to the Prime, it will be smooth so that nothing gets caught up when docking."

"And the engines?"

"We have the most modern Ion engines available on the Aurora. These two are air-rebreathing engines for atmospheric propulsion." Cress moved around the ship and pointed up to the low profile cones of the engines. "Two smaller electrostatic Ion engines are here. Our main is the size of one of the Prime Meridians four. So with the addition of Ushas and Aurora, the Prime will have six big Ions."

"Very nice." Aros continued to walk around the ship. "You're pretty young to be a Tech," he observed.

"I was actually just promoted. I guess after two years with one of the most advanced ships on Tellus, they figured they aught to make me more than just a standard Specialist."

"I agree," Aros said, and switched gears. "We have a briefing in twenty minuets with everyone going up?"

"We do, Sir."

"Good. I'm ready to get out of here."

***

"Ladies and gentlemen, I am Major Connors. We will now begin your mission briefing."

A group of people moved over to where the Major stood at the nose of the ship. There was fifteen in all: a majority from the Space Service, two Ground Service, and a man and woman dressed in civilian uniforms. The air hummed with the general feeling of nervousness and excitement.

"If your name is on my manifest, you will be taking the ride up to Sulva this afternoon," the major said, brandishing his scroll. "Lieutenant Drogen, you will be commanding this raft. Your pilot is Warrant Officer Lete. Any problems with this bucket, blame Tech. Crescent.

"Master Spec. Lee, you have seven others you're babysitting, correct?" Acknowledging his nod, the Major continued. "Good, keep an eye on them. Don't let anyone float away."

Pointing to the two youngsters in olive uniforms, the Major continued. "Sergeant Brack and Corporal Korinay, I hope you groundies don't get take-off sick. Mr. White and Ms. Cross, please don't judge the Services based on this group."

Finishing his riff, the major held out his scroll and assertively read his official brief.

"Mission Overview: Aurora is second in the order of march up to Sulva. Directly after this brief, you will suit up and buckle in. We will be using the electromagnetic catapult to launch you into the air. At that time you will graduate into a parking orbit and slingshot into a burn towards Sulva. Not until you reach the Karman line are you permitted to engage the main Ion engine. You will then take the eight-hour journey to the Palus Somni installation. Personnel with orders for reassignment will directly report to the replacement office for in processing. As for the rest of you, the Prime Meridian will be reaching station in 65 hours. That means a brief layover. So, have a nice little break, check out an arena fight, don't drink too much and enjoy that little bit of gravity while you got it. That's it for me. Unless you have anything for them L.T., get suited up."

Aros agreed, "You heard the Major, lets get suited up."

***

A shutter went through the ship as the catapult clicked into place. Radio chatter sounded throughout the flight deck and blue lights illuminated the soon to be unnecessary walkways. Lights from monitors and displays cast illumination throughout the sterile white interior of the ship as Aros began the final pre-launch check.

"Lower deck passenger compartment?"

"We are all secure down here," a technical specialist confirmed over the internal comms.

"Navigation?"

"My status is green," confirmed the specialist to Aros's right.

"Ships' status?"

"Ship is overall green," Tech. Specialist Crescent said.

"Pilot?"

"Lieutenant Drogen, the pilot is ready for launch. Alpha engines are warmed and standing by to fire," The Warrant Officer replied coolly.

"Alright, lets get out of here." Aros keyed the transmit button, "One-Panther-Seven-One, this is Aurora. We are status green and ready to launch."

"Aurora, we acknowledge your green status. Stand by to launch in 3... 2... 1. Launch."

***

People in the tall buildings of Camlon looked to the south for the second time that day. The distinct noise and slight ground vibrations informed them of the launch. The electromagnetic catapult shot a shining object out into the sky, away from Tellus, up into a resolving pepper of silver stars. Before the momentum from the launch slowed the ship, the atmospheric engines roared to life, continuing Aurora _'_ s gradual rise. The angle of accent became sharper as the sky above the ship gradually changed from light to dark blue.

"We have achieved parked orbit," the specialist on navigation reported.

"Time until we break free and make the run to the Karman line?" Aros asked.

"Twenty-six minuets to the checkpoint."

"Alright. Feel free to use this time to stretch, get acquainted to the lack of gravity, or whatever you want. I need everyone back at their stations five minuets prior to the next checkpoint," Aros said over the intercom.

Everyone on the flight deck unbuckled and floated out of their seats. Warrant Officer Lete began to stretch and the navigation specialist moved to the rear, going below to see the rest of her group. Aros also began stretching and moving around to get the blood flowing to his limbs.

"So what do you do L.T.? Do you have a specialty, or just command?" Crescent asked.

"I'm a weapons and security officer. I have been to a bunch of ground combat schools and spent some time on the North Station. I just finished up my admin time at Headquarters. My next assignment is as a weapons officer aboard the Prime. What about you?" Aros said.

"Been in six years and a mechanic the whole time. Always stationed on the ground. This is my first time up," Crescent said.

"Ever wanted to do anything else, Crescent?"

"You can call me Cress, Sir. 'Crescent' sounds so formal. And, yeah. I always wanted to be a space pilot. They make a ton of money on the outside. But, this was the only job I could qualify for. I wasn't too bright when I was younger. I have gotten a lot better at math and other things in the time I've been serving. I might try to take the tests to become a Warrant after this deployment. If they'll let me go."

"If you want something, do it. We are all in complete control of where we are and what we do in life. We may fool ourselves that we are just along for the ride; it's the easy thing. But each of us is in charge of our own path," Aros said.

"That's good advice, Sir. I'll have to remember that."

"Lete," Aros said, breaking his current conversation. "Show Tech. Specialist Crescent here how your station works. Brief him on the next stage, I want him to take us into the burn past the line. Once we are up to speed, you can take back over your station."

"No problem, Sir. Always nice to take a break," Lete said.

Crescent looked surprised. "Really? Thank you, Sir!"

***

Above the blue gem known as Tellus, the grey speck that was Aurora hung still on the cusp of space. The ship was in fact moving quite quickly along with the rotation of the planet. When it reached its target position, the ship flared secondary engines, built momentum and broke free from orbit. The Aurora streaked over the line separating Tellus from true space.

From behind the planet, the white orb of Sulva came into view. The Aurora was now far enough away from the atmosphere to fire its main ion engine and begin its long run across the open void. In the early days of space travel, it had taken days to reach Tellus's closest neighbor. With the technological advances and creation of much more powerful engines the trip could now be made much more quickly. Void suits were also worn, protect from the internal injuries that were commonly suffered due to the extreme acceleration of the catapult and burn maneuver.

The mission to bring the ships to the Sulva base was going according to plan. Both ships interfaced with one another seamlessly, running along the same trajectory, the Ushas 4,700 passus in the lead. The ships remained in non-verbal communications, sharing area scan reports every 15 minuets. For nearly seven hours, the crew of the Aurora was free to relax, move about and chat, while at all times listening for alert chimes as they made their way towards their destination. Most everyone down on the passenger deck made their way onto the flight deck. The civilian pair regarded this trip as a real novelty and made a point to observe each station and ask questions about everything.

Aros remained in his command/weapons station in the center of the flight deck, with his eyes closed in appearance of sleep. Most of the crew noticed this left him out of the excited chatter and small talk. Crescent also noticed and thought it very cool of the L.T. to take this unusual and important mission, which he himself would brag furiously about for the rest of his career, like it was just another fishing trip.

Ushas reported deceleration upon reaching Sulvan space and performed a successful direct decent to the Franz landing pad on the north west of the base.

The Space Service base on Sulva was placed at Palus Somni for strategic reasons. Soon after, Sulva became a popular tourist attraction; the families of those stationed at the instillation pressured the Service into building a community for their dependents. Picking up on the idea of easing the hardship of Service personnel by creating a more traditional environment, a city was constructed by a joint effort of several private enterprises. Palus Somni quickly became the largest and primary settlement on Sulva.

The Aurora was cleared for Lyell pad and began its own direct decent. Warrant Officer Lete earned his pay by bringing the ship smoothly down to the pad and locking into the ground docking port. The crew ran final checks, shut down necessary systems and unbuckled to depart the ship. The change back to gravity was initially disorienting after the brief experience of weightlessness. While on any long-term mission in weightless conditions, a required hour of every cycle was to be spent in Submerged Resistance Training. Sulva was no exception, despite the seventeen percent gravity on the surface. The newly arrived personnel grumbled upon finding out this fact in the welcome briefing.

"I hate the SRT. Why do we have to do forty-five minuets when we feel seventeen percent. Its thirty eight percent gravity on Malacandra and they only have to do twenty five minuets. Those numbers don't add up," one specialist complained to another.

Transient quarters were given to the crew who were not arriving for stationing. A map of the indoor city and the three main access points to the base were highlighted. A presentation on installation rules and city laws was presented. Aros designated three check-in times to span the two days before the Prime Meridian arrived on station.

"As you heard, all five of us will have to do two SRT sessions while we are here," Aros said to the people under his command. "We will all go report to SRT after the first and third check-ins. I should get a solid conformation when we will be taking off to go up to the Prime by that third check-in. Try not to get into too much trouble while we are here. But, do enjoy yourself before we spend some horrific amount of time on that ship. It will not have the luxuries they have here. If you need me, try my quarters before you send out a flash message."

The briefing broke up and everyone moved off to their temporary quarters for sleep after their long trip off the planet from which they were born. Not many generations before, the thought of going off to bed up on Sulva was beyond a dream. Now, it was no longer in the headlines when a child was born off-world. The humans of the planet Tellus had taken their first bold steps out into a sea of stars.

***

"Good morning, Sir. Please scan in," the attendant said. "I see this is your first session with us, Lieutenant Drogen. And, you have a group scheduled in a couple hours."

"Yes, I wanted to do my time before my people. Then, I can make sure they all do theirs. Is there space available?" Aros asked.

"Sure, when was the last time you used a SRT?"

"Over a year ago. The North Station is pretty old and had limited activities," Aros said.

"Well, here on Palus, we provide for the Services and residents, so we have a very large catalog to choose from. Feel free to go through the list and find the activity that interests you."

After scanning the long list for a few seconds, Aros said, "I'll do 'Tree Climb'."

"Very good, Sir. That's one of my favorites. You can put on your suit in room twenty three and report to the corresponding tank."

Putting on the skin suit took five minuets. Aros then left the dressing room and entered the tank room. Immediately the sterile smell came back to him. Though no one here would understand, the odor of the SRT viscous reminded him of the smell of vinyl. Aros climbed the ladder to the platform of the tank where he grabbed his headgear from a hook, which consisted of a full-face mask so that he could breath and see what was going on in his workout activity. Following commands, Aros grabbed a hold of the dipping bar, which pushed him down into the clear gel. The 'sludge,' as users of the SRT affectionately referred to the viscous, was warm upon entering. The dipping bar retracted and the gel began to thicken as the temperature dropped. Polarizing, to create upward resistance, gravity was simulated uniquely for each program.

Aros's view from inside his mask consisted of blurry images with the shadows of small bubbles trapped in solution. The view out of the mask began to darken as the program began. He was suspended upright, legs and feet extended straight down. Aros closed his eyes and took a deep breath of the dry air. When he opened them, Aros found himself in a grassy meadow with a morning light filtering through the tall trees he was to climb. Almost like home, he thought.

Submerged Resistance Training was like no other type of workout. Every movement made during the forty-five minuet training time faced a resistance from the thick viscous. The programs were designed to give the exercisers mental stimulation as their bodies got the stress they needed to counteract the reduced gravity. Aros climbed the branches of the never-ending tree, getting a better view of the 'landscape' the higher he went. Looking into the tanks in the large room, dozens of bodies deep in the sludge, connected to the surface by a hose off the back of the headgear, moved around in odd movements interacting with their simulated environments.

A timer announcing the coming end of Aros's time in the SRT counted down to zero. Aros once again found himself in the blur as the dipping bar met him for the short ride to the surface. The temperature increased and the viscous slid off the outside of the suit to the grated walkway that Aros was deposited on. Seven minuets later, Aros was back in uniform and setting off to the check-in he arranged with his people.

***

Later that evening, Aros walked into The Halftrack, one of Palus Somni's three bars. Filled with all types of Service personnel and civilians, the room was alive, but not over crowded. Lieutenant Veldt saw his fellow gunship commander and motioned him over.

"How you doing Drogen?"

"I'm doing good, Max," Aros said, impressing Veldt by remembering his first name. "You?"

"Having trouble sleeping in this gravity. But its worth it, I watched Tellus rise this morning!" Veldt said loudly over the dull roar of the bar crowd.

"Yeah. I'm glad everything has gone so well so far. No problems at all."

"You spoke too soon, buddy. You better go put your boy to bed before he gets himself into trouble," Veldt said, pointing across the room to the end of the bar.

Across the room, a conversation was growing more animated and gaining the attention of everyone in earshot.

"Yeah, yeah, whatever. I still say its fake. Look at the stupid stuff you guys wear to your fights," Crescent said. He was standing in front of a table that was occupied by two civilians, one of which was huge.

"We appreciate all our fans. Why don't you take your buddies and go drink over at the bar," said the arena fighter standing to the big guys left.

"I think what you guys do is neat, but you would never stand a chance against some of the league fighters from Northern Columbia," Crescent said, not realizing he spilled a small bit of his drink as he spoke.

The two other guys standing behind Crescent, also wearing dark blue, were quite enjoying this tell-off. The two at the table were not.

"Listen, space kid, get bent or we will show you how terrible Sulvan fighters really are."

"You show-offs would never stand a chance against soldiers in the Space Service. We are trained to take down Scalies. What have you ever done that was hard? Work out all day?" Crescent scoffed.

That was when the table flipped. In the low gravity, it caused a storm. Liquids flew and the table rotated several times as it continued it upwards movement, banging off the ceiling. Reflexes of the soldiers were slowed by the courage that had gotten them this far. the blue uniforms were stunned by the flurry. The big fighter stepped forward and grabbed Crescent by the neck.

"Alright, Scalie-Slayer," Anak said, lifting Cress off the ground. "Sort me out, then! No? Not a single man on this rock could make me submit, and especially not any little boy in your precious Service."

The giant tossed Crescent back towards where he picked him up. Anak turned to walk back to his seat when he suddenly changed his mind. He pointed a meaty finger at Crescent, who sat on the ground nursing his neck.

"In fact, I'm sick of you punks coming up here like you own this city, thinking you're invincible. You will be at the arena in six hours and we will set the record straight. Be there, or I will find you and force your submission, without a referee," Anak demanded.

This time, as Anak turned to leave with his companion in tow, he was stopped by the challenge of an unfamiliar voice.

"Not a single man in the Service could make you submit?"

In the silence that followed, Anak faced this new defiance with a look of tired annoyance on his face.

"I am in charge of this drunken idiot, and I will fight you in his place," Aros said, standing in the clearing created by the recent havoc.

"Fine, see you in six," Anak shot back, exiting The Halftrack.

***

"They're not going to take this seriously!" Martinez protested. A group of blue uniforms stood at the side of the arena. Across the ported glass they could see Anak warming up for the quick fight he expected. "Where is your L.T., Cress?"

Just then, Aros walked down into the arena floor. He began to take off his uniform top as the white faced Crescent protested.

"I'm sorry I got you into this, Sir. You don't have to do this for me."

"I can't report to my new assignment with a broken man, that I was responsible for," Aros said with a slight hint of humor. "Who are these two other chuckle-heads anyway?"

"Martinez and Doyle. We went to Training together. I saw them up here and we got a bit out of control, I guess."

"I guess. So, what am I dealing with?" Aros asked taking off his boots and rolling up his pants into cuffs.

"Almost half the city is here. We saw a Major, but no one higher in rank than that so far," Doyle reported. "In case you don't know, Anak is the champ up here. They kicked him out of the Brazilian league for repeated excessive brutality." There was worry in the specialists' voice. "And they don't call him a giant for no reason. He has got to be five inches and a hundred pounds bigger than you, Sir."

"It will be fine," Aros said, pulling his uniform top off. Wearing only his tank-top undershirt and rolled up pants, he left the worried Specialists outside the battle floor.

Aros stepped inside the cylindrical chamber and the door shut behind him. Across the opposite side of the floor, he could see Anak through the clear wall making his way to his entrance. The giant entered and stood across the fifty foot distance from Aros, tattoos adorning his hands from wrist down, and no where else. Bare-chested, Anak's equatorial brown skin looked menacing compared to the smaller and less bulky Aros Drogen who stood to face him. The crowd that gathered began to cheer as they anticipated a brutal one-sided fight.

The judge of the fight took his place in the overlook, located high up on the wall of the battle floor. Five minuets were put on the clock.

Around the circle of the battle floor, Aros stood on the north, Anak the south, the judge above the west and the clock above the east. A loud buzzer sounded its two short, one long, to signal the start of the fight.

***

Anak immediately exploded towards his prey, in order to close the distance. Getting inside his enemies striking range was Anak's usual tactic, being proficient at submissions. He lacked all concern for this fight, as he imagined it coming to a rapid and pathetic conclusion.

The crowd started in with it's beginning of match cheering, all present thinking that the young lieutenant had become frozen with fear. Anak moved through and past the middle of the floor. But, the collective thought evaporated when Aros leapt up into a slow rotating backflip, planting both feet on the arena wall, springing out, and sailing over the top of the incoming missile that was 'The Giant'.

Anak caught the movement and skidded around, facing the opposite direction. The large man rose out of his crouched position and began a series of spin kicks, moving towards the just landed Aros.

At this quick turn and flurry from his opponent, Aros lowered himself and shifted to the left, striking even more quickly at the back of Anak's outstretched leg. Anak's leg came down with no reaction from the strike and planted firmly on the mat.

Anak grabbed for Aros, who was positioned in front of him after the leg strike. Holding his opponent by an arm and torso, Anak began to bring Aros upwards for a spectacular throwing move, which he was known for.

Instead, Aros slipped both his arms free and grabbed Anak's head, pulling it close, delivering an effective knee strike.

Momentarily stunned by the blow, Anak relaxed his grip and Aros, allowing his prey to kick out with both feet into his midsection.

Aros shot away from the immediate danger, landing onto all fours in a defensive position.

Fifteen seconds had dropped away from the clock. The crowd cheered loudly, relishing the quick action early in the fight. But mostly, the crowd was amazed by Aros's nimble performance and current avoidance of a sure pummeling.

Back on the floor, Anak had taken a quick pause to assess what had happened.

Aros pushed with his arms and came back to his feet, moving backwards and holding his ground in the east end of the arena.

Anak made the decision to change tactics and moved in towards Aros, throwing a barrage of arm-strikes.

In sharp reaction, Aros moved away from each of the deliberate heavy-handed strikes just in time for each to miss by inches.

On the side, Crescent and the other Service personnel in Aros's corner winced with each blow.

"He is going to get his head ripped off!" someone said in dismay. From the angle of the upper deck looking into the floor, Aros appeared to narrowly avoiding the strikes.

"No, he's got this. He's just wearing him down!" Crescent said back confidently. "Look at the crazy way he is grinning!"

While the strikes were raining down around Aros, his feet were moving. Upon the first opportunity to relocate, Aros darted out of the cone of fire and delivered a roundhouse kick to the back of Anak's right leg. Using the momentum from the kick, Aros looped around behind the giant as he dropped to the struck leg. Aros wasted no time delivering a knife strike to the side of Anak's neck as he continued his movement. With Anak facing the wall where he previously stood, Aros side-flipped and launched himself off the wall in much the same way as his opening maneuver. As he shot forward, Aros delivered a punch to the other side of Anak's head. His flight pattern knocked askew by delivering the blow, Aros landed on his feet and was greeted by an incoming front kick from a recovered Anak.

Moving without thinking, Aros swung his left hand to strike the incoming leg, and used the power of that swinging punch to spin himself around. With a little leap and a right-handed back fist, Anak's jaw was dealt a solid hit.

Thirty seconds were now off the clock and the crowd was roaring as they watch the smaller man move like a cyclone around The Giant.

Anak, appearing unaffected by the strikes, used the opportunity to grab Aros and half spin toss the stinging whelp away.

In the substantially lower gravity, Aros sharply rotated his body, landing on his feet from the throw.

Anak pressed hard, coming down right on top of his slippery opponent, charging after the body he attempted to send flying.

This time, Aros was the one to change tactics.

Like a frog, Aros leapt away. Bouncing off the walls and floor, he continued to evade all of Anak's charging advances.

The crowd was thundering at the unexpected direction of this fight. Viewers commented to each other how they never guessed the young Space Service officer could last this long in a brawl against the exiled fighter.

At forty seven seconds after the clock began its countdown, the chase came to an end. A visibly tired Anak struck at his opponent who quickly was not there. It was apparent that Anak was fatiguing quickly, not usually having to fight this fast and furious at the same time. His specialty was closing the distance and swiftly ending the fight. But despite how close he got, he could not put the cocky lieutenant down! To make matters worse, this was not even a real fighter; this was some spoiled space adventurer. He was infuriated that this kid would not stand still and fight like...

And that's when it happened, instead of jumping away, the little black haired boy, jumped right at him. Anak found himself off balance, and overextended.

Aros came in headfirst and appeared to only be passing over Anak when he threw a vicious uppercut slammed into his jaw. Aros stopped mid flight and reversed course from the sudden impact.

Anak fell to the floor, motionless.

The fight was over.

Part II

Specialist Karcie sat at the main chair in the reception area to the office of the Commander of The Space Service. He was browsing over the schedule of Grand Marshal Midord for the fourth time that day. A young Major, who had already spoken with the specialist at his desk, sat in the outer office chairs, awaiting his time slot with the Grand Marshal.

