While Friend Terry was gone Nemta moved around slowly, talking to each of the fellow refugees. He ignored the glitter of madness in their eyes, their shiny makeshift helmets, and the fact that most of them were armed with knives.
"Friend Nemta," Mother said at one point.
Nemta looked at her, frowning slightly. The Hamaroosa had a chunk of battlesteel in her hand as she slowly made her way over to Nemta, her cane clacking on random stones.
"Yes, Mother?" Nemta asked. It felt so strange to call the Hamaroosa that. He was a Cemtrary, one of the Near-Civilized races. Taller than the others, light fur on his body. Yes, he was descended from Lemurs just like the Terrans, but his people had been civilized for nearly ten million years. The others were all neo-sapients. Why, the Hamaroosa had even given up their status as Council members, retreating to their own system to live in isolation after they were attacked by some strange gigantic space-going cephalopod creature that had destroyed most of their fleet and space-borne industry.
"This is for you. You should craft it, shape it into a blade. If properly cared for it can crack the plasteel carapace of the smaller Demons," Mother said. She held out the rusted piece of battlesteel. "Use what you wish for a hilt, but make sure it takes a keen edge."
Nemta stared at the piece of hyperalloy. It was heavy, oxidized, and felt dull and dead in his hand. When he looked around he saw some of the others had their knives out, slicing into ration packs or just honing them. All of their's were bright and shiny, the Telkan Hilma'ata's was engraved with runes and what looked suspiciously to Nemta like a prayer on the long blade. All of the blades were twin-edged, with needle-points, and hilts with crossguards.
He had no idea how to sharpen it. One of them, Shevvasti the Shevashan who's species was a full member of the Civilized Species Council, was using a common basalt rock to sharpen her blade. As Nemta watched she spit on the rock, then rubbed the edge of the blade in small circles, holding it up to let the light glimmer off the honed edge.
Rock can't edge battlesteel, went through Nemta's head. Battlesteel required high temperature plasma to work with temperatures normally found in the heart of a star.
But the Shevashan kept lifting up the blade and looking at the honed edge gleaming. She'd work for a few minutes, then turn toward the painting on the nose of the destroyed craft and pray, then go back to honing the blade.
Nemta frowned the third time she did it. He'd noticed that she had spit on the stone at the end of her prayers and began to rub the edge on the rock and that, oddly enough, there had been a wisp of steam for a moment.
I must need more sleep, Nemta though to himself, staring at the hunk of battlesteel that Mother had given him.
He looked around and saw Mother talking to the one green mantid technician still in camp. The icons and emojis were flashing rapidly above to the mantid's head but Mother was looking at a device in her palm. She nodded several times, looking serious, and moved over to the Shevashan female busy sharpening her knife.
Nemta scooted over, feigning an interest in keeping the Creation Engine warm, to eavesdrop on the conversation.
"It will be a receiver only, that way the Demons don't manage to hear our voices speaking," Mother was saying.
Shevvasti nodded, sheathing her knife at her hip and reaching down to move the tools laying on a sheet of plas with one blunt talon capped finger.
"I will be careful building this," she said slowly.
"Remember, do no leave the safety of our encampment. Friend Terry has been delayed and will not be back until nearly evening," Mother said.
Nemta frowned, wondering why and how the Terran had been delayed.
Mother moved over to another refugee, the Tnvaru Meklet, and touched his shoulder gently. "Check the wall, ensure that the Demons cannot detect us."
Meklet nodded, lacing together his fingers top hands then bottom hands and cracked his knuckles by pushing his hands out in front of him. He picked up a toolkit from in front of his shelter and started over by the convoluted S-pattern opening.
Mother moved up to Nemta. "You flew spacecraft, did you not?"
Nemta nodded. "Yes. Aerospace fighters, shuttles, things like that."
"Could you, if it was designed for you, fly an interstellar capable ship?" Mother asked.
Thinking for a long moment Nemta nodded. "Yes. It's been nearly twenty years, but I believe I could pilot a jumpspace vessel," he thought for a long moment. "Where will we be going?"
