Natraya accepted the outstretched hand, startled at the restrained strength she could feel in the heavy fingers and the musculature that pulled her easily to her feet. She looked up at the lemur, able to feel how massive, how dense, how... solid it was with more than just her eyes and the lingering phantom sensation of her hand in its hand.
"OK, sister, first thing's first, you have any combat training?" the lemur asked.
Natraya shook her head. "No. I was a lady in waiting to a Lady Most High," she said softly.
The lemur nodded. "All right. That's fine," it said. It frowned. "Do you usually go clothed or is your fur enough for you, like some Pubvian nudist or a puffie?"
Natraya shook her head. "The creatures, they ripped my clothing from me," she said softly, hugging her self.
"Huh," the lemur said. It reached down, grabbed the sleeve of one of the Dwellers, and yanked up, dumping the naked body on the floor and lifting up the robe. "Too big," it said. It eyed Natraya in such a way that she instinctively covered her privates and her mammaries. The lemur gave a chuckle before it lifted up the robe, bit part of it, then ripped it in half. Fat purple sparks jumped free from the cloth, dissolving in midair in sparkles.
"Ew, tastes like tinfoil on the back fillings," the lemur said. It held out the robe. "Here, sister, try this."
"Why do you call me your female sibling?" Natraya asked, taking the robe and putting it on. The sleeves were too long and the lemur came back with one of the bladearms of a servitor and sawed off the excess.
"We're in this together, sister," the lemur said. "I don't know your name."
"Natraya," she said. "Lady in waiting to Lady Most High A'ama'arya."
"Huh. Weird name. Your lady's name sounds like a Tee-bug's name," the lemur said. "Are we doing name and titles?"
Natraya nodded. "Please. It will help me understand you."
The lemur laughed. "All right, sister, I'm Staff Sergeant Eric Carter, Earth Defense Force, Third Republic Combined Military Forces Army, eleven bravo, 19th Infantry Battalion, 8th Infantry Division, part of the orbital insertion forces from the Defiance of Sol."
"I have heard of 8th Infantry Division during the defense of the Telkan system," Natraya said. "I have seen video footage of you on the Tri-Vee."
"Telkan System? Never heard of it. Pubvian or Tee-Bug?" the lemur, Carter, asked.
Natraya shook her head. "Home system of the Telkan people, out near the Long Dark."
The lemur shook his head. "I've got a bad feeling I'm more than a little lost."
Natraya nodded. "We all are, lemur Carter."
"Lemur? Like those little ferret things?" the lemur asked. "I'm not a lemur, I'm a primate."
Natraya made a motion of resignation. "If you insist. Your people are classified as lemurs."
The lemur snickered. "Could be worse, I guess," he looked down at Natraya. "Better now that you're dressed?"
Natraya nodded. "Yes. Thank you."
The lemur handed her a severed bladearm, the end opposite of the point wrapped in cloth from the robe. "Here you go, sister, one genuine makeshift 8th Infantry short sword. Don't stick it up your nose or any other bodily orifices."
The lemur's good natured amusement felt wildly out of place but Natraya smiled as she took the bladearm, holding onto the makeshift handle.
The lemur moved to another cell and looked in as Natraya followed it out.
Inside was a Tukna'rn, sitting miserably on the floor.
"Hey, green dude, want out?" the lemur, Carter, asked.
The Tukna'rn looked up. "I would."
"Can you fight?" the lemur asked as it stepped back and took that odd stance again, swinging one arm out.
"Yes," the Tukna'rn stood up. "They murdered my friends and left me alive to mock."
The lemur gave a sharp cry, like a bird of prey, and lashed out with one foot, impacting the rippling curtain of phasic energy. Natraya saw the lemur's eyes flash bright crimson.
The curtain exploded in a flash of purple and a shower of sparks.
"I thank you," the Tukna'rn said. "I am On'trak."
"On track?" the lemur asked, moving over and picking up another bladearm. Natraya remembered that the servitor creature had not even had a chance to unfold its bladearms from close to its body before the lemur had killed it.
"Close enough," the Tukna'rn said, watching as the lemur ripped away the bladearm the wrapped cloth around the end to make a handle.
"Here you go, brother," the lemur said. It handed the Tukna'rn the bladearm. "Another gen-you-iene 8th Infantry short sword. If we were cav it'd be a saber, but whatcha gonna do?"
The lemur laughed.
It looked around at the other cells. "Well, let's see who's willing to fight and who'd rather stay in their cells."
"And if nobody else joins us?" On'trak asked.
The lemur smiled, showing all the teeth again.
"Then we kill all these purple weirdos and their creepy looking Lovecraft nightmare buddies outselves."
------
Shandaar glided through the ship even as the lights flashed warning and the communal mind warned that the lemur had escaped confinement. Her, because she said she was a her, three eyes watched as other floated by, as servitors and slavespawn skittered by.