Karcie had been the Grand Marshal's pilot for the past two years. In that time he had accompanied the Space Services' top ranking officer all over the Tellus defense grid. It was a tall honor for any driver, but here he was, in an office, behind a desk, three and a half years into his service; still just a specialist. He couldn't wait to get his recommendation letter from the old man and get back out to the line. Back to the line and start all over. He would have to re-prove himself as more than just chauffeur who had gone soft lounging groundside.

After his short spurt of mental venting tapered, Karcie picked up his scroll to read the pilots manual. If he couldn't get real experience, he would have to settle for the next best thing. Like superstitious magic, just two words in to his reading of atmospheric maneuvers in non-fixed wing craft, the intercom connecting him to the Grand Marshals office buzzed. A red light on the pilot's desk blinked in rapid succession. Karcie punched the button.

"Yes, sir?"

"Has Major Kanalet arrived?"

The major's head popped up from his own scroll. The two looked at each other as the major listened in. The Major was common looking. Young, thin, medium skin and a dark shadow of facial hair that meant he would probably have to shave twice a day to look professional.

"He is here, Sir."

"I'm ready for him."

The intercom switched off as the major rose and adjusted his uniform. "Any advice for me?" Major Ram Kanalet asked as he began his walk towards the hall leading to the big office.

Karcie chuckled before he responded. "Just don't say anything bad about his favorite team."

"The Chiefs?"

"That's the one, good luck, Sir."

***

"Have a seat, Major," the Grand Marshal of the Space Service said to his subordinate officer. "I've got quite a bit to do today. I assume you have begun your assignment? You have a key piece of this puzzle and your reports will be critical in the overall picture that this inquisition will paint."

Midord took a deep breath and turned slightly sideways in his high-backed chair. It was black leather and made the golden-red of his uniform trimming stand out sharply.

"To give you a better brief, a major incident occurred on the Prime Meridian _'_ s last mission and Lieutenant Drogen was right in the middle of it. Contact with the Scalies was made and there was a substantial engagement. The reports from Captain Bartlett are not clear about the exact chain of events, but the Prime Meridian escaped and the gunship Drogen delivered is gone, along with himself and two other service members. Your assignment is him. When the Prime Meridian returns, you will join the other inquisition officers that will be investigating the particulars of the entire event.

"Your goal is to gather a cohesive story centering on the actions of the Lieutenant and write a formal report to be included with the others. But more than just another investigating officer, you are my investigating officer. I want the inside scoop before the official report comes out. We need to get to the bottom of this. I want to know who will be held responsible. What happened out there may very well give us the key to defending ourselves against our aggressors."

Kanalet processed the information he was just presented with. He had heard rumors of a recent skirmish with the Scalies, the first and only alien race that humans had encountered. He had assumed the alleged contact was nothing more than an unexpected engagement on the far side of the rift. This full assignment to an inquisition team was illuminating to the nature of his previous partial assignment. Pulling unbiased officers from as far as Sulva to investigate the incident was even more peculiar.

But, it was the wording of the speech that worried him the most. The Grand Marshal wanted someone to blame for this mess. He wanted definitive answers and hard leads to develop this chaos into something he could use for the good of Tellus. And it would be his job to look in the right place for those answers, his task to throw fellow service members into the engine exhaust if they had a speck of negligence in their actions. Most of all, his method of execution in performing this task would be a huge mark on his career and his future as an officer in the Space Service.

"Your original orders were to collect a comprehensive past on Drogen. Have you completed that?"

"I have, sir," Major Kanalet said pulling his scroll from a pocket. "Would you like a brief on this now?"

"Absolutely. Tell me about this young lieutenant. Start from his very beginning."

"Well, sir, I pulled a copy of Drogen's file, as well as copies of his training documents, evaluations and schooling. This gave me a good history from age seventeen to present. I looked at information from his security clearance application and found that he was raised in an orphanage in the northwest of Northern Colombia. Lacking any hard background from a majority of his life, I had my shuttle from Palus Somni rerouted to a nearby Ground Service Base."

"Excellent Major!" Midord broke in with a bark. He sat forward and pointed across his desk to the major who sat perfectly upright in his chair, "This is what we need in this inquisition, thoroughness! You got a real history from where he grew up..." Midord mused to himself. "To be frank, I have all my money on Drogen. This guy interests me. I looked briefly over his files, but I want the whole story. Start to finish, spare no relevant detail, I want to know what you know."

"Alright, Sir. Here are the facts, with as little analysis as I can. Here is all I have found about LT. Aros Drogen."

"Arthur Maurice Drogen was born the 19th of October, 2216. His father was a pianist and his mother was a nurse. During the attempted Scalie invasion of 2217, Arthur was separated from his parents but survived in the chaos. Both parents were assumed dead. Arthur was deposited at one of the many nunneries in the area, which took on children displaced by the attack.

"Edgefield Orphanage had a thirty child capacity and seven full time nuns. I interviewed Sister Nora, one of the nuns who had been there since the beginning. She told me she did not remember much about Drogen the first few years. She said there were a lot of children in and out at that time and they were mostly quiet and still a bit damaged from the trauma of the attack. Sister Nora first took notice of Drogen around his eighth year. He was quite normal for a young boy, hyper, loud, rude and always into mischief.

"And then, one day, she described a change. She noticed he calmed down and did not speak. Nearly at all. There was radical change in his personality. He did well in school, separated himself from any friends, and spent much time alone reading. Soon, no one was calling him Arthur anymore, but Aros.

"I looked at the orphanages records. Here are the pictures of him that were in his file." Kanalet tapped on his scroll and on a screen to the right of the desk, three pictures came up. They were not the best quality, digital photos of the old prints. The first was of a toddler with brown eyes, white skin and dark brown hair. The second looked to be a school photo of the young Aros Drogen posed in front of a bookshelf with his hands resting on a globe. Looking to be six or seven in the photo, he looked quite similar to the previous picture.

"The orphanages records indicate that at age fifteen, Drogen has his name officially changed from Arthur Maurice, to just Aros. This third photo was from his service application. He looks slightly different in my opinion. You never know how kids are going to age, I suppose. But, the eye color listed on the form says purple, of all colors... That is also what his service records indicate."

"Are you suggesting that Drogen assumed this child's identity prior to joining the service?" The grand Marshal asked.

"No. The nuns recognized his service photo and identified him by name. Sister Nora was one of the original nuns who helped raise him. She mentioned nothing like that. I believe that it is possible for eyes to change color as you age."

"From brown to purple? Check on that."

"Yes, Sir."

Kanalet found his place in his notes and continued. "At age seventeen, he took the primary education exit exams and left school a year early. He got into a secondary education program at Mt. Carpathian College, entering the military officer education course.

"His records show he took a normal course load but graduated from the three year program in two. His transcripts show twos in all his classes and ones in all his physical education classes. It appears that every quarter he would challenge a class, which is the reason for his shortened time at the school.

"At age nineteen he applied and was accepted into the Space Service. He completed his basic training at Camp IV and moved on to Officer School. Comments from his Officer School instructors included mentions of excellent physical abilities, sound decision making and great potential. He was commissioned at the rank of Ensign before his twentieth birthday."

"That seems pretty young. To be stationed off-word, the age limit is twenty and a half. How old were you when you were commissioned, Kanalet?"

"I was 22, Sir," Kanalet said. "Due to that age restriction, after his commissioning as a general automated weapons officer, he attended a string of advanced combat schools. Rarely do Space Service personnel get slots for Ground Service schools, so he must have impressed someone with some pull. I have an idea of who that might have been.

"Ground Combat's one and two, Advanced Interior Tactics, and Gold Crown; he passed each one. Gold Crown is the unarmed combat school that all Ground Commandos attend. Apparently he was one of a handful of Spacers to be accepted and complete this elite course. All performance reports from these schools place Drogen in the top twenty percent."

"Impressive. Almost sounds like he chose the wrong service."

"After that he was posted out on the North Station. All performance reports from this period were close to perfect. After a year on station, he was promoted to Leiutenant. With the new rank he was given cyclic command of a Buteo picket ship for his remaining two years.

"Drogen was rotated down to a staff job in the security department of Headquarters. His supervisor told me he wrote and reviewed security force policies and actions for the fleet. He occupied an apartment in the city. I found no close friends. Co-workers in the department described him as pleasant and helpful, but I found no strong relationships.

"His sealed apartment in the city was small and simple. It was clean and had very little personalization. His contact list was all work related. His scroll access history showed quite an extensive reading list, lots of history, mythology, the complete FarSeer works and some books on physics.

"Records show a specific request for Drogen as a replacement weapons officer on the Prime Meridian by the XO of the ship, Colonel Plash, himself. Colonel Plash was the commander of Camp IV from 2232 to 2237. Drogen completed his basic in the spring of '35. I will confirm that Plash knew Drogen from his time at the training camp."

"That, Sir," Kanalet concluded, "is the history I have collected so far."

"Thank you, Major Kanalet. You know your task. Here is an official letter of authorization from me. This says that you are my agent and gives you total access. You will be released from your task after the results of the inquisition have been presented."

"Yes, Sir. I will take care of it."

"Before I dismiss you, I think you left one thing out, Major. The reason I picked you for this. You have seen Drogen before. On Palus Somni."

Kanalet nodded. The fight. He was there, in the stands, a month before.

"Tell me what you saw. Stray beyond the facts this time. Tell me your impression of the young man you saw in that ring."

"I thought he had no chance," Kanalet said. "He was just plain small compared to the giant he fought. But he moved so fast. He seemed to have real control of everything in that low gravity. I don't think he was struck once. And at the end, it might have been my imagination, but there was so much power in his blow. I swear I saw flash of blueish light surrounding his fist..."

Part III

The Aurora and the Ushas departed the Palus Somni installation twelve hours after the Prime Meridian arrived in orbit around Sulva. The two large gunships with their oversized engines rose swiftly from the landing pads and flared their engines, moving off towards the ship that they were custom built to augment. For the past six hours, the crews had been waiting patiently in the landing pad's ready room for the authorization to take off. Now cleared for launch, everyone was eager to finish their trip and receive new duty assignments.

The two ships cruised as a pair over the channel of craft shuttling items to and from the flagship of the human fleet. Their big blue ion engines, moving up the chain of smaller ships, held a sharp contrast to the orange haze of sunlight produced by the twilight edge of Tellus. As a test run for actual operations, the ships moved together rather than in single file like the first half of the mission. The solidity and pure power of the two ships streaking towards their objective made everyone near a viewport capable of looking, stop and stare.

The gunships reached the rear of the Prime Meridian and slowly moved into their docking housing, effectively becoming part of the larger ship, herself. Aboard the Aurora, the passengers and crew all began to stir as the circular hatch retracted its doors and a Tech Specialist floated up into the main cabin.

"Welcome to the Prime, everyone. Debark and check your scrolls, you should be receiving a message shortly instructing you where to report."

With the brief welcome, the new members of the crew continued to grab their things and move down the hatch.

Aros's scroll chirped and he pulled it open. The message requested him to report to the officer's briefing room and showed a map of the ship with a highlighted path leading forward through the main body of the 'T' shaped ship.

"Which one of you is Crescent?" the welcoming tech specialist asked.

"That's me," Cress responded. He turned to Aros and stuck out his hand as he shouldered his pack. "Thanks again, Sir. That was so ripper getting a chance to fly, and... all that other business, down there."

"Don't mention it. I'm sure we will see more of each other in the future," Aros replied as he launched himself to the ceiling and then down to the hatch that led into the interior of the ship.

***

"I really hope there is no more 'Hammer's' in this new batch," Tech. Specialist Gorra said quietly to the Lieutenant seated at the sensor terminal next to her. The sideward glance of Lt. Novalis made her stifle a giggle.

"Specialist, the bride is no place to badmouth former officers assigned to this ship," Jane Novalis whispered, otherwise keeping full attention to the terminal. "Despite his obvious character flaws..." she added. At this Gorra stole a glance back at her superior and shared in the repressed grin.

Major Maekyss, the bride watch officer rotated the command seat towards the two women. "Sensors, report."

Lt. Novalis elbowed Tech. Specialist Gorra. "Sir..." Gorra began, buying time to formulate her answer, "QuadDAR is tracking forty-two ships within three squal of our position. Twenty-one are waiting in queue for docking and offloading of material. Sixteen are conducting survey or repairs. The remaining craft are in route to return to the surface." Gorra took a deep breath and again glanced at her LT, who gave a nod of approval.

"Thank you. Engineering, what have you got..."

***

Colonel Plash expertly floated down the large main corridor in the central neck of the Prime Meridian. He was a short man with a cap of silver hair. He had the movements in zero gravity that telegraphed he years he had served off world. With his legs cocked slightly back and efficient arm movements pulling himself along the hand grips and crash padding lining the corridor, Plash reached the end of the central neck. He entered the next area which contained the officers ready room. All the new officers and civilians assigned to the ship had received orders to dump gear and report to the ready room, but the two gunships containing the new crew members had only just arrived. Plash drifted his way to the front of the room and strapped down. He wanted to watch everyone's entrance.

Plash sat like a gargoyle and watched the five replacement officers and four new civilians trickle into the room. When all were present, a nervous silence stole over the room. They waited and Plash finally began.

"This will be no easy duty. I am Colonel Daniel Plash. I am the XO of this ship and the senior personnel in charge of personnel. I picked each you, so you can blame me, should things go south. Likewise, I will have no one to blame except myself if you all turn out like the ones you have come to replace.

"This is where things get serious people. There is no communications off this ship until our mission is complete, so we will give you all the hard truth and have you sworn to confidentiality when we return. The maiden voyage of this ship was a bit more complex than just a system confirmation run out to Glundandra. We had picked up some strange signals from that area of the Field and went to check it out. And sure enough, we ran into the Scalies on the ice moon. Some members of this crew did not live up to the elite caliber demanded of service members aboard this ship. You are their replacements, and you will be the infusion this ship needs. I will see to it, personally.

"Now that the serious stuff is out of the way, welcome to the Prime Meridian," Plash said and paused for effect. "We do things slightly different aboard this ship. Our commanding officer, Captain Bartlett, has devised a particular work rotation that has come to work exceptionally well. When Bartlett makes Marshal after this tour, you can be sure this style of rotation will become standard across his command.

"Each of you will be getting your schedules sent to your scrolls now. Civilians, yours is a modified one from the rest of the crew, but as a general overview, lets take our new bridge officers as an example." Lights flashed and the most of the room popped open their scrolls to read the new messages.

"Lieutenants Veldt and Drogen are your new weapons officers. We run off a thirty-hour clock, with each shift being ten hours. Ten on, twenty off. SRT on your own time, mandatory hour in-tank. We code shifts red, green and black, for the first, second and third shift. LT. Judaic controls the weapons station on red shift, Veldt, you are on green, and Drogen is black shift. We similarly have three Majors that rotate the bridge commander position. Major Farris, you are filling the position in green shift. Captain Bartlett usually drops in and takes over command of the bridge on and off during the day, but when readiness is called, he takes over the bridge and whoever is on shift, stays in charge of their station until relieved. If you are off-shift when a readiness is called, you will precede to a secondary posting. Civilians, yours is always your quarters. The weapons officers secondary posting is ship security. The three we ponds officers command teams of security troops. Ensign Mathers, you are assigned to red shift in Engine Room Two. Your secondary post is in command of a damage team. There is no time specifically assigned to working with your secondary team, so officers, find time to drop in and get familiar with the specialist who runs your team.

"Do you have any questions?"

Ensign Mathers spoke up. "How bad was the Scalie contact? Are we going back after them again, Sir?"

"We will receive a through briefing on this mission soon after departure. The Captain and I believe that everyone in this crew, all one hundred fifty, should be fully informed on all aspects of this ship. That being said, only members of this ship and the leaders at the top have the real story on our last mission. Feel free to familiarize yourself with it, but if you want the short version, we forced them out pretty quick. We also have a live feed of the bridge activity at all times, which I'm sure our civilian crew will enjoy on their secondary assignments."

There was some small laughter, but no other questions. Plash dismissed the room and sat to watch the new crew leave.

"Drogen, can I have a minute," the XO said before Aros could leave.

"Absolutely, Sir," Aros said He made his way to the front of the room. "How are you, Sir. I haven't seen you since Advanced Interior a couple years ago."

"Yeah, well, someone must have really messed up putting me second-in-charge of this place!" Plash said ironically. "I wanted to tell you I accepted your request for assignment not just to help you get out of Headquarters. That proposal you wrote, that we should install sonic shields at critical junctions in case of a boarding scenario, was a large oversight that should have been brought up sooner. Leave it to a young, gold crowned L.T. to point out that lapse in judgment. We have specs working on the install now and should have the job complete before we hit the rift."

Plash started his move to the door of the empty room and Aros followed. LT. Veldt happened to be outside and across the corridor looking at his scroll. Aros sensed the close of the conversation. "Thank you, Sir. I appreciate the opportunity. I am glad that the idea could help. I am looking forward to a solid run."

"Course," the XO said, "And keep that little slip about the rift under your rank till its announced. But, I'm sure you had an idea where we were going, rooting around in HQ and making requests for transfers," Colonel Plash said in a low voice, tipping a wink to the young officer.

"Understood, Sir," Aros said at a volume slightly above normal. He gave a salute, closed fist to opposite shoulder, and pushed himself away, glided down the corridor towards the bow of the ship. Lt. Veldt hung in the hallway, keeping his eyes on his scroll, but his peripheral vision taking in the conclusion of the exchange.

***

The last of the small bright spots created by the survey and transport craft engines trailed away from the Prime Meridian. The human flagship ignited secondary propulsion engines and began to move away from Sulva. With a view of the ivory colored satellite in the background, the full body of the great ship was visible. Metallic blue in color, built from mined asteroid ore, the ship consisted of three main sections. Resembling something like a symmetrical rock hammer, the Prime Meridian was long and cylindrical in sections with a widening at the rear where the two gunships docked, adding their two engines to the four of the main ship.

In the dock housing room, which looked at the nose of the Aurora, Crescent stood at a large control station linked on a video feed with the main engine room. The engineering chief was on the other side of the video link, working his station with a small group of specialists monitoring other stations. The officer in charge, a major, paced the floor.

"Ushas, Aurora, stand by to ignite engines. On my mark..." three of the attending specialists, with eyes on the chief, nodded sharply when he glanced in their direction for confirmation.

"Mark," the Chief said. Crescent slowly increased the power to the Auroras main, feeling a slight hum pick up and run through the ship. The Ushas _'_ s Tech Specialist reported in. Engines were operating at 15% and no red alarms. Crescent reported an identical situation. The main engine room confirmed that the ships were pressing well within structural integration norms and all feeds were running fine. The Chief dismissed the two Techs to attend to their ships until the Captain's address began. On the outside, two light blue, fifth-generation ion engines on opposing ends of the stern lit up and began to push the far-ranging ship out into the void.

At the bow of the ship, like the tip of a spear flying toward its target, Captain Bartlett sat in the bridge command chair. Eight stations surrounded him, with two to three bridge crew at each, monitoring and directing most activities onboard.

"Standby for ship wide broadcast from the bridge," the Captain ordered.

"You are on after the chime, Sir."

***

Three pleasant tones went out over the ships internal system, broadcasting the voice of the Captain to every private room, common area, work station, compartment and passage way. Most of the crew stopped what they were doing and listened and some tuned in an available screen to the bridge feed, which transmitted the activities of the bridge at all times.

"Crew of the Prime Meridian, This is your Captain. As of the start of green shift, we will have officially departed Sulva and begun our next mission. Stand by for the mission brief." Captain Bartlett cleared his throat and slid open his scroll. He re-keyed the transmit switch and began.

In the quarter full chow hall, crew, officers and specialists alike, were belted in to chairs eating appropriate meals according to the time schedule they were following. LT. Veldt sat with a small group of officers and a Chief that he had previously served with. They all placed their nutrient rich drinks down into cup-holders and looked up at the rooms' central screen. All eyes were on the Captain's brief, yet some continued to absent-mindedly munch on pellets or crunchy bars.

"Our mission is to successfully move the Prime Meridian through the Rift. This movement will take fourteen shift cycles, or four hundred-twenty hours. We are to proceed through the Rift and explore the other side. Upon completion of the recon and deployment of several beacons at specific points, we are to return to our Field and refit back at Sulva.

"The situation on enemy forces is unknown. Contact is not expected on the other side of the Rift, but we are to go forth fully prepared, not knowing any possible hostile contact capabilities or composition. We do have some probe data on the area we will be entering; the Unknown Field, as it has been dubbed, consists of a large red star and three planets. The first is just a barren rock, surrounded by thousands of asteroids. We will be taking closer looks at the last two. The third is a large gas giant with no satellite. The second, which may be of the most interest to us, looks to be slightly larger than Tellus, with encompassing cloud cover and two moons. It is in the Goldie Locks Zone and is to be the primary focus of our survey. We have no other friendly forces accompanying us, or poised for rapid assistance. We have our ships defenses, including the new additions of our pair of custom S-28 gunships. If we do run into any problems, we can relay a message back through beacons poised on either side of the Rift. _"_

Half way down a secondary corridor running close to the skin, inside the main body of the ship, a pair of specialists were installing equipment around a bulkhead. They continued their work, while listening to the broadcast.

"Sounds like we are leaving then," the younger specialist said to the older. He was holding the emitter in place while his partner bolted it to an interior frame.

"Yep, and we have three more of these to jam out quick. Chief said, 'All sonic shields must be done before the end of the fifth cycle.' Must be cuz they want them all in place well before we get near that rift."

