Chapter 17: The dogs

To say that Kutch and O’rmon were shocked was not to say anything about their state. Their mouths were agape, they spammed Achraf and Lunayrapo with questions. Eventually, they agreed to move her as soon as possible from SafoNur’s body.

In the middle of the conversation, Safo Nur regained his consciousness and returned to his body.

{“I’m sorry Safo, it was very tempting to live a little bit more again. When I’m in insects I can’t take control of their senses, the world is dulled there. But in your body everything is different I could feel, hear and see the world through your eyes. It was amazing so I couldn’t resist. I’m deeply sorry.”}

Safo Nur started to look around him trying to locate the source of the voice. The trio still stood in front of him. “Who’s talking?”

Fifteen minutes later Safo understood, Achraf retell the story again. As much as he felt pity for Lunayrapo he wasn’t willing to die so he agreed to transfer her spirit into a builder ant’s body once again.

“I’m sorry, Lunay..ri...to. I’m sorry I’m not good at remembering names. I’ll call you Luna. Yeah, it was fun to share a body with you. In fact, it is not painful so I wouldn’t be against the idea of doing it again some time. But like anybody else, I don’t want to die.” Safo Nur was not at refusing and saying “No” to people too.

{“Of course, I understand. And, yes it was the best day in the last 6 years. I was able to talk to my father finally, I appreciated every second of it. Thank you for that. I’m grateful that you ate me. Haha. Alright, let's do it...”} Her voice dimmed and disappeared.

“She is in the ant now. But our promise is still on. We will find a good body for her on New Tenga.” Kutch, considering that Psiora was specialized in breeding different types of animals for the last 18 years, suggested that finding an animal body wouldn’t be a problem. He also happened to know a perfect old man who could help them.” Achraf was happy that he met them and didn’t shoot them down.

{“Um… I’m still here! Safo I can’t leave this place. Something is wrong.”} The soft familiar voice of Luna rang once more in Safo Nur’s mind.

“What? What do you mean? You said you did it many times before!” Although Safo Nur knew that insects died after 2-3 days by being a host for Luna, he was scared to be with a ticking spirit bomb inside of him. He could die anytime in the next couple of days.

Others also started to panic. Luna tried to explain to Safo what was happening, and her guesses.

{“I think it is because your spirit stone is far bigger than mine. Its gravity pulling me back into you. I tried more than times while you were talking. I don’t know what to do. I’m sorry for making trouble to you.”} Luna sounded apologetic, Safo Nur made sure to insure her that things were going to work out. O’rmon suggested searching for Dost, he possessed more knowledge due to being a former Imperial authorized official. He used to work under the direct command of the Emperor.

“But where can we find that bastard? He was unconscious one moment and the second later he disappeared. I think he just fled.” Once more Kutch became highly irritated while talking about Dost.

“Oh no, you said he just vanished? He was there and then not anymore, right? It is bad!” Achraf talked Fast with the tone of worry. He didn't want to bring harm to Safo, which meant they had to find a guy named Dost. But if what Kutch said is true things could get worse.

“What do you mean, Achraf. Is there something we should apprehend on this planet?” O’rmon understood immediately what Achraf was trying to tell. A threat.

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“Yes, dogs. Invisible dogs. Cunning invisible dogs.” Achraf was terrified by the idea that they probably have to go to their “kennel”.

From Achraf’s words, Safo Nur got the idea more or less about invisible dogs. When Achraf’s ship slammed onto the planet, it was their nest. At that time he met them for the first time. Dog-looking like animals was so good in camouflage that evolution gave them a perfect stealth skin. They could bizarrely reflect sunlight so the rest of the world could see objects behind them, making an illusion of see-through dogs. However, it worked only when they moved, they looked like a regular grey-coated dog. They were a dominant species on a planet due to their aggressive nature and high brain development. With their level 4 intellect, they were not just keen on hunting and consuming other animals and insects. Caecanis - an invisible dog tried to annihilate all other living creatures. They were already able to exterminate several classes of animals.

When Safo Nur mentioned the time when the tablet detected a creature resembling a dog, Achraf explained that dogs started to use bigger but less intelligent animals to achieve their goal. In that particular case, dogs scared the Cerosnouts and made them run through an ant pit to destroy them.

“Whatever they can’t eat or destroy they drag to their nest. There are hundreds of them.” Achraf was petrified by the thought of meeting those eccentric and unpredictable animals.

Safo Nur pulled out his tablet.

/Caecanis - an invisible dog. \ Kutch checked the saved data on those creatures and his eyes shined with sparks. He was excited to know that there was a species that could be invisible just by moving. “Z” signs appeared in both of his eyes. Zee - was a currency made by the Empire, being part of the Empire territory New Tenga also used that money currency.

Just a level 4 creature gave a two-star price, adding on top that camouflage of the dogs may very well be a three-star. In his dreams, Kutch already bought a brand new ship, house on the main planet, and got married to a model. He stood there with a creepy grin on his face while everybody was looking at him as if he was crazy. Only his sister knew what her foolish little brother could possibly think about in an awful situation like that.

“Do you know the location of a nest? Lead the way, my friend! We shall hurry now.” Solemnly Kutch motivated the team.

“Y … yes I do. Let's go!” It worked. O’rmon sighed but went on with the rest, she didn’t want to ruin the mood.

Safo Nur and Achraf mounted the metal spider while Kutch and O’rmon walked by them. Achraf remembered all the facts he knew about Caecanis. Everything matched with a tablet’s info.

First, as Achraf suggested, they needed detection devices. He made some from the ship parts. It was simply thermal goggles, caecanis could hide themselves using a light but they couldn’t mask their body temperature. Therefore his goggles were in handy. The windshield on the metal spider also had a thermal detection feature built-in.

In half a day they reached the shipwrecks they picked up thermal imaging goggles from Achrafs ship and tranquilizer guns from O’rmon’s ship. Armed with vision and guns but lacking a plan they charged directly into the nest anyway.

During their trip, Safo Nur politely offered his body to Luna so she could have some time with her father. Crying with rivers of tears, Achref took that opportunity. They chatted, cried, laughed, remembered the past, and cried again. It was how Safo learned that Luna’s mother died in an accident when she was 9. Achraf took care of her in the daytime and worked hard on his engineering projects all night. He was heartbroken when she died in sleep and was overwhelmed with emotions when he found that their dog was now the Luna. And just like that, he saw his daughter’s “new” body die every couple of days.

Busy by searching for a proper body for her daughter he missed every deadline. His boss demanded to compensate for all the investments that the company spent on his research. That is how they became homeless runaways. After traveling escaping from their home planet they stumbled upon that planet purely by chance and unsuccessfully landed making it a new home.

After 6 years of an ant diet, because he was too weak to hunt a different prey, he saw another unlucky ship.

With the dawn, they reached the nest. Using their thermal imaging goggles they proved that the invisible dogs are real. To their mutual surprise, Dost was there in the midst of a dump and ejectments of the dogs. It appears that the dogs could use the robot that they stole. Dost, unfortunately, was still offline.

“So as we know from this tablet, Caecanis keeps their offspring center of the nest, right next to them their mothers and outer layer of defense is daddies. I and O’rmon will deal with parents, you too put babies to sleep. Try your best, let’s go.” Kutch gave basic instructions and the mission began.