Mother smiled. "A neutral world. My people and a few others are no longer members of the Unified Species Council. Friend Terry, of course, will need to be returned to his people, and those of us like you, who wish to return to the Council, should be allowed to."
Nemta kept the disgust at that thought, of people's leaving the Council, to show on his face. "I would need an astrogater, we'd need an engineer, and the ship has to work."
Mother just nodded, smiling. "We shall leave purgatory, go to a neutral world, and then rejoin our people and our families."
Nemta barely avoided drawing back from the madness in her eyes. Luckily the Hamaroosa turned around and hobbled to the piece of metal she spent so much time sitting on.
Nemta kept looking at his piece of metal, trying to figure out how he was supposed to work a piece of metal that required plasma. It was a flattened rod roughly 15 inches long, scarred and scraped, covered with oxidation.
Finally the evening came. Nemta realized that he kept expecting Friend Terry to leave his shelter and come out. It seemed strange that the Terran wasn't around, that there was only 1 green mantid around instead of two, that his fellow refugees were moving around more instead of just taking turns sitting by the fire and feeding it to warm the Creation Engine.
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Nemta saw the Mantid waving wildly, forcing everyone to scoot away, then activated the holoprojectors. A frame appeared, gold and blue, sparkling in the late afternoon light. Nemta watched as the big iris on the orb opened up and stared. There was swirling red and purple light inside with a light mist. As Nemta watched a battlesteel strut slowly was extruded from the orb and the green mantid used a small pressor/tractor beam to guide it along the frame. Nemta expected it to fall to the ground, but somehow the hologram was holding the beam in place. One at a time the mantid guided structural components onto the framework of light and somehow the light held it in place.
The survivors were on their knees, praying, as over the course of two hours the green mantid, with a tractor/pressor beam projector that it had gotten from somwhere, slowly built a framework. When the orb started beeping the iris closed and the green mantid went back to twiddling with his holograms.
Nemta moved up to the holograms, wondering why the holograms seemed to be able to hold up heavy battlesteel beams. He reached out and touched on and was surprised to find out that it felt like steel, just like would be used on a scaffold.
"Hard light," Mother said, almost making Nemta scream. "A Terran invention. I do not know how it works, but it does work. Sadly, it cannot be used to build us a spaceship so we can fly home."
Nemta tapped the hologram again, felt anger surge up, and walked away. He noticed that the fusion reactor had nearly a 80% load put on it. He wondered why as he walked away.
The day gave way to night and eventually Nemta went back into his hut, curling up in his nest. He fitfully went to sleep, his dreams full of anxiety and fear, shifting from dream to dream rapidly without any sense of rhyme or reason.
A pain behind his eyes woke him up, making him hold his head and moan. He staggered out of his hut and looked around.
The little green mantid was bringing out objects the orb, setting them down. Nemta could identify some kind of micro-fusion reactor and other parts that it was putting inside the frame. There was another twinge and the little green mantid looked around, then went back to work.
His stomach rumbling, Nemta moved over to the rations, digging in the box until he found one rated for his species. It wasn't his favorite, but it would do. He moved over and sat down, breaking into the rations and adding water and thumbing the self-heat tab.
There was another twinge between his eyes, hard enough that he winced. The refugees left their huts and came out to look around, all of them holding their knives.
His meal was almost over when he heard a whirring sound coming from one of the dog-leg hallway entrances into the encampment. He looked over to see the green mantid 303 driving a child's toy.
It was a wealthy Lanaktallan's children's toy. A six wheeled cargo vehicle, light pastel blue with flowers on it, built for a young Lanaktallan. The wheels had been removed it was using mis-matched graviton generators taken from hoverbots, their different outputs making the vehicle bobble around like a soap bubble in a breeze.
In the back was something that made everyone stare.
A Telkan broodcarrier was in the back, huddled around three Telkan podlings, four Hamaroosa cuddles, five Shavashan hatchlings, and a pair of small Tnvaru children. They were covered with a length of superconductor cloth over soft aerogel pulled from inside winter jackets.
The broodcarrier saw Hilma'ata and scooped up the podlings, dropping on all four and flowing out of the back of the children's toy and into Hilma'ata's arms. The Tnvaru, Meklet, ran over and scooped up the pair of small children, who clutched onto her.