"We oughta go at just the right pace so we don't have to go help Pine and Tharfur finish theirs. They have just as many to do as us. Its not our fault if they're slow," the younger specialist said.

"Shut up, we should really hear the rest of this," the older specialist said.

"Executions of movements, schemes of fire, and actions of individual units are covered in Readiness Operations and Tactics, which are part of every section _'_ s Standing Orders. Command personnel will deploy the S-28 _'_ s as the situation demands. Good judgment and strong training is what brought each of you to my ship, and that is what will sustain us in every situation.

"Support concepts include the color-shift cycle for maximum rest, and flexible secondary duty work times. In the case of injury or illness, report to the medical bay. Maintenance and serviceability of equipment and weapons is expected at all times. SRT is mandatory for all crew, at least once per shift cycle. Staying healthy and rested is the key to surviving the stress of this, and all missions. _"_

In the Submerged Resistance Training room, the civilian technician gave a snort. She moved the dial on her screen to polarize the liquid for forward resistance and prepped the program as the two 'customers' setting up their workouts were distracted by the Captain's speech. She mused to herself over the new information that was just put out. They were going to go through the rift. Terrific. Everybody knew that the Scalies made the damn thing, so it was no big leap what was on the other side. No wonder she had to get an advanced security clearance and three weeks of off-world ship training before this assignment.

"Though we are venturing into the unknown, outside our own Field, we are still accountable to higher command. As previously covered, we will be placing beacons along our recon path that will relay all relevant intelligence and requests by pulse-laser back to Space Service Command. Succession of command goes from myself to Colonel Plash, then to bridge command officers in the order of red, green and black shift. Next are the engineering officers, in the same order of shift seniority, and on and on. Refer to your standing orders for an exhaustive list.

On the bridge, the red shift stood by, listing to the strong voice of their Captain, sitting just a few feet away. Lt. Jane Novalis sat at her post, half listening to the mission brief. She had heard this similar brief each run. She had been aboard the Prime since construction and had been present on all test runs. After hearing exactly what their mission entailed in the beginning of the briefing, she knew all needed to know. It made total sense that this would be where they would be going next, they had been working toward this mission since the ship became operational. The rift was like the space under your bed that you didn't much know about and where the monsters may or may not come from. After that strange brush with the enemy last mission, Jane figured it was only a matter of time until they ran into more. With the last point of a standard mission briefing covered, she tuned back in and listened to the man in the command seat.

"I have spoke with Grand Marshal Midord," Captain Bartlett continued putting down his scroll, "and he has assured me he will be closely monitoring this monumental quest." Bartlett was sitting straight-backed in his chair, looking dead ahead into the camera that was recording the brief for crews watching on a screen. His short dark brown hair was slowly being overtaken with grey. His eyes were firm and showing no signs of age. His dark blue uniform was crisp with the muted silver trimming of Captain rank. The crew watched through their screens, truly getting a feel for the man on the other side. This man would lead them farther away from the place of their birth than they had ever been. All were steadfast in their decisions to follow.

"We are the best humanity has to offer, and this will be the toughest mission we have yet to endure. We are crossing through a half-studied anomaly that was a product of an enemy attack on Tellus. You will be one of a handful of humans who have been outside the Field of Arbol. Time on the other side will be kept to a minimum on this first operation, but we are paving the way for future exploration and human expansion. I am proud to have each of you with me, and I pray for the best of our luck. Bartlett out."

The Captain nodded to the internal control officer and the broadcast was terminated.

"Thanks for staying a few minuets over everyone, go ahead with your end of shift procedures so we can get green shift on and turn up the speed," Bartlett announced to the room. The Captain remained in the command seat through the slight bustle of the bridge crew running final checks and giving their relief a handover report.

Over at the Internal Control station, a Lieutenant was tapping away furiously as his relief walked up behind him.

"Having problems, Charlie?" the green shift L.T. asked.

"I have been getting random error messages in several systems over the past thirty minuets, but then they go away. When I run tests on the systems, they come back normal. If this happened just once, on one system, I'd dismiss it. But I have had eight."

"What were the error codes?"

"281-B, unauthorized access. Each of them."

"Strange. Doesn't sound like anything to report yet, probably just a newcomer messing around. I'll check it out on my shift, just make sure to note the activity in your log, in case it continues."

"Will do. Need anything else?"

After a negative response, the station was changed over. All red shift bridge crew had been relieved by green shift and Major Ferris, on his first cycle as bridge command officer, called for a status check. After all systems reported back, Ferris reported the successful shift change to the Captain.

"Thank you, Major. I want to welcome you and Lt. Veldt to the bridge. Now, lets get this ship moving! Pilot, let's slowly move up to a cruising speed of eighty five percent on engines."

"Sir, ready to move on your orders," the pilot said.

"Then, lets do it. Drop the hammer!"

In the dark abyss of space, the remaining four of the Prime Meridians big engines came to life. All six went from a light blue to a brilliant, blinding white-blue as they increased in power and sent the ship swiftly moving off, never to return the same.

***

On a spacecraft that had no windows and worked around the clock, most considered black shift to be the night. Lt. Jane Novalis's alarm buzzed a short 30 minuets before her shift change. Her eyes slowly opened as the lights in her small cabin came on dim, steadily getting brighter. She slept like most of the crew, in a gel pod that was vertical on the wall. With no gravity, once stuck inside the oxygenated chamber, it was easy to imagine you were 'laying down' rather than pinned to a wall.

The door opened and Jane climbed out. She wicked away most of the gel, which inevitably stuck to her light colored skin. She then entered a small shower recess that was part of her room, and punched the pad on the inside wall. Steam mixed with a mist of cool water spit out from several nozzles placed around the shower. Jane closed her eyes, ran her fingers through her longish black hair, to help rid herself of the nights sleep. The gel liquefied under the heat from the steam and easily ran off her body and down the drain, where it would be sanitized, reprocessed and reclaimed.

Just another morning, she told herself. You got plenty of sleep, once you get moving you will feel great. It was little solace, but she managed to slip into her dark blue uniform with the black trim that signaled she was an officer. Jane spun inelegantly threw the air as she pulled her 'boots', which were not much more than reinforced sox.

Out her door, Jane went deeper down the residence hall, rather than to the central corridor which ran the length of the ship. She slid open a hatch and came out on one of the secondary corridors that ran close to the hull of the ship. These areas were dimly lit compared to the central run and were much less used. She cocked her body back and pulled hard, throwing herself forward. Moving quickly, she used her hands on the crash pads that lined the walls, in order to keep up momentum and herself close enough to the wall. In officer school, it was briefly mentioned in the outdated curriculum of military officer training, that staying unpredictable in routines was a desired quality to avoid the enemy from gaining the upper hand. This was close to obsolete advice, if not only kept in mind for starship movements, but the lesson stuck with Jane. Something about the philosophy from which that nugget of wisdom fell really appealed to Jane. She wasn't going to get attacked by something because she was lazy and liked to take the same old way to work each day.

Jane entered the bridge five minuets before the black shift ended. The sensor officer greeted his relief, happy to be done with another eventless night. As he gave his change over report, Jane couldn't help but to feel eyes on her. From the top of the bridge at the weapons station, behind the command chair, was a new lieutenant. In a short glance past her shoulder, she studied the intruder. He looked average height, dark hair and fit the general template of most of the men who had been assigned to this ship. She returned her attention and claimed the station. Punching in her codes and entering the shift change on the log, she couldn't help but to look up at the new weapons officer at the top of the bridge. He was now giving his report and handing over the station. Technical Specialist Gorra swung around her own seat and belted in, jarring Jane out of her brief reverie.

"Checking out the new guy, huh?" Gorra said as she punched in to her station.

"He was checking me out. I was just making sure I didn't get another 'Hammer' vibe from him."

"Well," Tech. Specialist Gorra said, "Apparently his name is Drogen and his secondary is with security."

Jane gave her an accusative and questioning look.

"What? It's a small ship. Plus, I have a friend on his security team."

"The last thing I need is another distraction on this ride. I rather ignore all the men, especially good looking new ones."

The new bridge officer called for a change of shift report, cutting the conversation short.

***

In the chow hall, Lt. Veldt was sitting, eating with his small knot of confidants, as was their routine. The meal was more a meeting of their own private club than for nourishment.

"Been a smooth ride so far. What do we got, ten more cycles till the rift?"

"Yeah, then things will get interesting."

"You security boys may have a handful," a Lieutenant said to both Veldt and the Chief.

"Why do you say that?" Veldt asked. "You guys that paranoid about Scalie contact? I read the report from last time, they basically ran, right?"

"That's not what he means," the Chief said finishing his mouthful. "My security teams had a handful with some of our own people. You smart guys," he said pointing at Veldt.

"Not that I'm worried about you, Max. Just some of these fools look good on paper and can pass an interview, but under the stress of long term missions and orders they don't particularly like, we had some problems."

"In particular, Hammer," the highest-ranking member of the group, a Major from engineering, said. "This chuckle-head gave some women problems. He thought he was on a pleasure cruise. Then when stuff got serious, he said some wrong things on the bridge."

"Yeah," an Ensign confirmed. "That's why we got the replacements. The XO weeded out anyone that didn't perform up to his standards, which are pretty high. But I get it, this ship oughta be full of only the best. That's why they brought you and Drogen up. Quality replacements."

"So don't act like an idiot, huh!" the Chief laughed and smacked Veldt on the back.

As the conversation was still going, Aros came in the hall, collected some food and sat down at a table across the room. He sat alone and ate his food while poking away at his scroll. Veldt had a good view, and at the mention of his fellow weapons officer, he switched lines of thought.

"You guys ever talk to Drogen?"

"I had a conversation with him when he first came down to sort out his team. Young guy. Seems to know his stuff. Got his Gold Crown, I hear," The Chief answered.

"Hmm. I talked to him right before we came up here. He didn't say much. You guys hear what he did down in Palus? Took down some low grav arena fighter. Anak," Veldt said looking around his circle. "I was in the bar when the guy almost killed some dumb specialist. Guy has ice water in his veins."

"Should be good to have him along, then."

"But now it's got me thinking. Look at him sitting there alone. You guys have heard rumors about the Archmen, right?"

The conversation grew more somber and quiet.

"Midord's Eyes?"

"Yep. I heard he set up a small company of specially trained men that float around the fleet as spies. Apparently the Grand Marshal gives them signed letters, giving them power to usurp anyone's command, if and when they see fit. This way, Midord gets real feedback he can trust on how people act in the field."

"More than just that," another Lieutenant said. "A chief I had in officer school told us that he ran into one once. That this guy turned was on a security detachment he commanded. He said this Archmen took over his team down on the South Station. The guy led the boarding and capture of some freighter that was passing though. Once the ship was taken down, he sent them away and took it back to Tellus alone. Never saw the guy again."

"Makes sense we would have at least one on board this ship," the Ensign said.

"You really think its Drogen?" the Major asked.

"I don't know. How many people have a Gold Crown aboard? Him, the XO, a couple of high-speed specialists in security?" Veldt asked. The Chief nodded.

"All I know is that this guy would be first on my list as someone with a different mission than the rest of us. I suggest we keep an eye on him. I never trust a loaner."

***

It was green shift on the eighth cycle and Lt. Jane Novalis was in the forward sensor room, conducting training with her secondary team. Tech. Specialist Gorra was working a larger diagnostic scroll while Jane talked through the current procedure for the other two specialists. Loud thuds accompanying popping sounds, in the normally quiet ship, rose to the ears of everyone in the room. Jane stopped speaking and turned toward the door. The muffled thuds became louder. Everyone's eyes on the repair team grew wide in confusion.

The door to the sensor room slid open and a small grey object came spinning in, ricocheting off the door jam and into the room. By the time the four-member repair team understood what was just introduced to the room, a gentle pop and shroud of grey smoke came from the grenade, which kept its shape. Before anyone could utter a word of puzzlement, two figures, outfitted in combat armor and holding heavy rifles at the ready, swept through the door. Each grabbed the lip of the door with one hand, transferring all their forward movement sideways, to opposite sides of the doorway.

"Oh, blast! There are people in here!" the figure to the right of the door shouted into the hall.

"What do you think you are doing? Who are you, Specialist?" Lt. Novalis said.

"Sorry Ma'am. We are conducting drills up and down this hall. I'm Tach. Specialist Will Baering, Second Squad, Ship Security."

"Tach? You mean Tech." Tech. Specialist Gorra said.

"Nope. Security grunts get a Tactical designation, rather than Technical."

"Well, I don't care," Jane said. "You people can't just barge in here, tossing grenades around. You had better have been cleared for this! Who is in charge of the lot of you?"

"My L.T. is on the way." Baering said after listening to his communication earpiece while the sensor Lieutenant scolded him.

Over the radio and loud enough to hear, the command was given to take a break. Aros swung into the room and gave Baering a slap on the arm as he and his teammate exited the room, clearing themselves of the wrath. Aros took his time to examine the room before speaking.

"Sorry about that, Lieutenant," Aros began, popping off his helmet. "We thought we had this passage and all the rooms to ourselves. I should have been more thorough in my checks."

Jane let out a small sigh and addressed her people, "You guys take a break too." She moved backwards and strapped herself into a chair, putting her feet up. Her team filed out and Aros remained where he was. As he watched them leave, Jane noticed his eyes. From ten feet across the room, she could see them clearly, the purple contrast against the white sclera.

"It's Novalis," Jane said, intentionally putting a spin of annoyance on her voice. "You security hot-shots think you can just do whatever pleases you on this ship. I could make a complaint over what just happened. Straight up to the XO."

"What can I do to let this one slide? Can we chalk it up to my being new and call it even?" Aros saw the softening in her face and knew she wasn't really mad. "Or let me buy you off by having dinner with me. I brought some Yazis fruits up and I would be willing to share."

"First off, I have never heard of a 'Yasis'. And second, I was just giving you a hard time. I could care less, we needed a break. Anyway," Jane said getting up, "I'm going to get something to drink. Just make sure if we run into any Scalies, you guys take care of them before they get to us."

She went to leave and slightly bumped into Aros as she went for the open door. Her head became vaguely light at the faint touch and was gone again as soon as he spoke.

"You avoided my question about dinner."

"You noticed," she said and turned back to face him once in the hall. "I try not to get involved with guys I work with. Nice try though."

Jane left and Aros standing where he was. Everyone in the hall taking a break heard most of the exchange. One of the security specialists floated over to the open doorway.

"You can't win 'em all, Sir," Specialist Toma said. "And her, I hear she is a tough nut to crack."

"Yeah," Aros agreed, "The good ones usually are."

***

The Prime Meridian approached the rift on schedule. The ship turned down its engines to sixty percent speed in order to jettison a small, cylindrical beacon prior to crossing into the Unknown Field. Several other monitoring beacons, much larger in size, were already in the area, monitoring and sending back data on the abnormal region of space. They collected data on background radiation levels emitted from the tear, as well as proton emissions from the red star in the adjoining field. The humans took advantage of this opportunity, being as it was their first chance to closely study a star that was not their own.

The rift itself was generally unremarkable. It was invisible to casual observers, if they had a chance to look at it through ship windows, which were nearly non-existent in most modern starships. Only through enhanced spectrum viewing could one observe an oval outline where the flat surface of the universe had been torn, leading to a different region of space. When approached from the 'backside' one would simply pass through as if crossing normal space.

It was through this stitch hole in the fabric of existence that the Prime Meridian sped, at nearly full speed. Flaring their engines to ninety five percent output, and the crew on readiness alert, the starship flew into the virtual unknown.

Part IV

The Prime Meridian shot through the Rift on the fourteenth cycle of her current mission, with the black shift beginning its rotation. A second beacon was dropped as the ship decelerated after clearing the rift. The ship was called to a full halt as sensors, this time with more operators in attendance, performed a through assessment of the field.

"Have you picked up any electronic transmissions so far?"

"Sir, we have just begun our sweeps, but so far, we have picked up no electronic signals," Sensors reported. "If there is going to be some transmissions coming from any of the bodies, we may not be close enough to pick them up. I will immediately report anything, should it arise."

"How are we looking in our immediate surroundings?" the XO asked.

"Sir," a sensor specialist spoke up, "We came through roughly one hundred twenty eight thousand kilopassus from the star. We are picking up one of our delta-agros class probes that was launched six months ago to survey the field. It is moving slowly toward the north rim of the rift, approximately three hundred six passus-and closing- from our position. Nothing else in our immediate vicinity."

Captain Bartlett was consulting his scroll as he asked his next question. "Lieutenant Drogen, can you get me a firing solution on that probe."

"Firing solution confirmed, Sir," Aros replied.

"That was quick, what size missile would be best to completely destroy that probe?"

"We are not recovering it, Sir?" the XO asked from his position standing behind the command chair.

"No, it has transmitted all its findings. The only use we have for it is a target for test fire. Drogen?"

"I suggest a type 2 contact shredder. It's a bit of overkill, but it will remove all recoverability from the debris," Aros said.

"Very good. Fire on your initiative."

As soon as the command was given, the whole bridge could hear the faint sound of a missile leaving the ship. Aros reported that the missile was away. The whole bridge sat in relative silence as the main screen tracked the missile streaking to its target. The screen confirmed the hit and total destruction of the prob. Captain Bartlett congratulated the weapons officer.

"Very nice, son. That kind of skill will get you far on this ship," he said. "Now, Pilot, lets set a course for the second planet. We will survey it first, and then the third."

"Course set," The pilot confirmed.

"Well, lets get moving! Eighty five percent engine power."

The ships engines flared and once again, the prize of the human fleet, built from nothing in the short twenty-three years since first contact with outside life, moved deeper into unknown territory.

***

The Prime Meridian moved forward, now in new space, in much the same way it did before it crossed the rift. Day to day activities on the ship continued as it drew closer to the second planet of the Unknown Field. Morale was high, as was expectation of future trials. Everyone felt this, yet nothing was officially said. Leaders picked up the tempo and veracity of their training, which was already high on a ship full of elite service members.

The three security squads were no exception. After a particularly rough day of training, the security Chief ordered a competition. Inflatable 'enemy' targets were set up throughout a mid-section area of the ship, and each squad had to clear the area with the best time and least casualties.

The three security lieutenants lead their men on the exercise, with the Chief acting as an observer. If he saw any of the security soldiers make mistakes or poor decisions, he would use a judge laser to eliminate them from the exercise, thus creating casualties. The already tired men forgot all their fatigue at the prospect of a competition and an unknown reward that would await the winners.

Each eleven-man squad took their turn through the course, blind to how and where the enemies would be placed. The first squad, led by Lt. Lane, made their run at a respectable time of twelve minuets, five seconds and had only a single casualty on one of his three man teams. Aros's squad did better with a time of eleven minuets fifty two seconds, with also a single casualty.

Lt. Veldt ran his squad through and was surprised by finding no enemies in almost the whole course. Veldt split his squad into two halves. He left half stacked in an already cleared room within close in proximity to the last remaining uncleared room of the course.

"We don't have much time guys, so here is the plan," Lt. Veldt said to the five men with him, as the rest of the team listened in on the radio. "We will hit that room now, expect it to be full. Once we strike, Gans, you take your team and watch our rear. If we need help in there, back us up. On three we move."

The team, stacked together and moving as one, made quick for the door. The hand-swipe sensor did not work as they attempted entry. Veldt used hand signals to indicate a breach. The third member back in the stack brought out a small device that affixed to the crack in the door.

The second breach attempt yielded results. A barrage of red enemy targets, the size of small barrels, came bursting out from the corner of the room as soon as the team was inside the door. Each man in the team moved along his specified direction once in the room. All naturally used their long, square-barreled rifles as close quarter weapons, smashing the inflatable targets until the exercise was ended. The Chief entered the final room and announced their time.

"You were just barely the fastest, at eleven fifty. Unfortunately, you have three casualties."

"Who?" Veldt demanded, out of breath inside the room formerly swarming with enemies. "Everyone followed their proper routes and kept their sectors. Who died?"

"Three neck-benders, outside the room. Your other team moved right after you and pulled rear security, but three chuckle knuckles decided to look in and see what the mystery room held." The Chief moved out and addressed the offenders. "What were you looking for in here? Someone tell you about a nice little party inside with pretty women? No! You knew you needed to pull rear security! Your brothers in here were taking care of this mess and would have called for you if they needed you. Now three of you are dead cuz a bunch of razor-tooth Grinners decided to sneak up on you from behind!"

All the men shook their head in acknowledgement and moved out at the L.T.'s command. The day was done and they were ready for rest. They moved like men defeated- defeated by themselves.

"Why does the Chief call them 'Grinners'?" A young specialist asked another while moving back to the Armory.

"Ehh, who knows? They are mostly called Scalies, but I've heard people call them Grinners or Flat-Faces. The Chief is just old and crusty. He was in back before the Space Service was a thing."

"You hear what second got for winning?" A third specialist asked, overtaking the two. "They get first dibbs on a ground mission, if anything like that happens. Man, they are lucky! I wanna be the first to set foot on a new planet!"

The chatter continued, the way young boys who try to be good fighting men, do.

***

Silence. Silence and darkness.

Aros sat, reclined in a comfortable body chair, loosely strapped in. He looked up at the stars, and they surrounded him. Even at the ships forward velocity, it still looked as though they were stationary. Aros was in one of the two places aboard that had windows and a real view of the outside. Usually covered by thick metal shielding, bridge officers and certain other select members of the crew had access to this room and the authorization to remove the shutters.

It was a sanctuary. The observation decks, on the dorsal and ventral sides, were located at the 'T' of the ship. Left alone with his thoughts, Aros's eyes wandered across the sky and he was lost in himself when the door suddenly opened, letting in a ray of white light.