She could feel that the communal mind thought it could stop the lemur.
Shandaar knew better.
She had taken part in four battles for four different worlds. Had encountered the lemurs multiple times and escaped with her life. After the second battle she had been approached by the Cult of the Defiled One and inducted into its ranks.
She had stealthfully navigated to the Terran Tomb World, manage to fool its terrible robotic guardians, and entered one of the vast nine story treasure vaults. Inside she had ridden the Doom Train, riding in the rickety cart as the Doom Train clattered down the tracks, through loops and spirals, the g-forces punishing her body.
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She had passed out due to the blood being pulled from her brain, and in her unconscious state she had achieved enlightenment as she had seen a vision. A vision of maddened lemurs ripping apart planets and suns with their bare teeth.
From there she had approached one of the crafty and intricate treasure vaults. A large upright device, the bottom solid metal with a pair of joysticks with a big red button between, the top clear macroplas. Inside were all manners of treasures. She had used tokens scavenged from the dead lemurs to use the joysticks to manipulate the grasping claw until she had managed to wrest a prize from the device.
A prize she still carried in her satchel.
She had also managed to fool the guardians into dressing her in finery, paying with multiple passcards and keycards until the robotic servitor was placated. She had then entered one of the vast vaults, with shelves full of treasure, and carefully selected various treasures that her psychic senses told her were valuable. From there, she had even entered the Great Tomb, full of replica lemur bones and skulls, until she found a skull of wisdom that would make up to a hundred different replies if it was asked a question and then shaken until the eyes glowed red.
After her journey to the Tomb World, she had been gifted with her own small colony of biting and stinging insects to allow her to reach enlightenment.
Shandaar had hidden her initial reaction of horror when she had discovered that the others had found a lemur aboard the ship they had attacked and had brought it onboard. The lemur was gravely injured, with a serious head wound. Its mind was a barbed and jagged piece of glass, a broken mirror of razor sharp fragments.
Shandaar had known that bringing the lemur aboard was a mistake.
She had sensed the psychic burst of phasic energy when the lemur had been struck with the psychic whips and breathed a sigh of relief to know that the lemur was dead.
Needless to say, she had been startled when she had gone down to collect its body and saw it alive.
Except...
...it wasn't the lemur they had brought aboard.
Sure, it looked the same. Its physical form was the same.
But Shandaar had known, just looking at it, that it was different. It wasn't a carefully guarded mind.
It was a screaming lunatic swinging a razor at anyone who came near.
Still, she had been ready. When the lemur had effortlessly disposed of the slavespawn and the servitors, easily slain the other Atrekna, she had been ready.
She had thrown the blessed insects into its face, knowing that lemurs were vulnerable to their bites and stings, given out the audio cry that rendered lemurs confused for a few critical seconds, and fled the prisoner chambers.
Now she was moving to the bridge of the ship.
They had something aboard the ship.
Shandaar had been in close proximity to the Mad Lemurs of Terra.
That... thing in the prison cells, that creature that wore the skin of a Mad Lemur of Terra, was not a Mad Lemur.
It was something else.
Something terrible.
And it was aboard the ship.
Luckily, the insects biting at her flesh had invoked a burst of inspiration from Shandaar.
She knew how to get rid of the lemur. Or at least, how she could get away from the lemur.
She entered her quarters, made sure the psychic shielding was intact, and got out the Skull of Wisdom. She took a moment to admire the jewels around the eyes and adorning so much of the gone, the beautiful colors it was painted, and the avian feathers attached to it. She got out a can of Supplicant Oil and sat on her bed.
She asked if her course was the right one. She shook the skull. Its eyes turned red.
FLEE OR DIE! the skull roared out.
Shandaar felt relief. She had been correct. She opened the can, hearing 'you'll be sorry' warning her of handling the toxic brew, and poured some on the skull to placate the spirit within.
She put it, and other powerful relics and trinkets, in her satchel, checked to make sure the relic she had wrested from the trapped and powerful Vault of the Claw was still inside, and left her quarters.
She would have to work fast.
Faster than the lemur could kill everything sent against it.
-----
FWOOP!
The conical blast rippled the air and Natraya didn't quite get out of the way with her clumsy leap. It spun her in place, knocking her down, and she landed painfully on the floor.
She didn't lose her grip on the severed bladearm that dripped with gore.
Natraya rolled in place, like she'd seen the lemur do, and got up shakily, wiping the blood from her nose.
The lemur gave a sharp cry, like a bird of prey, attracting Natraya's attention as that cluster headache twinged again, wiping the fog from her brain from the Dweller attack. The lemur was in between two of the large, heavily armored, and deadly slavespawn. One was collapsing, its torso bent in half. The other reared back. The lemur had its legs spread shoulder width apart, bent slightly at the knees, one arm down by its side, its elbow bent, its forearm level with its waist. The lemur was shivering, like it was cold, or maybe trembling with something else.