Nemta watched as the children were scooped up by males and females of the assorted races. Two additional Telkan podlings had peeked out from under the superconductor cloth that had been used to obviously cover the small children.
Nemta felt isolated, slightly, by the way so many of his fellow refugees were holding tight to the children while saying thankful prayers to the Mad Arch-Angel TerraSol.
Everyone went still as a large snake-like form, rusted battlesteel, blowing red eyes, massive jaws, rose up above the walls, looking down.
"There you are, little ones," the snake said, staring down inside the walls. "I knew that if I followed, you would be revealed to..."
Whatever the refugees would be revealed to was lost as a missile came shrieking in from slightly behind the snake, impacting the side of the snake's head and smashing the snake's head to the side.
"IT'S ME!" came Friend Terry's voice roared out.
The snake whipped around as two tiny missiles were fired from inside the compound, went hypersonic only a few meters from the snake, and blew craters in the snake's armor. That broke the spell over the encampment and the refugees all ran for their shelters.
Nemta backed away from the horror of the giant metal snake, that had reared up only a fifty feet. He glanced over and saw the two mantids running around the truck. One was facing the giant orb, which was still open, drawing things out with the tractor/pressor harness it was wearing. As Nemta stared, ignoring another explosion outside the walls, one of the mantids poured silvery metal on the child's toy, which was plastic. Another mantid slapped a battlesteel insert into the bed of the truck, then picked up and slapped down a tripod.
Nemta looked back over in time to see the snake rear back, seeing explosions wreath the battlesteel snake's head.
"YOU CANNOT PREVAIL!" the snake roared, driving Nemta to his knees, blood trickling from his nose, ears, and eyes.
"HERE COMES THE FREIGHT TRAIN!" Friend Terry roared back.
Nemta looked back in time to see that the little truck was covered with shining chrome-esque metal. The mantid by the front slammed the hood, where it had just installed the micro-fusion generator, then puffed out black dust. There was a spark from the other one and the black dust suddenly adhered to the chrome, covering it in a thick bumpy rough layer.
"GET OFF OF ME, PRIMATE!" the snake howled.
"MAKE ME!" Terry bellowed back. Nemta saw Friend Terry was climbing up the snake, ripping away handfulls of armor.
Nemta heard graviton generators start to whine and looked over as the mantid slammed the hood and jumped into the cab. The other mantid had a small quad-barrel, holding onto the handles at the back of it, the barrels starting to spin. One either side of the mantid were tiny four-pack missile launchers with orbs the size of a golfball at the back.
As Nemta watched, the child's toy, now riding low and blowing purplish sparks from underneath, wobbled before heading out of the encampment with the high pitched scream of stressed graviton generators.
Nemta turned and ran into his hut, looking out the window when he heard what sounded like tearing thunder.
Purple light was connected to the snake creature at an angle that suggested the weapon was on the ground and moving. It was bright, with a white core, eye watering and stinging to Nemta.
"MANTIDS! YOU DARE!" came the bellow.
Nemta saw that Friend Terry had almost climbed the snake, who suddenly slammed its own neck and head against trees, trying to dislodge the Terran ripping off chunks of armor and circuitry.
A handful of missiles flew up, hitting the metal serpent's head, even as the thick laser beam, powered by four barrels rotating so fast the bar appeared solid, kept slagging at the armor.
Finally Friend Terry managed to get up on the snake, ripping away a large section of armor and plunging his hand inside. He ripped something out of it and the snake reared up and back, crashing to the ground inside the campsite, Friend Terry jumping free to land on one knee with his fist against the ground and the other fist slightly raised up.
The snake gave a hissing noise as Friend Terry jumped up and then slammed down with both feet, crushing the snake's head.
As Nemta watched, horrified, Friend Terry tore open a section of armor and started ripping out segments of electronics, shoving them into his mouth and chewing on them, reddish organic superlubricant dripping down his chin.
Nemta realized with a chill that the Terran was staring right at him as the Terran grabbed another chunk of the mechanical snake's interior and shoved it into his mouth and started to chew.