Jane Novalis floated up from the entrance that was on the 'floor' of the observation room. She went all the way in the room, with the door sliding shut and her eyes adjusting to the light, before she noticed she was not alone.

"Oh, I'm sorry! I didn't realize there was anyone else up here," Jane said turning to leave.

"No, its fine. Stay. There is plenty of room. Jane, right?"

"It is. And it's Aros?"

"True enough," he replied.

Jane hesitated, but finally moved to one of the three vacant body chairs. The chairs were arranged as the four points of a square, and Jane took a seat diagonal from Aros. She settled in, the room was quiet.

"A whole new set of constellations..." Jane mused out loud.

"I guess if humans settle this place, they will have to come up with names for them," Aros said. "That one in the corner looks like a horse, wouldn't you say?"

"It does," she agreed. There was another pause before she spoke. "Its funny you would notice that one. As a child, I grew up on a horse farm. I miss them terribly."

"Did you have one of your own?"

"Yes, a mare. Her name was Gentry. She was a huge Gaul, black with a chestnut mane. When I got her, we were both ten years old. I learned to ride on her and we were inseparable. I even built a miniature barn, just for her and put a bunk in it so I could sleep out with her in the summers."

The two were talking without looking at each other. Looking out into the void, it was like communicating directly with the person, without the complication of a face getting in the way. Jane's inhibitions dropped away as she relaxed in the darkness.

"As I got older I used to use her to help train the colts for my father. Gentry was also getting older at this point, but she really took to it. The younger horses would look to her and mimic her movements. She was so graceful! She was the best horse I ever had."

"What happened to her?" Aros said.

"She got old and had arthritis. It came on quick, a lot younger than expected. When I left for the service when I was twenty, she was all but unrideable. I wouldn't let my father put her down, so she just spent her last days in that small barn. When it got to the point that she could no longer get up, they finally put her down. My father called and told me when I was in Camlon. He asked if I wanted to come home and say goodbye. I just couldn't make the trip. So I just let her go. It breaks my heart."

Aros was silent; there was not much to say.

"But the bright side is, every time I run into one of the horses that the two of us trained, I see her movements. It's like she passed them on and her personality of movement lives on. Looking out into the stars, I see how big this place we live in is, but it doesn't seem any larger than my horse and the things she passed on. Is that strange?"

"I don't think so."

"What do you see in the stars?" Jane asked, suddenly feeling foolish for letting a stranger get a glimpse at her heart.

"I just feel small compared to all I see. I feel like I am in a space suit, drifting all alone in this emptiness, with the points of light so far apart. I do feel small. It does make me feel like all my experiences are minor compared to all this."

"Do you have a favorite star?" Jane asked after a moment, still unsure of what to say.

"Have you ever seen the Great Ladle back on Tellus? It's only visible from the Northern Hemisphere."

"I am from Moldavia, so yes."

"Well, if you look at the second star down the handle, there is another much smaller star, almost looking like it is orbiting it. That one is my favorite. It's not in fact orbiting the star, but much further behind. Have you ever seen the star I'm talking about?"

"I've never noticed it," Jane said. "Why is that one your favorite, of all the stars in the sky?"

"I couldn't tell you. I just feel drawn to it. It feels familiar and it is my favorite."

"Hmm," Jane mused. The silence, this time much more comfortable, settled on the room.

"I've got SRT." Aros said, abruptly unbuckling and moving to the hatch. "Enjoy the stars," he said and left Jane before she could reply.

***

Two hours into red shift of the twenty-sixth day of their mission, the Prime Meridian reached the second planet of the Unknown Field.

"Call the XO to the bridge," Captain Bartlett ordered. "Place us in a high orbit of the planet. Communications, if you pick up anything, I want to know immediately."

In order of the commands, Internal Control, the Pilot and Communications gave their acknowledgements. Despite the high stress environment of the bridge, each officer and the select specialists working the consoles responded with complete composure. Next, the Captain turned to Sensors.

"What can you tell me about the planet?"

"Sir, as seen on the main screen, the cloud cover is planet wide. The atmosphere is thick and the electromagnetic field is making it difficult to see what is going on down on the surface."

The XO entered the bridge and took a place beside the weapons station and Lieutenant Veldt.

"That's fine," the Captain said, after noticing the XO's arrival. He turned his gaze to the main screen that was dominated by white and tan swirls of clouds that encompassed the world below him. "We will complete one rotation of the planet before we close our orbit and drop terrestrial probes."

A chime went off to the Captains right. The Communications officer punched furiously at his console and then looked up at the Captain.

"Sir, Massive bursts of electronic transmissions, from all over the planet. Major bursts are also emanating from both of the planets satellites," he reported in a calm manner.

"I thought we cleared those as we crossed them!" The XO said in disbelief.

"Sound full readiness!" The Captain said.

Another chime and more activity, this time from the Sensor station.

"Sir. We have incoming craft. Five and counting. Emerging from the planets surface, on a course directed at us. Moving fast."

"Why didn't we detect these before!?" The XO growled.

"QuadDAR is having trouble penetrating the clouds..." Tech. Specialist Gorra, one of the four personnel working the station, reported.

"Weapons! Set up a snap shot," the Captain said, cutting off the specialist. "What are the configurations of those craft?"

"Sir, they don't directly match any known enemy craft."

"Get a visual on the screen."

Rising quickly up from the clouds were spike shaped craft with yellow electric-like arcs propelling them to their targets. Staggered, and in no obvious formation, the craft split from their original trajectory and looped in at oblong angles towards the long sections of the Prime Meridian.

"My snap shot solution has been blown, Sir. They made drastic changes in their flight paths." Lieutenant Veldt said, managing to keep control of his voice. "I am compensating. We only have a few seconds until they are too close."

"They are too large to be warheads. There are internal cavities... Best guess is boarding craft." Sensors reported.

"Then fire on what you can! Pilot! Take evasive action and prepare for egress."

The sound of friendly missiles being fired barely registered on the bridge crew as they all worked furiously on their stations. On the screen, the Prime Meridian _'_ s missiles attempted to block access of the incoming craft, but most had no major affect on the incoming spikes. The ship was rocked by the first of the eight spikes crashing into the thick hull.

***

Aros sat in his very small officers quarters monitoring the bridge channel on his rooms computer screen. When readiness was called, he opened his scroll and disabled his prompt to report to his secondary duty station. He sat staring at the edge of his screen while the action unfolded on the bridge, experiencing the action peripherally, but primarily locked in decisive thought.

As the Captain gave the order to brace for impact from the incoming craft, Aros snapped into action. He unbuckled himself from the chair and hovered mid air, finishing entering commands into his scroll. While the whole ship shuttered from the peppering of impacts, Aros was unaffected in free-fall. With alert sirens echoing throughout the ship, he opened a wall locker and pulled out the tough case he brought with him from Tellus. He punched in the code on the lock and popped the lid. Inside, he pulled out two leather sheathed hand weapons. They were shaped like the letter 'H,' with the center handgrip low and parallel double-sided blades reaching away from the wielder. He slung them on a belt, with each sitting on an outside thigh, handle up.

With one last look at the computer screen monitoring their situation, Aros pulled his scroll from his shoulder pocket. Leaving it closed, he punched the voice command button on the top end.

"Enable Gamma response. Activate persons one and nine. Disable persons two, three, six and eight."

***

Lieutenant Jane Novalis was in a submerged resistance training tank when readiness was called. Her program went black mid exercise and she was alerted to the situation. She quickly got out of the tank and moved to the changing area where she began to peel off her SRT suit.

She felt calm enough, but was jittering slightly as she raced to get back into her uniform. Is this a real attack? she wondered to herself. I got to get to my station and find out what is going on.

The crash of multiple impacts from the incoming ships made Jane jump in the zero gravity and loose the boot she was about to pull on. She looked around wide-eyed at the shaking walls in front of her, cringing with each impact. After what seemed like fifty bone grinding crunches, Jane began to search for the boot that was in her hands before her world started rolling.

The boot was drifting toward the suction grate at 'bottom' of the room. Jane turned to go for it when it suddenly changed directions of travel. It took her brain a second to react to what she was seeing. The boot was falling to the wall.

And so was she!

Jane's shoulder touched the same wall and she began to press harder. It felt as if the wall was pushing on her and she was doing nothing. Rolling over to the floor, Jane lay with her back to the wall. What is happening? her brain raced. She looked over to her scroll and saw the message light was flashing. Still pinned to the wall, she pulled it from her pocket and slid it open.

LT. JANE NOVALIS

!! CHANGE IN SECONDARY ASSIGNMENT !!

REPORT TO THE S-28 GUNSHIP 'AURORA' FOR IMMEDIATE DEPLOYMENT.

END.

Jane sat up, closing her scroll. Gravity, that _'_ s what I _'_ m feeling, she realized. We must have landed, that _'_ s what the crunches were. But why am I going to a gunship?

In a dazed state of confusion, and not having experienced real gravity in close to a year, Jane finished dressing and made her way out of the SRT room.

***

Back on the bridge, the calm was starting to break. Internal Control was reporting damages to the XO. Secondary crew assignments teams were beginning to log on as active. Every station was busy dealing with different aspects of the situation. The Captain was letting his people have strong control over their jurisdictions. He sat observing the action when he noticed his hand hit the armrest of his chair.

All in the same moment, most of the chatter died down as the bridge crew watched and felt the effects of gravity settling over the ship.

"Do we have the gravity detector up and running?!" Captain Bartlett demanded, breaking the silence.

"I'm spinning it up now..." Sensors replied. "Sir! I've got a craft coming from the backside of the planet, polar west! It's large, larger than us... Oh merda, a second inbound! From polar east. Same configuration as the other. Both on an incoming vector." The sensor L.T. went silent as he worked with the others at his station.

"Alright," the Captain said quite loud. "We will deal with the threats as they come. Sensors! Designate the new targets as East and West. Apprise us of any changes. Now, tell me why we are feeling gravity! Are they trying to anchor us in orbit?"

"Those spikes!" The XO shouted, stumbling over to the Internal Control station. "Show me the points of impact!"

"There! Eight impacts, all on our ventral side. It looks like from exterior cameras that they are all still protruding from our hull!"

The XO looked up at the Captain. "We've been boarded!" he shouted. "Activate the bulkhead sonic shields! Alert security to begin sweeps!"

***

In the rear of the ship, the flashing light on top of another crew members scroll blinked.

TECHNICAL SPECIALIST BRYAN CRESCENT

!! ALERT !!

PREPARE THE S-28 GUNSHIP 'AURORA' FOR IMMEDIATE DEPLOYMENT.

AUTHORIZATION TO LAUNCH UPON ARIVAL OF ADDITIONAL CREW.

END.

***

Jane climbed heavily through a half open hatch into a secondary corridor in the main body of the ship. The lights were flickering further down the long corridor, but emergency lighting was on. She stopped to check the map feature on her scroll to confirm her direction of travel, feeling unsure of her turns with the addition of gravity. Smoke was drifting along the floor from a small fissure in the circular corridor. It smelled of a strong chemical as if a fluid was dripping on a hot surface and becoming a gas.

There was a snap and hiss, followed by a high-pitched whine as the ships newly installed sonic shielding was activated, covering the entrance she just came through.

"Great," Jane said aloud to herself. "How am I supposed to get all the way back to that gunship now?"

She opened her scroll and attempted to activate a communication channel to Internal Control. She began to walk as she waited to request a drop of the shields in her corridor, so she could get past. A chime, signifying an attempt at connection, chirped away. Jane figured that she was not the only one with this same problem.

It came to the front of her mind that she had been hearing thuds that were coinciding with the chirps. Her eyes again went wide as she began to hear scratching and strange deep shrieks coming from further down.

More smoke rose from a wall blocking most of her view, fifteen feet ahead. The emergency lights were out beyond the smoke and the thudding was getting louder. Jane realized she was clutching her scroll hard and let it go. The channel to Internal Control was still attempting to go through.

Why aren _'_ t they answering? She wondered in a panic. An exhaust vent kicked on, causing her to jump, sucking out the smoke collecting in front of her. Jane was about to activate the emergency switch on her scroll when the smoke was vented enough to be seen through.

Just past the clearing haze, on the other side of the bulkhead, were two monsters, slashing at amber tinted air.

She screamed when they saw her. She screamed again when she saw that they were scratching away at the bulkhead where the projectors were hidden. She went quiet when she saw the tip of their craft that had sliced through the Prime Meridian. The vile spike was jutting through the wall of the corridor behind the Scalies.

And that's what the monsters were, Scalies. The weight of the realization hit her harder than simulated high gravity.

The creatures had oval, flat faces, with sunken black marble eyes. Jane thought they looked very much like barn owls from back on Tellus- almost sweet. That was until one opened its mouth, a slit running all the way across the bottom of the oval portion of its face. Matching rows of razor-sharp, uniform teeth were bared at the small human just out of their reach.

Jane was small compared to them. They were nearly twice her size, with their size being locationally-appropriate and covering their entire body. Both were light grey with regular swaths of black coloring, reminding Jane of the interesting patterns of bright colored tropical fish. The aliens had two tales, about two meters long, emerging from the one point at the end of their spine. They walked upright, but slightly hunched over. The Scalies large feet and hands had four digits each. Small horns and ridges adorned their backs and shoulders, rounding out their overall reptilian appearance.

Petrified, Jane all but refused to flee from the nightmares before her. She was not the type of human to travel so far from her own home, only to run away. She crouched down and worked on her scroll. She activated the emergency switch and continued her attempt to get a communication line established.

Either something isn _'_ t working or they have no time to answer my call for help, Jane thought. If I can _'_ t report that we have been boarded, at least I can take video for when they find my body.

The Scalies were trying in earnest now to take down the shield projectors. One projector was already on the way out as the Scalie vocalizations came flickering through intermittently.

As Jane was filming and narrating what could have been her last seconds, the Scalies both sharply turned their heads away from her. They paused and the one on the right turned to investigate, as if it had heard a noise. Jane watched it move with a questioning walk, as if it had been spoken to. The one on the left stopped its work and turned to watch the outcome.

Out of the shadows, Aros rose, and struck the Scalie on the side of the head. His hand was on fire, his fist surrounded by a dark blue halo of non-light emitting energy. The reptile took the blow and lunged back with a swipe of his own. Dodging beneath the blow, Aros pulled a hon-ra from the holster on his hip. He stabbed out with the weapon, bracketing the alien's ankle between the blades. He twisted and drove the blades into the wall of the corridor.

The Scalie was left upside down, pinned to the wall by a single limb. Both tails went up to the hon-ra in an attempt to free it's caught foot from the snare.

Aros spun around, kicking the reacting Scalie in the head, halting all movement.

The second Scalie now turned and began to charge. Aros, at a half crouch, drew his remaining hon-ra and heaved it overhand at the beast. Two steps from his intended target, the Scalie fell. The blades dug deep into the area below its face. Jane did not hear any gargling, but a puddle of milky, pink blood began to pool around the upper body of the reptile. Aros crossed the creature, lifting up the body slightly and pulling his weapon free. He wiped the blood on a wall crash pad that was now useless under gravity.

Jane stopped recording and stood up, unsure if she really wanted to get his attention. Aros snapped his eyes over to where Jane stood and moved to the shielded bulkhead. He drew his scroll and activated a command, dropping the shield.

"Are you ok? There are more forward of us, where are you going?"

"I got redirected to the Aurora of all places," Jane said, half thinking. "What the hell was that? How did you take down that shield? Did you kill both of them?"

"Your scroll must not be working. We need to get moving, quite a few of them got a good distance away from their crafts before the internal shields went up."

Aros left Jane standing, staring at the bodies. He went over to the intruding ship. The tip was hinged off, which had allowed the Scalies to disembark. He jumped up onto the tangle of pierced starship and reached into the encroaching object. After a second, Aros emerged with a lantern shaped object that had a dark blue orb suspended behind a solid transparency.

"What are you doing?" Jane asked. She kept asking questions as if her brain was in shock from the things she had just seen. "What were those knife things? What was with your hands. My god... we didn't land did we? Where are you going?"

"Get it together," Aros said. He turned fully toward her. "We are in a bad place. We were both reassigned to the gunship. We must act like Space Service officers and perform our duties. Now, lets go."

"Alright," Jane said. She was coming back to herself. It was the first time she had been exposed to such violence and it took her otherwise well-trained mind a second to take over.

They began to jog.

"I've just never seen a Scalie up close before, only diagrams and photos of the few that were killed attacking Tellus twenty years ago. How did you find me?"

"I was coming from my quarters when I heard them. So I took them out to get at their ship." Aros stopped at the next sonic shield and deactivated it with his scroll. "I knew they must have had something on their landing craft that would generate gravity. You were just lucky, I guess."

"You killed them both so quickly..."

"That's what I do."

"But no rifle. What were those things you used?" Jane said.

"Didn't have time to stop by the armory," Aros grinned. "I brought this along," Aros said pointing to his remaining hon-ra, "and it sure came in handy."

"I heard you were from Northern Columbia, are they aboriginal weapons?"

"An old man, from back where I grew up taught me how to use them."

***

Jane and Aros arrived at the Aurora _'_ s dock soon after the massive Scalie starships were spotted coming around from the planets far side. The two ran up to the control terminal situated in front of the Aurora _'_ s nose, which was poking into the room. The docking collars, angled against the top and bottom of the wedge-shaped ship, provided the resistance needed to utilize the power from the ships massive engine. Tech Specialist Crescent descended a short ladder from the bottom hatch of the ship.

"Oh, I'm glad to see you, Sir," Crescent said. "I saw from the bridge that we were boarded. And gravity! What the hell is going on!?"

"Are we ready to go?"

"Yes, Sir," Crescent said. "But, I thought your secondary was security. Wasn't Major Farris supposed to command this ship?"

"I don't know," Aros said, climbing the latter ahead of the other two. "All I was told was to take command and get this thing launched as fast as I could. What's the normal complement? Five?"

"Yes, Sir. But you two are the only ones that have shown up!"

"We have big company coming. We can't wait. The other must have gotten stuck."

"We had to take two Scalies down on the way here. I almost got trapped, but apparently I wasn't the only one..." Jane said, also climbing aboard.

"Yeah, we are missing Pilot, Weapons, and Comms, assuming you are Sensors and you are in command, Sir."

Aros jumped into the command seat, set the stolen gravity projector beside him and pulled up a display. He pointed at the pilot chair, "You know how to fly this thing. Novalis, take sensors and route communications to your secondary panel. I will be command and cover weapons."

"I don't know," Jane said. "Should we wait a little longer or get conformation from the bridge?"

"We have no time. I have orders to launch as soon as I am mission capable. 'In the absence of orders, I will take appropriate action,'" Aros said, quoting the officers creed.

The reference to oaths taken decided the point for the unsure. The hatch was sealed; the dock room was locked and depressurized. Against protocols, the ship launched itself out into the hostile space with only three crew members aboard.

***

"Sir! I am detecting the launch of Aurora!" Internal Control reported above the bridge commotion.

"Launch of the gunships was not authorized! Who gave the command!?"

"The crew ID code that gave authorization was... all zeros? I don't know, Sir."

"Just what in the world is going on! Call that ship back! What the hell is Farris thinking?!" The Captain said.

"Sir, East and West have moved within fifty thousand passus of our position. The Aurora is moving off, heading towards West," Sensor reported.

"I want to talk to those fools NOW!" The Captain yelled. "This is unacceptable!"

"We are right here, Sir," a voice said from the back of the room.

Captain Bartlett got up and turned to see Major Ferris, Warrant Officer Lete and a Communications Specialist entering the bridge.

"What is going on? Speak, Ferris!"

"I'm confused, Sir," Major Ferris said, sounding on the edge of anger himself. "Each of us got redirected to alternate secondary assignments. The three of us got messages to report to sensor array four, on the other side of the ship from Aurora. After a few minuets it made no sense! Our scrolls aren't working to confirm with IC. So we came here. Is that the Aurora?"

"Sir, I am leaving the bridge. I will link up with the security teams and make sure the Ushas is secured," Colonel Plash informed his superior. "I won't let those reptile irrumator take a second ship."

"Go," Captain Bartlett turned back toward the main screen. "Why am I still not talking to them!"

"Sir, something is malfunctioning with our systems," the communications officer said. "Wait! The Aurora is transmitting on all frequencies! I can receive but we can't transmit. Oh meus deus... I am recording and putting the audio on speakers."

What came out was not Latin. It was low frequency with high sounds spiking through in places. It sounded like a song with warbles and growls. It was like a language no one on the bridge crew had ever heard. And then it stopped.

"Plash was right, those damn creatures some how took the Auror..."

The Captain was cut off by a reply to the Auroras transmission. This time, the language was much more harsh. It grated on the ears, despite the reasonable volume. Every member of the bridge crew stopped what they were doing and listened with wide eyes.

"Sir, my linguistic analyzers are telling me this is not a human language."

"That seems pretty obvious to us all, Lieutenant. Thank you," the Captain snapped.

"But, Sir, the strange thing the computer is reporting a recognizable difference between the quality of the speakers," the communication officer quickly rattled off. "The program says that the similarity of languages being produced by the speakers is nearly identical, with the only difference in the vocal equipment and modulation of the first speaker being quite different from the second."

"What are you saying?"

"That the computer believes that the speaker on the Aurora is human, and the respondent is not."

The implications of this information took a second to sink in.

***

"Crescent, move us toward the closest Scalie ship. Lets set a block between it and the Prime."

"I'm still having problems getting in contact with the Prime Meridian," Jane told Aros. "Our single channel protocols don't seem to be connecting."

"We are going to have to just do a broad spectrum transmit. It won't be secure, but it's the best we can do. Let me know when you have it set up."

"Hey, Sir! We are coming up on that ship fast. How close are we going to get?" Crescent said, on the edge of panic.

"You are doing good, Cress. Just hold us here."

The Aurora had a small main screen, and Aros pulled up a multi spectrum image of the Scalie ship. It had four main spikes connected by the rest of the ship. It was arranged like a square with the center being large and open. It was aimed, spikes in direction of travel, leaving the yellow energy arcs from the engines slightly visible.

"This ship looks nothing like the ships that attacked Tellus..." Crescent said.

"The channel is open, Drogen. The Scalies are probably going to hear this too, so keep it short."

Both Jane and Crescent turned to listen to what Aros would have to say back to their own ship. Instead, they were both shocked by what came out of his mouth. Having to extend his neck at points and odd movements with his tongue, Aros sang out a stream of vocalizations that were not human.

Jane and Crescent had both never heard a Scalie speak, as was the case with most humans, but they instinctively knew to whom Aros was talking.

When he finished, Aros sat with his eyes closed, awaiting a response.

"What in the Field of Arbol was that!!?" Jane shouted.

"Just wait. He knows what he is doing," Crescent said in awe. A smile spread across his face when the hair-raising reply from the true speakers of the strange language came across the open channel. "Ripper..." he breathed.

***

"Internal Control!" the Captain bellowed. "I want a headcount of scrolls on this ship. Tell me who isn't here!"

The crew continued to listen to the back and forth communication between the Aurora and the unknown enemy as Internal Control made the headcount.

"I am missing Tech Specialist Crescent, Lieutenant Novalis and Lieutenant Drogen," Internal Control said.

"Drogen!" the weapons officer said under his breath.

The Captain turned. "Lieutenant Veldt! Do you know something that I should?"

"Sir," Veldt began, "I have had my suspicions from the first moment I met Drogen that there was something more to him than appeared. He is too good! He doesn't really connect with others the way one would expect an officer to. That is not to say that people don't like him, but..."

"The point!?" Captain Bartlett cut in.

"Sir, I think that guy is one of the Grand Marshal's men. I think he is one of the Archmen."

"You think he was a plant on this mission with his own set of orders?" The Captain stopped and thought. He had heard rumors Midord's Archmen. He regretted letting Plash take off. He needed a second opinion.

"So, I am supposed to operate on the assumption that Lieutenant Drogen is one of the Archmen and has commandeered my gunship for some reason that I was not made aware of?" Captain Bartlett reflected aloud.

"He is not an Archmen."

The room all turned to the sensor station at the front left of the bridge. Tech Specialist Gorra stood up. She spoke and walked around the station, positioning herself so everyone on the bridge could see her.

"There are two Archmen assigned to this mission, and Drogen is not one of them," she said aloud.

"And you are," The Captain scoffed. "So, are you taking command my ship or should I continue to deal with this crisis as I see fit, Archmen."

"No actions have yet triggered my orders. I am here to help, Sir."

"Sure you are," he said dismissing her. "How far are those ships?"

"Twenty eight thousand passus," Sensors said. "The West is positioning itself at a different angle from East. Sir, I am detecting a large energy shift in West... Look!" the sensor officer said, pointing to the main screen.

The shot was of the Scalie ship dubbed West. In the central open portion, surrounded by the body of the ship, was a bubble of aqua light. Energy beams from the ship shot inward to the central point of the open space, causing the bubble to grow. The bubble was just that, undulating and slightly transparent. The surface was not uniform; its surface had a similar appearance to the light that is thrown on the bottom of a rippling swimming pool.

The clamor on the bridge was at a near roar when the bubble slowly began to move away from its birth point in the center of the ominous West. It slowly shifted toward the Prime Meridian.

LT. Veldt on weapons attempted to fire on all his preset firing solutions, but the commands failed to activate missile launch. The pilot made an effort to move the ship, but turning on a dime to activate engines took too much time. The ship began to rotate, but the bubble reached it first. The alien bubble passed over the Prime Meridian, encompassing it, Scalie assault craft and all.

In all of the confusion, it took the crew a second to realize that the aqua tented image on the main screen was slowly dissolving away to blackness. Everything disappeared beyond the thin veil. From the outside, the bubble solidified and shrank, finally winking out of existence in a fraction of a second. The Prime Meridian was gone.

***

"NO!!!" Jane screamed when the Prime Meridian no longer appeared on any of her instruments.

"What have you done!?" She turned and cried at the man sitting at the command seat. "You've killed us all!!"

"Point your scopes toward the rift," Aros said. He paid no attention to Jane's wide eye stare as he told the sit-in pilot where to move the ship next. After he finished, he reactivated the open channel and began taking to the Scalies.

Jane turned back to her station, wiping back the tears of rage and sorrow that clouded her eyes. As she moved the ships main sensor scopes and compensated for their movement, she thought about what to do next. Should she try to attack and subdue the mad man? No, he had dealt with two Scalies like they were stuffed toys. She would have to convince him to make a run for the rift and home. But how would she be...

Half way across the system, the most startling thing appeared. The same aqua-green light of the bubble materialized, the same size it was before it flashed out of existence. A second later the bubble burst, evaporating away. Jane quickly pulled it up on the main screen and magnified the area. The Prime Meridian sat hanging near the rift, in the same poor shape it was in seconds before the near instantaneous movement.

***

"We seem to be back in normal space, Sir!" Sensors shouted. "Computing our location."

"Internal Control! Get a report from the XO. Find out how we are doing with our intruders," the Captain said. "Where are we, Sensors?"

"It appears we are back at the edge of the rift, Sir!"

"You have got to be joking me," Captain Bartlett said to no one in particular. "Gravity and fast travel..."

"Sir," Engineering spoke up, "we have sustained massive damage from the intrusion by the enemy ships. We have systems down all over the penetrated ventral areas. If you are thinking about going back for the Aurora, the drag alone will slow us down by days. Security teams are reporting engagements in various locations. We are in pretty desperate shape."

"Then get repair teams working on it!"

"Captain," the Archmen began, "I would have to agree. We need to get back to Tellus with all this new data and technology we have obtained. The treasure trove of linguistic data from those transmission alone may give us the key to translating their language..."

"But we left a gunship behind! I demand an explanation from Drogen. I can't let that ship fall into enemy hands. I will not just slink away like a defeated curr!"

"You will slink away if you want to keep control of your ship," Gorra said in a low voice. "If you attempt to go back, I will take command from you and return us nevertheless."

Bartlett sunk back in his command chair and covered his face with his hands. He had waited his whole career for this appointment. And now he wrecked the crowning achievement of the human race, a ship capable of long-range travel that took five years to build. Now he would go down in the history books as the man who was defeated by the Scalies and lost a ship under his command.

"This can still turn out well. We have gravity generators! We know the position of the enemy! We just traveled a quarter of the way across this field in a second! Our scientists will be poring over the data that we bring home for years. You may have saved the human race! We are leaving that gunship. Those people chose their path. There is nothing we can do for them."

The Captain straitened up in his chair. "Take your station, Tech. Specialist, or whatever your true rank may be. I yield."

"Pilot, take us home. Fast as safety allows."

***

"They are leaving? They are leaving us!" Jane cried

"That's perfect. Right here, Cress," Aros said.

Aros again switched on the channel to the Scalies and let out a croak. Ahead of them, the West began to charge another bubble.

"Wait!" Jane jumped up. "What just happened!? How did the Prime just get back to the rift like that? What is going on!!?"

"Sit down, Jane. I will explain everything. I promise."

"Are you sure about this, Sir?" Crescent said.

"Yes, this will take us where we want to go. They can produce bubbles that transition everything inside into a baby universe. They send it in a direction with an expected distance which the baby universe will pop us back out into the real universe," Aros explained.

"They can do that?" Crescent said.

"Wait. Direction of the bubbles movement dictates where we go? Why is the bubble coming toward us this way and not aiming us at the rift?"

Aros looked at Jane. He smiled. The bubble got closer. While it was engulfing them, Jane and Crescent sat stupefied. Their minds were reeling from the events of the past hour. Aros was grinning.

"Here we go!"

Part V

The gunship Aurora popped out of the baby universe, a miniature created universe completely separate from the original, very far away from the Unknown Field.

"This is not Tellus!" Jane said. "Where did we just turn up?"

"Relax. We are in the Sagittarius Dwarf Elliptical Galaxy." The other two stared at Aros in disbelief. "It is a small loop of stars, mainly consisting of four globular clusters, that runs perpendicular to the plain of our spiral galaxy. We are in the furthest of the star clusters."

"Why would you send us out here? Why wouldn't you send us home?" Jane said.

"If it all works out, we will all be going home. You just have to trust me."

"Trust you? You must be joking. You just tricked us onto this ship, launched without permission, spoke in some alien language, got us separated from our ship, and sent us off in a baby universe to another Galaxy! _"_

"Well, it's basically an extension of our own..." Crescent tried to help.

"Stay out of this, Specialist," Jane snapped. "You have some explaining to do. Now!"

"Easy enough," Aros said, sitting back into his chair. "We are looking for a star. A very particular star."

"Look for it? How come you didn't get us sent right to it? Why do we have to look for it?" Crescent asked.

"Well, because it is small. It will appear similar to a neutron star, only very small. Probably a couple hundred passus in diameter. It will look like a white dwarf star, but emitting less light than sensors would expect, and have no mass. That fact should give it away. I don't know exactly where it is, somewhere here in the last globular cluster, so we are going to have to search."

"Are you mad? A star? Why would you come out here looking for some star, thats existence sounds impossible the way you tell it?" She paused. "Did you have this planned the whole time? Did you know we would get attacked so you could steal this ship? Why did bring us along? I want to know! Start talking!"

"Cress, lets start a search pattern. I doubt it will be close to any other bodies. Probably a serpentine pattern out towards the end of the cluster. We can do continual scans..."

"Did you hear me?!" Jane interrupted.

"I will explain everything in time, I promise. I will answer all your questions, but first I want you to think about our situation. We are too far away from home to even comprehend. We have no way, without assistance, to make it back in our lifetime. The only way we will ever see real ground again is if you trust me and we make it to this star. So, I will tell you this: don't attempt to stop me. I'm sure both of you realize at this point that I will not be stopped. Second, if you attempt to sabotage any key systems, I will know. I took control of the Prime Meridian the same way. I am not attempting anything sinister; I just want to get home just like both of you. Agreed?"

"Alright, Sir," Crescent said. "I have no idea what is going on, but I know you are a good guy. So, I trust you."

"Thanks, Cress."

"But, I am going to take you up on explaining things. I think I have about a million questions."

"Jane?"

"To think I started to like you, and you lied to us the whole time. I'm going below." Jane got up and walked out of the main room of the gunship and took the hatch in the back of the room down to the lower level.

"Don't worry about her, she will come around," Aros said to Crescent. "Lets start that pattern. I will set up the sensor search."

***

About two hours into the search, Jane climbed up from below. She went silently to the sensor station and sat down. Both Aros and Crescent looked at her work on the station out of the corners of their eye. After a minuet she finally spoke up.

"You forgot to limit the parameters of the QuadDAR search from going over sections we have already passed though. You had it on total scan. This will save us time and prevent re-scanning areas."

"Great."

"The telescoping cameras might also give us a hit before the scanners get in range," Jane said, immediately launching into her next thought.

"Things have been bothering me. I couldn't even sleep, although I'm exhausted. I have to know how you were able to talk to the Scalies. What could you have said to make them not destroy the Prime? Instead they sent us both away using some advanced technology? You said you would answer my questions."

"That is a big question to answer, but probably not the biggest you will ask me on this trip. You may not believe what I have to say, but I swear it's the truth. I have come far and am tired. I will tell it all," Aros began.

"I am a traveler. I am not from your world. This body was born there, but I was not. I am just like you, nothing more than a man. But, I was lost and have been searching for my friends and home for a very long time. You must understand that there are other worlds than these."

"Other worlds?"

"Yes, other planets. Different versions of the same world. Versions of Tellus where the Roman Empire fell much sooner and the aboriginals of the western continents did not band together to keep out invaders from across the sea. There are ways to travel to different realms, dimensions and worlds. Existence is speckled with great powers or just simple cracks that allow you to leave one world for another. I have sought out these passageways, traveling up and down the levels of existence. Most of the time I had little idea where I was. Much of my knowledge comes from other travelers I have met on my way.

"Once I found myself on another human world, in your own galaxy. Piecing it together, I believe it was in the Perseus Arm. This world was taken over by the race of reptiles you call Scalies. They call themselves Chi-kashdta, which is not right, but the closest human equivalent of their word. The Chi took over that world, much the same way they attempted to do so on Tellus. It was suitable to them and they were in the habit of expanding, so they took it. The people were not as close to developed the way Tellus was, but they were intelligent and had a great capacity to learn.

"I arrived more than a century after it happened. The Chi had long since wiped the planet clean of humans, minus a handful of survivors. It was a great loss, which the Chi came to realize eventually. This clan softened from a hard nomadic group of youngsters and grew wiser with age. You see, the Scalies we saw on the Prime were young males, warriors and meat eaters. As they grow older, their teeth dull and they become herbivores. They transition to be the reproductive sex in mid-age and finally to asexual creatures in the last half of their life. As they age, they gain intelligence. By the time the invading young ones grew old, they realized the error of their ways.

"Humans were given great rights. They were allowed to live as they pleased and join in all walks of Chi society they wished. The children all grew up speaking Chi as well as their human tongue. The Chi treated the men with high regard. The humans had great talent as storytellers, musicians, poets, and oracles. But the thing that made the Chi elders change their minds about the humans and hold them in such high regard was some of the men's skill in mediation.

"When problems arose, the Chi would hire a Mediator as judge. Much liberty was given to these Mediators and it kept their people living better than even some Chi."

"So you learned their language from them at one of their schools, then," Crescent said.

"No. Language was a gift I earned long before. But that is not this story," Aros said. "Just now, I spoke with an elder Chi, who was on the planet and bargained for the lives of all of you, though you don't deserve it."

"What do you mean?" Jane asked in disbelief.

"Every version of your world I have visited seems to have their own group similarities. There are versions where the people are obsessed with pride of their groups, others that are overly political. But your version has this idea that they are the crowning achievement of existence and it is inconceivable to you that you are not the hero of the story.

"You assume that since one group of Chi attacked you, a minor attack on the grand scale of things, that they are the one great enemy of the human race and you must destroy them. I don't know where this mentality came from. It is all over your popular culture, so many films and book about the big bad creatures from outer space that come to destroy humans. As a group, you had no idea that that was only a small clan of Chi-kashdta marauders, not one of the large clans you attacked. The ones that attacked Tellus used old, inferior technology to burn a passage into your Field. They came to trade with your planet. Trade. Make a name for themselves and grow. But your governments jumped to the defense and angered these young Chi. You people made yourselves the righteous victims and crossed the stars with that warped mentality and revenge in your souls.

"I know, I know, it's not your fault. You were just acting on the information you had at the time. You didn't even know what the Chi were saying to you on that first attack. and they reacted back violently. With the plethora of communication between myself and the Chi, that the Prime Meridian no doubt recorded, I'm sure the real intent will be discovered. Whether that changes anything will be the thing to see."

"You make it sound like we are wicked and have a fatal flaw that has little chance of being corrected," Jane countered.

"Maybe I am being too harsh. Maybe I have been too long from a society I fit into. Tellians are great by themselves or in small numbers. It is the same with all versions of your world, whether you call it Earth, or Tellus. It is when you get billions of humans together that the tidal pull of their collective personality can be seen. I don't expect it to change, just something for you to think about. Maybe you can communicate this to your people, when you get back."

There was silence for a moment as each processed what had just been said. Jane snorted and shook her head, fighting against every notion. She couldn't believe the story, it was pure fantasy. But here she was, in another galaxy, with few other explanations to account for it. He was either mental or something else. She closed her eyes and concentrated on the swelling weight of all the things on her mind.

"You said there are other worlds. How many have you been too? How long have you been traveling?" Crescent said.

"I have no grasp on how long I have been searching. I have traveled through time, which complicates things. This is not my first body, and I have been to plenty of worlds. I just hope this path will lead me where I want to go."

"Lets take a break, we have been going at full speed for a while," Aros said. "I'm going to rack out for a dozen hours. I'll see you guys later."

Aros got up and walked to the hatch below. He didn't look like the old traveler he claimed to be. He looked like a young, fit man in the prime of his life. Passing him on the street, no one would have thought twice that he was capable of so much. He dropped below and the room was quiet.

"What do you think, Ma'am," Crescent said. "Do you think he is telling us the truth about the Scalies and ? It is kinda hard to wrap your head around."

"I don't know Cress. I just don't know. I think I'm just as tired as he is," Jane said. "And you can drop the Ma'am thing. I think we have passed those formalities."

"It's just, you should have seen him on Sulva. He beat this arena fighter who was twice his size. And the way he spoke back there. How else did he get us sent way out here?"

"I heard about the arena. He must have gone easy on the guy compared to how fast he took out the two Scalies back on the Prime. And his hands... they were glowing this odd blue... I don't want to think about it! Just leave me alone for a bit Cress. I am so stressed out."

"Alright, yeah. I think we all need some sleep."

***

The next ten hours on the Aurora were quiet. A few minuets after Aros departed, Crescent left his pilot's chair, situated front and center of the bridge. He went to the lower deck of the Aurora to sleep off his own fatigue. Jane stayed awhile longer, sitting at the sensor station. She looked around the bridge at the four main stations surrounding the command chair, where weapons were also controlled.

She had so many questions, so many things unanswered. She was not sure if she believed that the quiet lieutenant was actually not from their world at all. The only thing that was firm in her mind, from looking at the astrometrical data, was that they were hopelessly lost, very far from home. That, and she felt grimy from the past cycles events.

Jane walked back behind the engineering station to the porthole connecting the two decks. Usually without gravity, one would just push themselves through to the lower deck. But now, the thin ladder used by construction crews on Tellus, came in handy. She gently climbed down into the dim room, as to not disturb the others.

The lower deck was a rectangle room with a high ceiling. On one end was a heavy door that slid open from both sides that held the engine room behind it. On the opposing end was the ships head. Jane walked quietly down the center of the room, avoiding the wall folded out cots where Aros and Crescent slept. She gave an especially wide birth to Aros's cot.

***

Jane woke up in the darkness and immediately grabbed for her scroll. But it was not in its place, and she remembered she had changed clothes before she slept. She found her scroll clipped to one of the unnecessary sleeping straps that was attached to the edge of the cot. The only light in the room came from the open porthole that lead to the bridge. She fanned her scroll to check the time.

"That can't be right," she said, pulling off the thin but warm blanket and swinging her feat over the edge. Jane hopped down, bumping into the cot below her, as once again, the gravity had changed. Crescent lifted his head and sleepily watched. Jane, in undershirt, pants and barefoot, bound over to the light from the ceiling. She stopped at the base of the ladder and launched herself halfway up to the porthole. Crescent tore off his covers and followed.

"What is going on now?" she demanded when she reached the bridge. Aros was working on his scroll and turned around at the newcomers. "What's with the gravity generator? Is it going out?"

"I just turned it down for a couple hours. Being a little lighter really helps you sleep. I knew you two needed it. Morning Cress."

"Morning, Sir," Crescent said, coming up to the bridge.

"We slept for fourteen hours," Jane said. "You shouldn't have let us sleep that long."

Jane sat down at her station, looking over the data from the time she had been away. "So no hits while we were out, I take it?"

"None."

"So, is it ripper if I break into the emergency rations?" Crescent asked.

"Go for it. We have food for at least five days."

Crescent pulled out a tough box and began fishing around for the best meals. He tossed one to Jane and Aros. They all opened their packages and began to eat when Crescent spoke up.

"I've been wondering, Sir. Why us? Why not go alone? Of all the people on the ship, why did you take us with you? I can't imagine we were a random choice. Everything you have done has been pretty purposeful. What is so great about us two?"

"Well, Cress, I couldn't fly this ship alone. You know it inside out, and know how to fly it. I could have diverted you like I did with the other crew, that's true. I figured that you would follow my lead with little question. I'm sorry if that seems heartless, but I needed someone like you with me. And, I like you Cress! You are a good guy. Plus, you owe me one, after saving you from that knuckle-scraper back on Sulva."

Crescent let a faint grin cross his face and he nodded.

"What about me," Jane said with a blank face.

"I needed Sensors and at least one more pair of hands."

"And you thought that because of the way we talked the other night, that you would be able to manipulate me, as well?"

"No. No, I figured you would react like this. The truth is, you remind me of someone I once knew. Same strong will. Same demeanor. You even look similar." Aros looked down at his food as he explained this to Jane. Jane was slightly taken back by this body language, as Aros usually had an unashamed gaze, using his eyes like weapons. A strong urge came over her. Her mouth opened before she knew what she was doing.

"What was her name?"

"Kya."

Jane looked away. The name meant nothing to her. Just two syllables that stood for a person that she had no connection with. She could care less, but the name kept echoing around her brain.

"What about the star we are searching for? How did you find out about it? How are you sure it will work?" Crescent asked.

"I told you, I have been to many worlds. I have read libraries of books listened to many lyrical tales, seen hours and hours of films. On Tellus, I found something that really surprised me. Have you heard of a storyteller called the FarSeer?"

"I think so," Crescent said, searching his memories. "Didn't he write five or six books about a bunch of different stuff? I remember one about some gangsters in the desert..."

"That's one of them," Aros said. "There are six tales, all written is a mysterious tone with the author saying that he saw these stories happening, 'far from here.' It's a good literary trick to excite your readers into believing they are reading something truly special. And it worked.

"His stories are all over the place. They do not fit into one particular genre. They are all written in slightly different styles. I thought each was done very well, but the most important thing about them is, I knew every one before I read them. The stories were new to your world, but not to me. That story about the two gangs fighting in the desert and a lone gunslinger that plays both sides, I heard it before. Each one was, to some degree, a known tale on some other world. I thought maybe this guy really could see to different worlds.

"It was his final book that convinced me. It was the story of a prisoner in a tower. I knew this story only because I had known that prisoner. In the book, there are two sentences, almost out of place with the rest of the story:

'An arm of stars stretches away from the bulge of our galaxy, and at the end of this arm, sits a dim white star. This facade can take you where you desire; it is the gateway to other worlds. _'_

"I was convinced, so I tracked down the author. His real name turned out to be Miles King, and he lived on the northeast coast of North Colombia. I found out he had died when I was only twelve years old. I went to his grave before I joined the Space Service and found a huge black granite headstone with a small star carved on along with his name. That's when I knew. This time, that star would be the way I escape your world."

***

"Enough of this. You have told us all about how humans have terrible tendencies and everything that is wrong with us. You risked all of our lives on some stupid story you read so that you could get back home. You have been hinting all around it, so now I want to know, where did you come from, who are you really Aros Drogen?"

There was a brief silence as Aros took his time finishing his mouthful of food. Crescent, with full eyes, snapped his neck from Jane to Aros.

"It's just Aros. Drogen was a given name. I am a Tarkin, from a world called Yazos. We have no last or secondary names. I am just Aros."

"You said you would answer everything. Don't get bashful now. I want to know it all. Is that where you are trying to get back to?" Jane said. She felt on fire. The filter between her brain and mouth seemed to have just disintegrated. She noticed her hands were gripping the sides of her seat. She let go and took a deep breath.

"I'm not getting bashful. I was planning on telling you everything before we got there. So here it goes, here is my story on how I first left my world and began my wonderings. It is all because of the legend of the dark star."

Legend of the Dark Star

Going home is always good, especially when you have been gone for a while. The feeling of returning to a safe place, one held dear in your memories, is one of the best feelings in the world. The prospect of seeing people left behind, sights and smells that have long been missed, a deep longing for the familiar; these are the things that Aros held in his heart as he returned home.

He walked. His feet fell softly along the dusty path. His way was flat and he walked with three tubes arranged as a pack, which were strapped to his back. Aros was not alone. Another boy, slightly taller, walked beside him. They did not speak. This trip had been a long time in coming and they both had plenty on their minds. Aros's five years of service were over. He was free to pursue whatever he was inclined to do; the next question was where that inclination would lead him.

Rather than face the problem head on, Aros stared off in the distance, taking in the view. Across the plain of yellow grass, he could see an enormous emerald building. The main structure of the Dohit city was perfectly square, rising high into the sky, with a low angled pyramid completing the top. It was massive compared to some of the similarly shaped smaller buildings surrounding it. The whole area of Tapa Urkan City looked like a very regular formation of crystals, when viewed through the slight haze created by the distance. It was far enough that the two Tarkin could not see the base of the city from across the field.

It was morning, in the end of the dry cycle. After the much shorter wet cycle swept over the continent, the yellow grass would become green again and stand up to stretch for the sun. But for now, it was withered and drooping with the lack of water, perfect for the boys to walk off the path and sleep when night came. They had left late from the Tarkin main city Kayros, a mountain forest surrounding a lake in the middle of the continent. They chose the non-expidant route home; one full day of walking to make it to Tapa Urkan. From there they would be able to get on a Dohit transport that would take them to the coast and the homes they longed for.

***

"You think you may stay for a night before you take off to your family?" Aros asked Akoda. They were sitting on an open-air cargo flat, riding an over-land transport they had snuck on. The cargo portion of the free rolling train was sparsely loaded, allowing the shocks to give them a smooth ride on such third class accommodations. It was the Tarkin way, they hid in the tall grass when the transport left the city and stealthily climbed on as the train slowed to take the final corner before it reached its full speed. They sat, back to back between two large containers that were secured to the bed.

"I might as well," Akoda answered. "I am sure I could use a break and continue on the next day, using the canopy route."

"You tell anyone you were coming back?" Aros said.

"Just my Father. But I'm sure the whole village knows by now. You?"

"No, I figured I would surprise them."

They rode the rest of the way in relative silence, taking in the view on either side of the quick moving train. From Aros's view of the north, he could see far across the slowly descending planes. Huge white boulders stood sporadically across the sea of grass, like islands in the seas to the south. Far to the north and east, the base of the great mountain could be seen rising into the clouds. The top of the mountain became lost in clouds, indistinguishable from the rest of the sky. Aros had never been to the Tavair mountains, but had heard of the many villages, Nar, Dohit and Tarkin, that encompassed the area.

Akoda, facing south, had a much less interesting view. He too had the white rock islands standing in the grassland, as well as some greenery. A belt of trees paralleled their path west, slowly pealing off as the train curved slightly to the north. A river, off-flow from the lake, ran its winding path to the ocean. The two had debated following the rocky river to the coast and trekking north into the great pocket of coastal forest which hid their villages. But in the end, a much quicker route, enjoying a lift to a small Dohit city, was chosen instead.

A couple hours past and the smell of fresh ocean air crept upon the two passengers. Akoda slowly pressed his body out looking in the direction of their movement. He pulled back just as slowly. He taped Aros on the shoulder three times. Aros moved his pack to his right hand and prepared himself. As the transport slowed, the two slid off the cargo deck, tucked, rolled and disappeared into the grass. The act was probably unnecessary, as it was no secret that Tarkin used the transports for rides. This fact would not stop any of them, for the Tarkin, being sneaky was as natural as breathing.

Getting up after the transport left the area, Aros looked west. Marking the end of the plane region rose up a great coastal forest. The trees were, at maturity, three hundred feet tall and so wide around it would take 16 Tarkin men touching hands to wrap around a trunk. The bark was smooth and tan. Branches left the trunk at ninety-degree angles, with the root of the branch arching deeply on the underside. The ends of the branched spread out like the frayed end of a rope. The leaves were fist sized and oval, giving the illusion of dark green clumps of clouds surrounding the towering wooden soldiers. In the rainy season, light blue flowers would adorn the trees, later producing small, red, pitiless fruits. The forest was thick, trees standing close enough for some of the branches to overlap, but not so close that the strong ropes of the root systems could ever be confused with that of another tree. This incredible woodland was just one of over thirty that existed all over the main inhabited continent of Yazos.

The two young men moved quickly across the end of the plains, to disappear into the deep forest that they knew so well. Once into the tree line, the two would use hidden climbing routes that would lead up into the lower third of the trees. Pathways between the branches acted as a road that the inhabitants used to cross the area in between villages. They swiftly made their way.

***

Maran walked out of the community tree as dusk was settling. She had just finished eating with three other women in the village, as they usually did after the youngsters had been fed. She enjoyed being around the children, they made her feel young. Maran took her turn teaching, both the boys and girls, how to plant food in the troughs of the higher up branches and how to gather the sweet fruits which grew on the edges of the trees. She was a village mother and more. She was the leader of the small village. All twelve families took turns leading, and for the past six years, it had been her turn. She enjoyed the job as it gave her something to do since her own son had been gone the past five. In fact, she thought, coming out onto the branch and breathing the fresh air, it had been exactly five years since Aros has been gone. He said he would be returning one of these days _..._

She walked down the main branch leading away from the community tree and took a ramp up to a branch from another. The winding path leading to the tree she lived in was not long. As she approached, she looked at the tree she called home. Above the entrance to her room she looked on the face carved onto the spot where a branch had been removed. Her father had decoratively carved the face of her grandfather onto the family tree as a memorial. Around the village, many faces of the departed decorated trees, but this one was special. Her father had carved it himself rather than commissioning an artist. It was not as flawless as some she had seen, but it had captured the love he must have had for the man. Maran suddenly became aware of a presence behind her, so she turned. Behind her stood two figures, but it took her no time to recognize her own son.

"It's about time you came back," she said, embracing her Aros. "I was just going home. Have you eaten? Who is your friend?"

"This is Akoda. We did all our time together. He lives across the forest in Lantun. He is going to rest a day before he heads home."

"That's fine, that's fine. Are you boys hungry? I bet it was a long journey from the lake. Some of us just finished eating, I could make you something."

"We brought some food with us," Akoda answered. "I am just ready to get some sleep."

"Straight ahead. The third level has a spare bed. I'm going to catch up. I'll see you in the morning."

Akoda knocked Aros on the shoulder as he went past and smoothly traversed the landings of Aros's family tree. He disappeared into the black doorway of the third level room hollowed into the heart of the huge trunk. Aros turned back to his mother.

"How have you been? I am so happy to be back!" The pair began to walk.

"Yes. I just don't know what to do with you being back. You're so much bigger, so tall and strong! You look just like your grandfather. How is he?"

"I would see him at least once a week. We would eat together. He is always so busy," Aros said. "How are you? What have you been doing to keep yourself busy?" Aros let his mother go first up a ladder leading to the first level where she stayed. She talked as she made the short climb.

"Oh, all sorts of things! I take the children and teach them to farm, and what plants are okay to eat. Tell them stories and we go on day trips. I'm still taking care of everything around here. Organizing when seasonal work has to be done. When I get lonely or sick of everyone, I go high up to the tops and play my whistle, like when you were a child. I have even made up a lot of new tunes."

"That is great you started playing again. So great. So how is everyone else? How is Tharn?"

"Tharn has not changed a shade. He has asked when you would be back. He wants to see you, I'm sure."

"I will have to see him first thing." Aros hugged his mother again. "I need some sleep too. I will see you in the morning."

"Sleep well."

Aros was halfway up the latter to his own room when he stopped.

"Is Kya still around? Has she gone off?"

"No, she is still here."

"Good night, mother."

Maran smiled. Aros departed and she turned to go in her own room. She was glad he asked about Kya. A mothers meddlesome thoughts marched around her mind as she got ready and went to bed, totally content with the way her night ended.

***

In the early morning, Aros got up and went outside. Akoda was waiting, sitting on a branch near his level. It was early enough that they were probably the first ones up in the village. Aros stretched.

"You are not going to want to start doing exercises, are you?" Akoda said. "I am done with all that guardian stuff. I don't even know why I am up this early. I just want to be idle for an occasion. I am tired of always being on the go."

"Life is movement. The point is to do things and go places."

Akoda guffed. "So what is the plan today? I think I will leave tonight to head home. You said you had some good rivers around here? I wouldn't mind a swim and a nap on a warm rock."

"We can do that. I want to see a couple people first. Come with me and meet Tharn. He is the forsaken I was telling you about. Taught me almost everything I know. You would like him."

"Should we should get some food? Wait for everyone to wake up?"

"Oh no, he will be awake. He doesn't sleep much."

The two moved across the village, taking secondary and tertiary routes above most of the main platforms and walkways. When Aros reached the two level tree that Tharn called his home and workshop, he lowered himself into a dangling position from the branch he was on. He did this in a slow and deliberate manner, which required a lot of muscle control. When he was still and a few seconds had passed, he dropped the few last feet to the platform outside Tharn's workshop. He touched down to a crouch without a sound, scanning the inside of the lit room.

"Glad to hear you are back," A voice said from inside. Aros smiled and began to stand when Akoda followed suite with the same maneuver. Directly after the slight sound of Akoda's arrival, Tharn appeared in the doorway with a hon-ra in hand. The weapon was connected to a body in an attack stance.

Tharn immediately softened when he saw his visitors.

"I had it in my mind it was you, but when I heard a second... Thought someone had come to get me." Tharn flicked his wrist and sent the hon-ra into his inside wall and walked forward to embrace Aros.

"Glad to have you back, kid. I see you survived. Who is this?"

"Akoda. We were paired together ever since training. Fundamentals, sentry duty, a few operations, long range stuff, always paired together. He is from Lantun."

"Good to hear Aros had someone from his own forest to watch out for him," Tharn said to Akoda. "Come in, boys."

The three walked in to Tharn's workshop. Akoda kept his head on a swivel, I treated in all the things filling up the room. They sat down at a crowded workbench as Tharn grabbed three cups and filled them with a red juice. Tharn followed Akoda's searching gaze.

"I know, I have a lot of things in here. Always working on a project. If something breaks, it is brought to me. I am always making trips to the Dohit trading posts to get parts or tools. You name it, I will try to build it. I have gotten fast enough to make a hon-ra in just one day."

"This is a nice one," Akoda said, getting up and taking the one recently placed in the wall. "It's lighter and a bit more slim than the ones we were issued."

"True. But it doesn't affect the strength or blade. You can keep that one. I have plenty."

"Thank you. I wish we had a forsaken living in my village growing up. Aros is always showing me things he learned from you."

"It is what you have to do when you are forsaken. I don't regret being in the wrong line when God was handing out the gift. I was taught from a young age that I must use my strengths rather than wallow in shortcomings I have no control over. My greatest pride is being helpful to my fellow Tarkin for one hundred and fifty two years. I have never let the fact that I can't produce the ghost fire slow me down."

"But enough about an old man tinkering away in his tree. Tell me about your time in Kayros! Lets see those stars!"

Aros and Akoda both brought up their left forearm and showed the forsaken their marks. A blue star for Aros and a red star for Akoda. They were the marks of their clan. All young Tarkin who prove themselves worthy of the small stars etched in their skin were never again looked upon as children.

"Kayros was great," Aros began. "We trained and learned. It was a bit lonely, but we kept each other company and we were always busy. We got to travel all around. The city is amazing. More Tarkin in one place than I have ever seen. And so large. In our last year, we got to go on a lot of small missions, scouting, and other things. It was great."

"But now we are done," Akoda said. "No more waking up early or having to travel long distances to hand deliver messages or stand sentry in front of some council members tree. I can go wherever I want and do as I please."

"They didn't try to talk you into becoming Verdur?" Tharn asked Akoda.

"It was offered, but I outright turned them down. I liked being a warrior, but I want to start a family and not be sent off on dangerous tasks with no warning. Aros didn't say no. He said he needed a break and he would decide."

"Is that so?"

"Yes," Aros said. "My grandfather wants me to become a Verdur. He tells me about his time and how important it is for strong Tarkin to serve their people. I am not against that logic, but I just have this feeling that I should be doing something more. I needed some time to think, that's all."

"Five years was not enough?" Tharn joked.

"I guess not," Aros grinned.

"Well, it is dangerous." Tharn suddenly became serious. "You remember Ekam?"

"Sure. Kya's brother. He gave me a hard time growing up."

"Well, he was sent off on a Verdur mission. I probably shouldn't know this, but he should have been heard from by now. His whole family is worried."

"Sometimes missions run a bit longer than you expect," Akoda said.

"No. This was an important one. It was supposed to be done very quickly. The only reason he would not have sent word to his sister would be because something went very wrong."

"How do you know all this about a Verdur mission? Those arn't things just anyone can know," Akoda pointed out.

"Tharn has his sneaky little ears in most things," Aros shook his head.

"I was not trying to search out this information!" Tharn said. "Ekam didn't close off all other lines to the village when he took the pre-alert for assignment."

Aros laughed. "So what was he sent to do?"

"I cannot be totally sure from the little that was said, but I put it together from other rumors I have heard. A half team of Verdur was sent to take a young boy to the highest peak of Tavair in order to avoid another war."

"What are you talking about? A war?" Akoda said.

"Have you heard of the legend of the dark star?"

Both shook their heads.

"It starts back at the beginning. In the beginning, God created this world, and all in it. He gave life to the strong Nar, the intelligent Dohit, and the clever Tarkin. Soon, the Nar began to be envious of the Dohits intelligence and the Dohit, in return, became jealous of the Nar's strength. And so the two races fought.

"When the Tarkin saw the feud, they climbed the trees to stay out of the fighting. The Tarkin, not being strong like the Nar or intelligent like the Dohit, hid as to not be hurt. Because of this, God looked favorably upon the Tarkin. He gave us our gift, completely unique from the other two, so that we would not be stuck in the trees forever.

"The creation story ends, 'Now with the three races balanced, Yazos thrived.' We all know this story. We are told it from children. But it goes on. When God spread the gift out to the Tarkin, it was not perfect. Some did not receive the gift, and we are called the forsaken. This unbalance created the appearance of the dark star Tarkin.

"Every one hundred fifty years or so, a child is born. When he reaches the age of twelve, when a Tarkin powers emerge, his ghost fire comes out black. The child is amazingly powerful, in more than just our gift. The child is overflowing with strength and rage as well. It is the power that counterbalances all the forsaken that have lived since the appearance of the last dark star.

"The child is dangerous. The first child, his parents tried to raise him normally. But at the littlest anger, the child would explode with rage and nearly unstoppable strength. Seeing that the child could not stay on this world, ancient Tarkin built the gate. High up on the mountain Taviar, a stone doorway to the universe was built. The legend is that whenever the child appears, it must be taken to the top of the mountain and sent off through the Chaos Gate, where the child can do good rather than only cause sorrow here on Yazos."

"You mean, rather than deal with our own problems, we shove him out to some where else? Where does the gate lead?" Akoda asked

"Chaos. No Tarkin, other than the dark stars of the past have ever used the stone gateway to leave this world. It sends the child to some random place in all the worlds. The legend says that he will be a force of good there rather than a negative force here."

"I don't understand. Why he is so bad here? We can't control him at all?"

"I am afraid not," Tharn answered Akoda again. "In the past thousand years since creation, no dark star has ever been controlled. Last time, when I was still unable to climb, there was a small war over a dark star child. A kingdom of Dohit was convinced that they could steal the child and use her as a weapon against their enemies. It was a chaotic time. I was told a bright star fell from the sky and many Tarkin died in the struggle."

"So you think the dark star has returned?" Aros said.

"It has been long enough. I believe that Ekam was one of those dispatched to send the child off. Since he has not been heard from, I feel something has gone wrong. Mayhap the Dohit have tried again to take this child. We have all heard the stories of Tarkin that have escaped capture by the Dohit. There have been stories of gloves and experiments. Perhaps the Dohit have become envious of us as well as the Nar."

"I should find Kya. Thank you for your wisdom old man," Aros said and quickly left.

***

Kya was returning from a path leading south of the village when Aros finally found her. He waited in a branch above the main path, watching her walk back. He seemed to be stuck, paralyzed with not knowing what to say. He wondered how she would look after five years, wondered how much she had changed. She was slightly above average in height and thin. She continued to walk beneath and past him. Her hair was medium length and straight. As children, her auburn hair was always long and wild. She looked so grown, and with a closer look, Aros was even more unsure of how to approach her.

She stopped. After a second, she spun around on her heals and looked up to the exact place where Aros had concealed himself.

"So are you going to mess around, or come down here and say hello to me?"

Aros swung down and landed in front of her.

"I was getting to it. I just had not yet figured out what to say," Aros said. "Hello Kya."

"Hello Aros. Come on, let's walk."

They began to walk back to the village. When the path became tight, Aros dropped behind Kya and let her go first. They walked slowly, no haste in their movements.

"So, you finally came back home. How long are you here for?"

"As long as I want, I have nowhere to be. I am done with the guardians."

"You didn't decide to continue on with the Verdur? What are you going to do?"

"I haven't said no, but I think I am going to take some time to see what I want to do. How about you," Aros asked. "I am surprised you are still here and have not taken off."

"I know. Things have been quiet here since everyone left. I thought about going to Kayros and finding an apprenticeship. I have always wanted to see the hanging gardens and the theater. This place is just so small. You never meet anyone from outside our forest. I bet you loved it in Kayros."

"It is a great place. Busy, but exciting as well. So many Tarkin." Aros paused as he mustered his next thoughts. "I heard that Ekam hasn't checked in with you."

She stopped and turned to him. "No, he has not." She leaned against a vertical branch they were passing. "I'm just so worried. It's not like him. He goes out of his way to let us know he is okay after he is headed home from a mission. Its probably not allowed, but he does it anyway. He is really good about letting us know he is okay. My only brother... He said he would check back in nine days at the most. It's been a whole day over. I just know something went wrong. I have come to trust my feelings on these things."

"He didn't tell you where or what he was going to do?"

"No, you know how secretive Verdur have to be," she said. "He did say this was a big one for him, he was lucky to be chosen for the task."

"Yeah. He probably only knew he was supposed to meet an Appointer. From there he would find out what his task was. No one from the council has contacted your family about him?"

"No, and we don't know what to do. We are almost certainly not supposed to know what Ekam told us before he left. You know the way things work over there, what should we do?"

"I know someone I can call and make an inquiry."

"Thanks," Kya said, not sounding fully hopeful. They continued their walk back.

"We were good friend, right Aros?"

"I'd say we were."

"Even though we have both grown up and changed, I hope we can end up friends again."

"Shouldn't be that hard," He said and bumped into her.

Kya hit him in the arm and they were back home.

***

The day passed by. An early dinner was held in honor of Aros and Akoda's return. The whole village showed up and everyone had a good time getting caught up. Kya was quite, sitting on the far side of the large table in the community tree. She smiled and let the others talk. Aros and Akoda caught her eye from time to time and she made an effort to look cheerful, although both could tell she was deeply troubled.

As the meal wound down, Aros slipped out at the first opportunity. He went to his room and grabbed his handheld communicator, checking his room's computer for the communication codes that he would need for the call he intended to make. After assuring his device was set with the proper set of frequency hops and on the correct time, he left his room. Dusk was falling as he scaled the trees to the upper levels. It had been five years, but he still knew all the best route to take to the villages main communication point.

With the trees in the forest being so thick and tall, transmitting points had to be placed in the tallest trees, to avoid any interference. While physically visiting the communication point was not necessary to make a call, the chances of having your call intercepted between the caller and the transmitter became much smaller. As guardians, the training step to become independent Verdur, the precautionary step was an ingrained action. Aros reached the small transmitter station, set into the last few feet of the trunk, he followed the cable with his eyes out to the small parabolic dish at the very top. No splices or foreign devices. He then scanned his surroundings. He didn't have a strong feeling of being alone, but couldn't distinctly detect anyone either.

Aros clipped the flat side of his communicator into the docking port of the transmitter. All the equipment was bought or traded from the Dohits, and fully checked out by the Tarkin to ensure security. Aros then rechecked the settings and activated the call. He sat and waited for his grandfather to see he had an incoming call and get to a place where he could answer. The blinking blue light, signifying an unnoticed call, quickly changed to blinking green as he acknowledged but had not yet answered. Aros sat patiently, listening to the forest.

"I am Arrin."

"Hello, Grandfather."

"Hello, young man. You made it back home, I see."

"I did."

"Great. How is everyone? My daughter?"

"Fine, everyone is fine, with the exception of the family of a Verdur from here. He goes by the name Ekam," Aros said. "They had some concerns about a mission he was on."

Arrin took a deep breath. "I am sending you a new frequency hop. Wait until we both sync up."

Two clicks came out of the speaker and the blinking light went yellow for a few seconds. When the red of connection came back on, Aros began.

"I know this is inappropriate, but I wanted to ask if you knew anything about his mission. What happened? I heard some interesting rumors."

"This is very inappropriate," Aros's Grandfather said heavily. "But I am going to tell you a few things, because I am frustrated. I just came out of a meeting of the Tarkin council. To discuss the exact mission you are asking me about now."

"What happened to have the whole council discussing it?"

"The grey star called us together to tell us that his Appointer went, two days ago, to meet up with the team and found no one. He did some more investigating and what he found was disturbing. It appears the team was ambushed." He stopped.

"Is it true they were moving the..." Aros lowerd his voice, "the dark star?"

"Where did you hear that?" Arrin demanded. He was clearly flustered.

"The legend. I guess its true."

"Oh, it's no legend, boy. I was just a young man when the last one showed up. We were trying to prevent what happened last time. But it looks like we may have not been successful."

"Has anyone else been sent? Seven Tarkin don't just disappear."

"No, and that is what happened at the meeting. We have intelligence that suggests that the Dialon Kingdom has made a play for the dark star, and have our Verdur as prisoner now. The Council has voted to not send in any more teams. They want things to calm down. They want to try and talk with the Dohits first. They have grown soft," he said in disgust. "We need to find that boy!"

"We need to get our Verdur back. Where did they take them?"

"The best we have is they were ambushed near the North Sea Palace. That's all we have. Every Appointer we have is out searching for information." Arrin took a deep breath again.

"Thank you, Grandfather."

"Don't try to get yourself involved, Aros. Leave this to the Appointers and the Council to sort out. Just tell the family that we are doing everything we can. We will get their son home."

"Yes, Grandfather," Aros said and punched the disconnect. He sat and stared at his handheld for a moment. How will I tell Kya her brother is missing, probably captured by Dohits? He grabbed his handheld and turned to go. I _'_ ll just have to tell her what my grand father told me to _..._

Aros climbed down from the top of the tree and leapt onto the first large branch. Turning away from the trunk to head for home, he came face to face with Kya. His brain kicked into gear, preparing to recite the story of what he had discovered when she spoke first.

"I heard everything," she said with tears rolling down her cheeks.

"I am so sorry."

"I have made up my mind," she said. "I'm going after him. I can't wait for a bunch of old men skulking around while my brother is hurt or in some Dohit labor camp. I can't loose him."

Aros truly felt sorry for his old friend, but was a bit baffled by her loyalty to her brother. He had been nothing but insufferable growing up, always giving Aros a hard time and acting like the best at everything. Aros had no siblings, only about half of any Tarkin children did. He did not feel the strong connection to anyone the way Kya did to her brother. All Aros had, were his friends.

"I'm leaving tonight. I will get some things..." she said, turning away in thought. "I can get to the North Sea Palace by tomorrow afternoon..."

"I will come with you..." Like that, his mind was made up. "...You'll need someone with you. I know my way around a hon-ra, which you may end up needing as well."

Kya turned around and looked Aros full in the face. There eyes meet for a long second, then she threw her arms around his neck. Aros was stunned. By the time he had it registered what had happened, she had released him.

"Thank you so much. In truth, I have barely left this forest..."

"There is nothing to it. But we should leave in the morning. We need some rest before we go. And, I will see if Akoda wants to join us."

Kya nodded and wiped at her eyes.

"Pack light, we may have a long way to go."

They climbed back down to the village together, both lost in their own thoughts. When they reached the point where they would have to split to go to their separate trees, Kya grabbed Aros's hand.

"I feel bad, you just got back. And now here I am, dragging you off again."

"Ehh, this place will always be here. Besides, I'm sure it will be a quick trip."

She released his hand. "Right here tomorrow? Right before the sun rises?"

Aros agreed and Kya set off to her own tree where she would pack some things in a dual-tube pack and try to fall asleep. Aros stayed on the branch.

As soon as Kya was out of sight, Akoda dropped down from his hidden place higher up in the trees. He looked at Aros and shook his head.

"What do you say, want to do one last run?" Aros asked.

"Aros," he began with a sigh. "I'm done with all this. I don't want to go running around in the night anymore for anyone other than me. Her stupid brother is probably locked away in some impenetrable Dohit yard where we have no chance of reaching him. And this dark star kid, I don't even know. Let the Verdur handle that. Not our problem. You should listen to what your grandfather said."

"She needs someone to look out for her. She has her mind set on going and she'd be lost without someone helping her. You sure that you won't come?"

"No. I'm going home. I will leave to Lantun tomorrow. After the sun comes up. I wish you luck and let me know how it turns out."

Akoda slipped away, now in the full dark, leaving Aros sitting in the contrasting light of darkness and the lights from the village below. He looked across the way and saw Akoda slip inside the third level.

Oh, well. Akoda was a good friend, but this was not his fight. Aros didn't blame him. His eyes shifted over to the face of his great-grandfather carved into his home. He had never met the man, but felt like he could sense the sort of Tarkin he was, just from the likeness of his face. Aros sat for a while before he ventured to his room.

***

The next morning Kya met Aros where they parted the day before. Both were packed with minimal supplies, and they departed their village in the quiet of the early morning. The pair headed north across their forest in the direction of the North Sea Palace. The first place they would start their search was an old Dohit city on the ocean. It was one of the first real Dohit cities, constructed out of stone, full of open patios and circular towers. The city was abandoned for a time as the Dohits refined their construction type to the more current emerald buildings, that caught and converted the energy of the sunshine. The old city was eventually reused as a major trading center, a marketplace for all kinds of products and services, and open to all. Now, the modern Dohit city stood north and inland from the ancient stone patio.

Between the forests that Aros and Kya called home, the North Sea Palace lay grasslands similar to the ones Aros had crossed only days prior. The only difference was that this area was much more rocky and had small groves of trees scattered about. When the two finally reached the tree line, still midway up, they surveyed the type of terrain still to be crossed.

"This is going to take forever to cross," Kya said, "It will be a three day cold trail by the time we begin to look for answers!"

"So don't walk," a voice came from behind them.

Aros just shook his head and laughed as Kya turned to greet Akoda.

"You came! Aros said you had to return home," she said hugging him. "Why did you change your mind?"

"Well, I couldn't let Aros think he could protect a pretty girl like you all by himself," he said with a grin.

"So, what is your plan then, lazy Akoda?"

"I'm glad you asked, good friend. We are going to take a tri-blade."

"Really? You have a tri-blade?" Kya asked.

"Well, I know where one is... That we can borrow," he said bumping into Aros as he passed him, heading west. "Follow me."

"Pleased to see you decided to come along," Aros said.

"Well. I could use some things from the market anyway..."

***

They moved a short distance across the woods and Akoda began to decent. They arrived at the stump of an old tree that had died or been cracked by a storm. The stump looked normal enough, that was until the trio transferred from a neighboring branch to the leveled stump.

"What is this? Camouflage?" Aros asked as he sprung lightly on to the surface.

"It is. Look, peel it back here," Akoda instructed.

The tarp like covering stretched perfectly to fit around the top of the stump and functioned like the cap on the opened top room below. Aros was amazed by the detail of the coloring used on the false stump, it looked just like the real thing. Below, the stump was hollowed out like a room, containing a tri-bladed flying vehicle. Akoda jumped down onto the pilots seat.

"A elder in my village keeps this here. He loans it out when people want to make a trip up north. I'm sure he will never miss it."

"It is sure better than walking. You good on flying this thing?" Aros said, climbing aboard.

"He let me take the controls once," Akoda replied. "Now, the start up sequence... There!"

The tri-blade hummed to life. Two small fans on the bottom side sat in the front of the triangular shaped vehicle. A large main fan for vertical thrust, dominated the back portion below the pilots chair. Kya took her place opposite of Aros, in a prone position over one of the smaller directional fans. The craft could fit one more person between Aros and Kya, so as to balance the vessel in the event of an even number. Akoda made one more suggestion before they took off.

"You may want to put on your jackets, flying this thing up north can get pretty cold."

The tri-blade fans increased in power, creating the oddest sensation of weightlessness. It quickly rose from its hiding spot and began to creep out of the forest. Once clear of the wind resistance provided by its parking spot, the vehicle made a sharp drop towards the ground. It quickly bounced back to its cruising height once it got closer to the ground. Akoda tilted the front fans, setting the forward speed of the tri-blade. They were off to the North Sea Palace, cutting their journey time from hours to minutes.

***

The trip up the coast took them until the sun was at its zenith. They landed the flyer in the outskirts of the city and covered it with the camouflage tarp that they had taken from the forest. It was grey and overcast on the coast, as it was most mornings until the sun burnt away the fog in the afternoon. The three young Tarkin were all wearing their fitted animal skin jackets. Aros and Akoda flipped their hoods up. They walked single file towards one of the south entrances of the small city.

"So what is the plan here, anyway?" Akoda asked. "Are we just going to march up to one of the Dialon princes and say, 'We heard some people in your kingdom might have kidnapped a bunch of our highly trained warriors, can you tell us what happened to them?' I'm sure there have already been Appointers all over this place asking questions."

"Do you have any better ideas? I was just going to ask about my brother. I have a picture of him. Someone had to have noticed him if this was the last place he was seen. And plus, I'm a young girl and family, not a representative of the Tarkin council's will. I don't know what else to do. Aros?"

"Yeah, we will have to just ask around. Any clues about anything that anyone has seen that could lead us to where they might be held. But, I do suggest staying away from Dialon officials and security. They are going to be more than a little jumpy if they really have the Verdur, whether it's a girl inquiring or not."

They made their way to the gate, stone pillars on a wall, surrounding a large cobblestone courtyard. All the stones were in a state of slight disrepair, but it had been that way for generations and still sat solidly for all that time. The south marketplace was small, and in the far end three passageways ran through the maze of circular stone buildings, back into the heart of the city. One of the paths in the network of stone would lead to the west terraces that looked out on the ocean. In the north, closest to the modern Dohit city of Dauna, sat the main market, three times the size of the smaller south market.

Kya took the lead, approaching shop and kiosk owners and showing them a picture of her brother. Aros walked with her, staying quiet and slightly back, but still giving the strong impression that he was guarding her. Akoda drifted off, remaining in the same vicinity, asking his own casual questions. The market was not busy, but still had many other Tarkin, Dohit and a few Nar patrons milling around. One group of Nar, who were obviously on a supply run, continued loading a cart with their recent purchases, camped themselves on the outskirts of the cobblestone promenade. There were several small Nar children running around the area, playing and lifting each other up off the ground. One little Nar girl stood looking at Kya while she spoke to a Dohit working at a kiosk. When Kya turned away without any new information, the little girl waived.

"Well arn't you very pretty," Kya said bending to her level. "Have you by chance seen my brother?" she said, showing her his picture.

The girl giggled and ran away. Kya stood and looked to Aros.

"This doesn't seem to be getting me anywhere."

"Yeah, lets go for a walk through the terraces, there are always lots of people out there enjoying the sea."

"Alright."

They began to walk in that direction and Akoda joined up with Aros.

"Did you see the Tarkin watching us?" Aros asked quietly.

"I did, a light-green star from the look of him. This guy was not Verdur or Appointer. I don't know what he was."

"Yeah, I saw him leaning against that wall observing us."

"Then he just took off," Akoda finished.

"Keep an eye out for him. If you spot him, give the signal and I'll be overt, you waylay him.

Akoda gave a grunt of approval and drifted back from the pair, taking another route deeper into the maze.

Kya kept going, following painted signs high up on the stones of the path she was following. The two wound around the shaded streets and finally entered a dark tunnel with the brightness from the ocean on the other side.

"Ahh, the sun is finally out! What a lovely place!"

Kya walked out onto one of the terraces. Large stone steps spread out from the city down to the edge of the water. Several split-levels, placed seemingly at random, were all interconnected by stairways. Visitors to the palace, all enjoying the ocean view, occupied stone tables, chairs and benches. Aros followed Kya, again making her enquiries. As he trailed along, Aros kept his eyes moving, watching the entire crowd. Akoda would appear in and out of Aros's sphere of awareness, and disappear again.

Aros turned his head, as if to stretch his neck when he again saw the light-green star Tarkin, lurking by a wall. Aros looked for Akoda and finally caught his eye. He was about to give the signal when Kya's voice rose to the top of his mind.

"You are sure?" she was asking someone.

"Yes, dear. I will tell you all I know. But not here, come with me," a Dohit woman said.

"She says she saw the whole team," Kya whispered to Aros as she swept by him, following the Dohits lead.

"Wait, Kya," Aros tried to protest, but was cut off by their quick movement. Rather than draw attention to them, Aros followed, trying to signal to Akoda to follow.

The Dohit woman led them to a crumbling circular remnant of a tower, and opened the wooden door. She was beckoning Kya inside when Aros caught up close enough to try and stop her. Before he knew it, Kya was practically in the door and Aros felt a large presence behind him. He turned and came face-to-chest with a large Nar male. Aros began his instinctive crouch-and-draw of his single hon-ra, but the Nar muscled him straight back into the room without any room to resist.

Shoved inside and weapon removed, Aros found himself with a male and female Dohit, and the big Nar. Blasting blue ghost fire from his hands, Aros slowly moved in front of Kya.

"There will be no need for that," a voice said from the door.

Akoda was lead in, with the light-green star holding him, a hon-ra pointed to the back.

"My friend is right," the male Dohit said. "We are doing you a courtesy, young ones."

The male and female were tall and skinny, typical of Dohits. Their heads did not seem proportional and to their bodies, as far as the Tarkin were concerned. They wore common clothes, rather than the royal blue accentuated clothes of Dialon Kingdom Dohits. Even more odd was that they seemed to be working together with a Nar and Tarkin.

"We have no stake in this, but if you continue to expose yourself like this, you will be arrested. There are spies all around this palace," the male said.

"Who are you? What do you know?" Akoda demanded from the Tarkin. He figured he could better get answers from his own kind.

"I am Sar. That is Danna and Taris. Our muscle is Dor Anned," the Tarkin said, putting away his hon-ra.

"That's right," Taris continued. "We are just a assemblage of like minded persons who perform or facilitate tasks here in the city."

"You are a bunch of criminals," Aros said, letting his ghost fire abate.

The Nar in the corner with his arms crossed across his massive chest laughed.

"Call us what you may," Danna said, again speaking to Kya. "I told you the truth. Now, do you wish to know about your brother?"

Kya, who had been standing with big eyes, nodded her head.

"Some Telgents from Dialon captured a party of Tarkin four days ago. That, we heard as rumor. But, what we know is, they missed one. Your brother. We know this because he came into the city looking for some supplies. Very particular supplies, that we had access to. These were things that someone would need to slip into a city, and not be noticed. We asked him why he did not just ask for assistance from his council, but he said he could not do that. He felt that he could trust no one but his captured team. So we sold him some things and he left."

"I even offered to help him get into Dauna. I have done it before," Sar said. "But he refused and demanded we tell no one, especially any Appointers."

"Sure enough, they showed up looking for him," Taris said. "And we said nothing. We heard the next day that something had happened at Dauna and assumed that the young Tarkin boy had succeeded at rescuing some of the ambushed prisoners."

"Then where is he?" Kya said, more tears came to her eyes.

"No indication," Tarris said. "A Telgent force was seen leaving the city soon after. This was all two days ago. If you go around broadcasting that you know him, security will pick you up in no time, thinking they can use you to find your on-the-run brother."

Akoda was gravely concerned. "Thank you, thank you. We have to get out of here now. I'm not letting any Dohits strap gloves on me and keep me locked away. We owe you one," he added to the Dohit couple.

"No such thing," Danna said.

"Come on, Kya," Aros said, ushering her to the door.

They made it out into the maze of the streets and Sar popped his head out of the building.

"There is exit just east of the South market where you came in. Don't run, make yourselves dim, and go."

The two Tarkin nodded. They were trained Guardians, as Sar must have once been. They moved quickly and stopped at the first place of relative cover they could find.

"He snatched the dark star!" Kya gasped. "That must have been the reason they sent Telgents after him. Ekam is completing his mission!"

"Kya, quiet," Aros said.

"He is going to the Taviar Mountains, the gate..." Akoda said.

"Alright, I know. Now, lets get out of here alive first," Aros said. "We have to go dim and walk out of here. Kya, do you know what that means?"

"It's the way you move unnoticed, but I've never done it."

"Ok. Focus on your breathing, keep it slow and regular. Then imagine the light inside of you," Aros's voice became low and regular. "Focus on yourself and hide that light from the world. Imagine you are in the shadows, even if you are standing in the sun. You are the only thing in this world, and all those around you are just the wind. When you can center yourself in this way, you will be dim. Do this, stay between Akoda and myself. We have to reach the tri-blade."

Kya had her eyes closed and murmured an okay.

"Let's move."

***

The three Tarkin exited the North Sea Palace at a slow run. Once they were away from the walls by at least two stones throw, Aros, in the lead, picked up to a full run. He and Akoda had much practice staying dim, and could look around and move while staying nearly invisible to those who were not looking for them.

Akoda got to the tri-blade and ripped off the cover as Aros took Kya by the shoulders.

"Well, now we know. He is completing his mission, we need to report back to the council and..."

"No!" Kya cut him off. "There is a reason he didn't contact anyone for help! We are going to the mountain. We will make sure he doesn't get captured."

"Are you really asking us to go to Taviar?" Akoda said from the pilots seat. "Because this is way out of our league."

Kya stared back.

"This is a bad idea! I won't do it! Aros! Talk some sense into her!"

Kya jumped on the tri-blade and got in her position. She pulled her hood over her head and turned, giving a nasty look at Akoda.

"We are wasting time."

He looked back at Aros, who felt powerless.

"Well, then! Let's go Aros! You heard the lady! We are wasting time!" Akoda said. He threw back his head, brought it back and fired up the flyer.

"East, north-east. Taviar Mountains! On we go."

***

They flew for the rest of the day, stopping only once at a Nar town in the foothills of the mountains. They bought shoes, as their tough feet would not be able to stand up to the cold of walking in the snow. They bought children's shoes and had to lace them up tight as they were already too wide. The tri-blade flew on.

As the sun was setting and a bright moon lit up the sky. Aros rolled over and faced Akoda.

"This thing have maps on a route we can take to the top?" he shouted over the roar of travel.

"It doesn't look like many people travel to the top of the mountain. There is a meadow about half way up to the top on the east side. From there, I think we will be going by foot. This thing can't run when the air starts getting thin. If we find anything..."

They continued along, where the night became thicker. White patches of snow scattered in shady spots suddenly became a blanket covering the ground. They had reached the mountain, and were driving the tri-blade hard as they gained altitude. Finally, they came to the place where the mountain path widened and a high altitude meadow spread before them.

"The hiking path is that way. I'll set it down as close to the trailhead as I can."

"Do you see that?" Kya spoke for the first time in hours. "Smoke!"

As they got closer, they could make out the smoldering ruins of a much larger flyer, and bodies scattered about. Dohit Telgents. Akoda flew the tri-blade over to the trailhead and set it down.

"What do you think happened?" Kya said, shocked.

"These guys must have caught up with Ekam and the dark star. This is not that old, everything is still warm. They probably are on their way to the top now," Aros said.

"I see footprints. Two pair: a big and a small one. Ekam looks like he may be limping..."

"Let's go!" Kya ran past the other two.

They followed behind.

***

The footpath wound up the mountain. The three moved at a slow jog, keeping an eye on the prints in the snow. The winding trail turned into switchbacks that seemed to never end. Aros took the time to look out down the mountain. Anything beyond and further out from the meadow was covered by a silver blanket of thin clouds. He was hoping he would be able to see all the way out to the prairie, where he just crossed days earlier, looking up at the mountain he was ascending now.

The switchbacks finally came to an end and turned into a wavy ribbon, moving straight up the mountain. Several times, they found marks in the snow where one of the two had fallen. They looked ahead and felt they could barely see two dark figures climbing the stone steps, which were the last obstacle before the top. A non-Tarkin may have called out, but the three all felt they would overtake the slower moving two in a short time. They had to push through their exhaustion and resist the urge to stop and take a break.

Moving quickly across the non-uniform steps of rock, which led to the peak, the distance between the pair they pursued became smaller and smaller.

"We are almost there," Akoda puffed. "Just over this rise."

As they reached the top, exhausted from their breakneck pace to reach the top, the shouting began.

"WHAT IS THIS!" the high-pitched voice of a boy screamed. "THERE IS NOTHING HERE! NO TEMPLE! WHY HAVE YOU DONE THIS!?"

All three were now on the summit. The area was flat and not large. They could make out the faces of the other two across the clearing. The dark star was in a rage. Behind them sat a stone structure, two thick slabs of stone standing upright and a third laid across the top. Strange symbols were carved into the horizontal top. The Chaos Gate.

Ekam looked over his shoulder and noticed the other three's arrival. He was visibly hurt. His left arm hung low and his right leg held the majority of his body's weight.

"This is the only way for you! There is only safety for you on the other side of that gate!"

The boy screamed. His hands lit with a black power like Aros and Akoda had never seen. Chills ran over Aros when he noticed that the boy's eyes began emanating the power as well. The rage was unmistakable; this is what had happened to the Dohits down in the meadow.

"EVERYONE WANTS TO CONTROL ME! MY PARENTS, THE VILLAGE, DOHITS, AND NOW YOU! LEAVE. ME. ALONE!!"

With the last statement, the young dark star threw his hands forward and lowered his head, letting go a blast from his hands and eyes. Aros, Kya and Akoda jumped out of the way as the blast caught a dumbfounded Ekam in the chest. Akoda landed in the snow, wide eyes at the young Tarkin who had just done something he could not believe. Throw ghost fire from his hands?

Aros hit the ground, equally as shocked when the Gate lit up a mix of colors and flashing lights. He could feel himself so close to everywhere and everything. Space and time opened to different points faster than his purple eyes could focus. The boy had activated the Gate.

Kya scrambled over to her brother. She grabbed him and began to scream.

"You killed him! YOU killed him!"

She got up and ran towards the dark star. Aros and Akoda were stunned, but quickly got up to try and stop her. She ran blindly at him and he easily deflected her backwards. She tumbled to the ground, stopping right before the threshold of the gate.

Aros closed the distance with the young boy and began to attack. The boy took a few steps back and came to a fighting stance. Deflecting the blows, despite the display of violence of action from both Tarkins that were now attacking the boy. He took no real damage. They struck him with amazing blows, fists full of ghost fire, and he seemed to be affected by none of it. Aros and Akoda, in a well-practiced dual attack, continued to push him back toward the gate.

Kya was on her feet as they grew closer. She turned in fear, looking at the gate then back to the approaching combat.

Just then, the dark star made a sudden backwards move with his arm, in a windup for a heavy strike. Kya was knocked backwards, and fell through the gate.

Aros watched the panicked look on her face as her body slowly passed through the event horizon of the gate. Her face disappeared and the last thing he saw were her fingertips falling back into chaos.

The child, surprised, began to look back at what he had just struck as Akoda's foot, thrown in a high front kick, connected with his jaw. In a second, he was gone as well, thrown through the gate.

The two Tarkin stood in dismay, alone, left on the top of the silent snowy peak. Aros turned and looked at Akoda, spoke Kya's name and leapt through the gate, leaving his world behind.

Part VI

"So you went through after her?" Crescent said.

"I did."

"Why exactly?" Crescent asked.

Aros was staring off at the wall of the ship, as if he could see the universe or the past actually unfolding just beyond the ship.

"She was flung off somewhere randomly into space and time. All alone. I didn't think. I made a promise to her, as I saw her fall away from our world, that I would go after her. So I did, and I have been. She would have done the same for me," he murmured.

"So you have been looking for her all this time? Across worlds and you never found her?"

"I came close, several times. But again, those are much different stories." Aros looked toward Jane. "I even gave up hope a couple times. I hardened my heart and just looked for a way home. Maybe I will get there and she will be there too. Maybe she, like me, was reborn on some world and will find her way like I have."

"What was she like?" Crescent asked. Now, he was daydreaming, completing the picture of her he had in his head.

"She was tough, stubborn and beautiful. She never wanted to show any weakness or that she could be wrong. She could be so messy, but at the same time organized and clean. She liked to sing, but never when anyone could hear her. When she was happy, the look on her face made you want to grin and be happy right along with her. But when she was sad, the strongest urge to fix the problem swept over you. She was silly and playful at the worst times. She got me in trouble constantly, and she was my best friend. Everyone liked her and always wanted to be around her."

"You were in love with her, huh?" Jane said.

"Back then, when I was just a child and jumped through the gate after her, I thought I was. But the more and more I have been chasing her, getting close or seeing echoes of her, I know it's more. It's more than that. She is the reason that I didn't just stop one day on a nice world, on an island maybe. Or in some rainy forest. I could have just settled down and settle for less. Stopped fighting in wars and reading books. But, I just can't keep thinking about that night, years and years ago. I almost barely remember her, and if she is out there, out there like I have been, who knows if she is even the same. She is just a dream to me anymore. But I still remember that look on her face as she fell back. No, I will keep on going. I could never bring myself to give up."

The room was silent. Aros, sitting in the command chair, turned and faced right at Jane.

"Have you ever felt you were looking for more? Has my story struck a cord with you?"

"What are you saying?" she demanded.

"Tell me that some of that didn't feel familiar. Like it had happened to you." He paused. "Kya."

"No, no, no!" She stood up and moved away from him. "What did you think? I was some reborn version of that girl? Is that why you kidnapped me and brought me all the way out here!?" She turned away from him.

"You have her face. The coloring is slightly off. I can't remember her voice... Tell me that when I described her, I was not also describing you."

"No! You are mad! I don't even believe your story anyway. I can't believe this! No, I am not your 'Kya.' My name is Jane Novalis and I was born in Moldavia. A human woman," she said, turning back toward him. "What were you expecting? I would just go jump into some star with you and go back to your crazy planet? Did you think I was so stupid that I would just agree? I am from Tellus! That is my home!"

"No. Don't you see? I'm done with all of this. I got us all the way out here. I have no constraints on my life. I don't have to go back to Yazos. We don't have to go home. We could go anywhere. Anywhere in all existence..." His face was desperate. The dark rings circling beneath his eyes were pronounced. His face spoke of the distance he had spanned. "I even know of a nice cluster of islands where it never gets too cold..."

Jane stormed off, dropping down the ladder from the main room to the crew sleeping area. The room went from hot to cold in a flash. The bridge was quiet and the crew station screens continued on working. After a moment of calm, Crescent ventured another question.

"You really thought Lt. Novalis was Kya?"

"I really did," Aros said, deep in thought. "The moment I saw her, I just figured my journey had finally came to a close and here she was, right at the end. But I guess I was wrong. I guess I have wanted this too much and it blinded me."

"If that's why you brought her along, why did you really bring me? I'm not Akoda, am I?"

Aros tried to let out laugh, but under the circumstances, it felt totally fake. "No, No Cress. I know you are not Akoda. I really brought you along because I needed someone to fly this thing while I took care of other issues."

"Oh. So what now?"

"I'm sure we are about to find it. Why don't you get some rest, and I will keep watch."

"Alright, Sir," Crescent said. He got up and walked over to the gravity generator, turning it back to half. "I'm sorry you turned out to be wrong about her. I hope you find what you are looking for."

***

The two below slept, and slept hard. One tried to sleep away all the stress and anger she felt, the other dreamed away with a head full of another world. Meanwhile, the gunship Aurora slipped through space, ever closer to the end of the Sagittarius Dwarf Elliptical.

Jane awoke, in a similar manner as she did the last time, in a dark room, feeling a strange weightlessness. The only light coming into the deck was from the hatch leading to the bridge. Only this time, something was different. It finally hit her as she sat up and slid off the cot. The ever-present hum from the engines was gone. She stood lightly on the floor of the bottom hold, unsure of what to do. She settled on waking Crescent, since she couldn't bring herself to go up on the bridge alone.

"Huh, what?" Crescent said after a boot to the edge of his cot.

"You feel that? The engines are off."

"The engines are what?" he said, still waking up.

"Off. I don't feel the vibration from them anymore. I think we've stopped."

"Oh. Oh yeah," Crescent said with a waver in his voice. "Does that means he found it..."

"Come on let's get up there."

They climbed the ladder, Crescent first, and stood on the main deck. The lights were dim, and Aros was pulling on a thermal suit. Tech Specialist Crescent and Lt. Jane Novalis stood still, looking at Aros, not sure of what to say. The pair felt like trespassers on the bridge. Their short time on the small ship with this enigma of a man was doomed to come to this end, but it didn't feel real. Aros sealed the front of the suit and faced them.

"We have arrived. Sensors picked it up not long after you went below. I just arrived and cut the engines, that must have been what woke you."

Jane moved over to her sensor station to take a look. "Wow. We are really close. You almost bumped us into this thing," She threw a quick glance at Aros. His eyes were on her and she went right back to the screen. "This is odd. Just like you said, no heat, very little light, no gravity. This thing is like no star we have ever encountered. And... What? There is an envelope of gas surrounding the star. Oxygen and nitrogen. We could breath it..."

"It's cold out there, but at least I will not have to put on a pressure suit."

"You really mean to do this?" Jane said. "You are really going to put all your faith in a ball of light you think might take you somewhere?"

"Yes. This facade is the central point for this universe. It is the path to other levels in existence. It will take you where you want to go. Remember that. You too must have faith in me and believe me when I say, this is your only way home."

"We are supposed to fly the ship into that thing and hope it takes us home?" Crescent said.

"I don't think you could fly the ship through it. Jump through, like me. Think about where you want to go, and hold it in your hearts. I'm sorry if it seams like I'm just abandoning you. But I'm really not. This facade is your only chance at getting back."

"You have killed us!" Jane cried. "This is all a bunch of nonsense. You brain is full of rotten holes and thinks this is going to save you. But it's not! This is suicide! Just because it behaves like no other star we have seen, doesn't make it not a star! We can try to make it back, find more Scalies and ask them to catapult us back home. What you are suggesting is madness!"

Aros's face was a full smile. "I would expect nothing less from you, Jane. But you are going to have to trust me on this. Goodbye my friends. Thank you for being with me on the last leg of my journey."

Aros hit a command on his chair, and the top hatch, only ever opened for docking, slid open. Bright white light poured into the bridge, mixing with the dim amber light in the ship.

"You may want to hold on," Aros said. He walked directly under the hatch and picked up the gravity generator. With it switched off, every item not held down began to rise and float in the air.

Jane and Crescent clung to seats, shivering, looking up at Aros as he gently launched himself upwards out of the ship. Crescent swung himself over and grabbed the floating generator, and slowly added gravity to the ship. Both he and Jane went over to the place below the hatch and stood in the brilliant light as they watched Aros drift upwards into the star.

The light engulfed him, and he was gone.

Part VII- Epilogue

Major Kanalet entered the secured door to the Linguistics Lab with a wave of his closed scroll. He walked into a huge room, desks and workstations scattered about. The door closed behind him and he went further into the empty room. Standing in the middle of an open area, he looked at the touch-write screens lining this portion of the room and looked at all the strange scribbling and diagrams on the walls. Wasting little time, he bellowed a hello.

Walking out from a back area of the Lab, a young civilian in a science uniform came out questioningly.

"I'm sorry," he said, "You cant be in here. This is a top secret department."

Kanalet fanned his scroll, showing the concerned youngster his official letter from Grand Marshal Midord.

The scientist studied the document and relaxed.

"Oh, wow. Cool. Never seen one of those before. Well then, welcome to the linguistics cave."

"Where is everyone? I thought you guys were working around the clock."

"Oh, we are, we are. The whole science building has been here for five days straight. Judging by what we got, they must have just as much interesting information to process as we do. Though, I'm not asking. 'Keep things compartmentalized,' and all that." The young man droned on. "I am Mathew Rucker. Pleased to meet you."

"Major Kanalet."

"What can I do for you, Sir."

"Where is everyone?" Kanalet repeated.

"Oh, yes. Well, we have made a huge breakthrough, and everyone went out to dinner to celebrate."

"Then, why are you here?"

"Oh, someone has to stay at the office. I volunteered," Rucker said.

"You volunteered, huh?" Kanalet was not convinced. "Anyway, you have seen my authorization. I am here to get a report on your departments progress on the translation effort."

"Well, you are in luck, Sir. The reason everyone is out is that we have a full translation of the Scalie language. The wealth of the conversation that was recorded for us was amazing. Did you know that before last week, we had only twenty 'words' to work with. This new data has been the Rosetta Stone of our time. And the implications of the conversation... I'm sure you know more than I do! And again, we were told to just translate and not ask."

"That is probably the best thing."

"Yes, well, anyway, I heard our report would be included in some final inquisition report. Our next task is to complete a translation matrix. It is going to be a long project, hopefully not under an absurd time constraint..."

"That's fine. But, I'm not here about that. I am on special assignment for the Grand Marshal, exclusively. He is not going to wait for the official report. I am here to get the down and dirty to include in a narrower investigation."

"Oh. Okay. Well, if you want to come back tomorrow, I'm sure my department head, Doctor Jeorgson, can give you a full briefing."

"No. I am here now. I have other places to visit and reports to write. You seem like a smart guy. Brief me and show me the translations."

"Alright." Rucker said, scrambling to pull up data on a main touch-write screen. "How in depth do you want?"

"Everything of relevance. I will filter what the Grand Marshal won't need. Just give me your analysis. I haven't even seen the transcripts yet, so I will want to see those, and a copy to take."

Mathew Rucker nodded along with everything the Space Service officer said.

"Ok, then. So this was a huge puzzle. We attacked this ten-minute conversation with every linguistic tool and approach we have been building as humans studying language over the past five hundred or so years. And let me tell you, this was like nothing we had seen before.

"First, this was a conversation. Thus, we named each participant 'A' and 'B'. 'A' started the conversation and so he got the first letter. Simple as that. We first analyzed the voices as a whole. This was very interesting. Phonetically, these two speakers were generally speaking the same language, but with very different vocal equipment. Biased on the differences, we are assuming that 'A' has vocal equipment very similar to human, and 'B' is not. There is a wide, wide difference between the two speakers vocal equipment, but 'A' seems to generally be able to produce the same sounds as 'B', albeit lacking some of the necessary articulators. To us, this would sound like totally intelligible Latin coming from a machine. A good imitation, but not human speech.

"Next, we looked at what we assumed was the native speaker and analyzed the phonetic quality. 'B' must have a large oral cavity with minimal use of bilabial processes as the language under analysis has a very small accounting of bilabial sounds. There is obviously a large and flexible lingual area, as many tongue sounds are found.

"The language as a whole is very interesting. We broke it down, collecting and grouping every single distinct sound and mapping the range of point and manner of articulation. Where as we humans have our familiar phonetic inventory, the mapping of speaker B's language had some familiar, and some very different from our own. There was extensive use of trithongs..."

"I'm sorry to interrupt," Kanalet broke in, tapping away furiously at his scroll. "Forgive my ignorance, but what is a trithong?"

"Oh! Not at all. So, a monothong is a single vowel, like the 'a' in 'cat.' A diphthong is when there are two vowels back to back like the 'ay' in 'hay.' And a trithong would be..."

"Three vowels in a row," Kanalet cut in.

"Exactly. Or glides, but you get it. Anyway, trithongs were prevalent. So were various nasal versions of consonants. Like I said, few bilabial, many palatal and alveolar sounds. There were clicks and ejectives, which are not as exotic in human languages as one may think..."

"Oh, of course not," Kanalet said.

"We even charted two injectives, which were very odd. Overall the language was very tonal. Lots of word distinctions were conveyed by tones. The language almost sounds like a song in that way. The really odd bits were the croaks, whistles and retroflex tongue chirps. Such a treasure trove of sounds. I found myself listening to loops of it for hours..."

Kanalet tried to hurry the scientist along. He obviously loved his job, but Kanalet had more tangent goals to achieve. "So you were able to take all that and figure out what they were saying?" he probed.

"Yes, and that is where we employed much computer help. How to best describe it... Have you ever done a crypto-quip, Sir?"

"I'm not sure that I have."

"Well, if you take a little quote or quip, just a sentence. Like, 'can't teach an old dog new tricks.' Simple enough. Then, each letter of the alphabet in the quip is assigned a random letter, with no correspondence or pattern in the choice of letter. All you have is your knowledge of the language and the fact that all the D's will be Z's and so forth."

"Okay. I think I'm following you."

"So imagine this language like a crypto-quip. It obviously means something that we can translate into our own language, but how we find what that may mean, takes millions of attempts to make sure all the assumptions and patterns work out. But rather than just matching one letter to another, we are dealing with levels of semantics, proper nouns that are untranslatable, syntax, tone, clause structure, establishing a typological morphology, and so much more... Have you ever heard of Hankamers Theorem?"

"Can't say I ever took a linguistics class in school," Kanalet answered.

"Haha, yes, well. It theorizes that translation is impossible! So no matter how hard we try, we can get close; we can get very close to the meaning, but never get a perfect translation. And that is what happened here. The computer could only get to eighty three percent continuity. But we're okay with that. Here is the transcripts of the conversation," Rucker said pulling up the document on Kanalet's scroll and the touch-write.

Kanalet began to read with utter fascination. He had been working on his report for the Grand Marshal now for about a week and had been captivated by the mystery he had been uncovering. He was desperate to hear what Drogen had to say to the Scalies to make them spare the Prime Meridian. And hopefully this would give him a clue as to where he took the stolen gunship and the level of involvement of the other two. He read the transcripts slowly, analyzing it best he could.

\--Begin Transmission--

A: Powerful Chi.ka∫.d _ʕ_ a]{Proper noun} (name for B's race?) , I am a human [Mediator. I wish to speak with the leader of war (action).

\--Pause--

B: That authority rests in me. How does a Mediator make his presence with

this race, so far from his own world? Speak, so that we may trust your role.

A: I was in existence at  _ɻ_ oae.ti _ü_. _¤_  when the decision to free the offenders was made. My kind watched the [riots] and persuaded the elder to perform a [ _⊙ɳ_ ii. _ɤωæÇ_ ] (Ungratefulness?) (ritual?).

B: You must have existed long to see these things. We will accept your (claim?).

Why do you now come to us?

A: I am with these humans to correct their foolishness and rid you of their presence.

B. True? Why do they enter our (territory?) set for war? We are to defend

ourselves.

A: I exist in the small(er) ship, but am in command of the larg(er). They will take no

action (war) to any [Chi.ka∫.d _ʕ_ a] that exist here. These humans come from their world through a made rip in space. They seek answers for an attack on their world.

B: This was not under this authority. We know of their field, and travel there without their knowledge. Yet, this was not under our authority that the tear

was made. We do not tear space in such a fashion. This was (perpetrated?) by

young (wanderers?).

A: I have tried to convince them that you are truly wise and would never do this. But

these humans, who I only advise, are not convinced. Show them your grace (knowledge?). Send them back to the tear, let them return home whole, and have no want of action with you.

B: That would be (positive?) for them, as they are nothing but m **ʑ** o **ã** k to us.

\--Pause--

B: They shall be sent back. You are to council them to never approach us in

such a foolish manner again. We see that some of the humans have died at the

hands of our warriors, as well as our own have too sacrificed. We call this fair. Return your ship to theirs and we will send you away.

A: The humans will be told. I ask a gift. I am not to return with them. I wish to be sent elsewhere, as my time with them has ended.

B: Fair. We shall demonstrate our wisdom and compassion by sending them

away, with no more harm to them.

\--More pause, the channel is open but on mute. The remaining transmission came back on mid-conversation.--

B: **...** we can send you to this place. The point you seek is unknown to us, as is

most of this region (space?). We can send you close, and you will have to travel the rest of the way.

A: I express my thanks in accepting mediation in this matter.

B: Your skills have again saved further action on both sides. We grant your

request as recompense.

\--End of Transmission--

Kanalet finished reading the transcripts and sat in silence as Rucker droned on about the particulars of the translation and further things that mattered so much less than what he just discovered. How could some child from Northern Colombia do all this? The mystery was getting larger and more questions kept arising. This was going to be quite a report.

"...And as I said, our job is just to translate, but the content is shocking. We try to ignore it and just focus on the product, but we are human after all..." Rucker continued. "Is that all you will be needing, Major? You can also tell the Grand Marshal that a full translation program will be the highest priority of this department..."

"No, that's fine. I've come for what I needed. You have been helpful, thank you." Kanalet got to his feet and started out the door, leaving Mathew Rucker sitting alone in the large room.

As soon as Major Kanalet got out the door, his scroll buzzed with a face-to-face call. He saw it was the Grand Marshal himself. Kanalet raked a hand through his hair and answered his scroll.

"Ram! I saw you just exited the Linguistic Department. Are you alone?"

"Yes, Sir. I just got the translated transcripts of the communication from the Aurora. You are not going to believe what I found..."

"Oh, I'm sure I won't," Midord cut him off. "I have had a day full of things I just don't believe. I have a ship on its way for you, along with two of my men. They will be on the roof in twelve minuets. Now, get ready for this, Lieutenant Novalis and Tech. Specialist Crescent just turned up in some small town on the edge of the Great Desert in northern Africa."

"What? The Prime Meridian confirmed they were not on board with them and had to be on the Aurora!"

"That's what I said, and I even confirmed their DNA check-ins, there is no way they were not part of the mission across the Rift!"

"Then how are they on Tellus? The Prime Meridian is not supposed to make it back here for another six days."

"I know. I am sending you to pick them up and debrief them on the way back here to Camlon. I want to know exactly what the hell is going on. Five days," the Grand Marshal said, "Five days since the incident and they are back on Tellus... Go get them, Ram."

"I'm on it, Sir."