The lemur gave another outcry and, without looking, struck the other spawn with a palm, its wrist cocked back. The lemur shook, vibrated, and Natraya noticed its hand was shaking.
The back of the spawn exploded outward even though there was no mark on the spawn's chitin at the front of the torso.
Natraya whipped her head around to stare at the Dweller in front of her.
She recognized the jewelry, recognized the iridescent pattern on its robe, even as it back up against the wall, a thick disc of purple energy between it and Natraya.
"YOU KILLED HER!" Natraya shrieked, running forward, stabbing at the disc with the bladearm. "SHE ONLY WANTED GOOD FOR PEOPLE AND YOU KILLED HER!"
The Tukna'rn smashed about him with the club, crushing the smaller spawn. He had tossed away the bladearm and scooped up a heavy piece of metal from the floor, ripping it free of its moorings with one explosive yank.
The lemur jumped forward, one leg extended, and the force of the flying impact smashed another one of the large spawn to the floor, its upper torso caved in. It spun in place, giving another one of those cries, and waded into two more, its hands flashing as it blocked or slapped away attacks before punching once or twice at the heavy chitin armor of the spawn.
They went down and didn't get back up.
Natraya saw the brow crinkle on the Dweller and screamed at it, diving to the side.
FWOOP!
It caught her legs and they went numb, full of burning pain.
Again with the bird of prey warcry and the cluster headache twinged again. Natraya found her legs working and she kicked and scrambled her way up.
The Tukna'rn crushed a robot into the floor, shattering the crysteel globe, the brain inside pulped by the raw power of Tukna'rn muscle. It glanced at the lemur and saw it leap into the air, one fist drawn back. It punched one of the largest spawn in the head, still in midair, and the head flew off in a spray of ichor and gore. The lemur landed, crouched down as it spun, and swept the legs out from under another one, coming up with a blow that tore the head clean off of that one two.
A spawn reared up and the Tukna'rn imitated what he had seen, jumping into the air, pulling the heavy club behind his head, and smashing the spawn across the face with it as he came down.
The spawn's head exploded in gore and On'trak almost stumbled, thrusting out with the club into the chest of one of the heavily armored ones.
A bladearm flew by him, trailing a fan of ichor.
"YOU KILLED HER!" Natraya shrieked as she charged again. The bladearm skidded across the disc, showering sparks, and she sobbed, screamed, and physically bit at the phasic barrier even as she pummeled it with her off hand and stabbed at it with the bladearm she held in her other hand.
The Dweller was against the wall, nowhere to go.
The lemur landed in front of the one of the last two Dwellers, firing rapid punches into its torso that On'trak could hear shatter cartilage and bone even over the death scream of the spawn he clubbed into the ground. With another bird of prey cry the lemur reached out, snatching the feeding tentacles from the face of the Dweller, throwing them to the side, then buried his fist in the creature's head. He pulled it out with a sucking sound and a spray of purple blood.
"YOU KILLED HER! SHE WANTED NOTHING BUT PEACE AND FREEDOM FOR EVERYONE! I'LL KILL YOU FOR THAT!" Natraya shrieked, beating her forehead against the disc, hammering at it with her empty fist, stabbing at it with the bladearm.
The lemur suddenly reached behind the shield, grabbing the Dweller by the robe, and snatching it up.
The Dweller screamed as the lemur kicked its legs out from under it and drove it to its knees.
Natraya saw that the lemur had one arm around where its neck should be, had its hand over the forehead just above the eyes, holding it in such a way that the lemur's head was over the Dweller's.
fwoop
She could barely hear it, felt only a light nudge at her.
"Heh, it tickles more than stings," the lemur smiled. He looked at Natraya and his face got serious. "This the one that ate your friend's brain?"
Natraya nodded as the Tukna'rn moved up beside her, dragging the heavy endosteel beam in one hand.
"Through its eye, sister," the lemur said. It squeezed its arm and the Dweller clawed at the lemur's forearm with its six fingered hands.
Natraya hefted the bladearm sword, grabbing the hilt with both hands. She aimed the point at the Dweller's eyes.
"Slow," the lemur said. It squeezed again and the Dweller made a choking noise. "Slow like it did your friend."
Natraya didn't care about its silent pleas, didn't care about its shrieks, didn't care about the waves of denial she felt coming from it. Didn't care about it trying lash out with its conical attack that was somehow blocked by the lemur's hand.
She saw her mistress spit on the Dweller's robe as it yanked her dying body up. Heard her mistress scream as the hide over her head and face was ripped away.
She pushed the blade through its eye slowly.
When she felt the bladearm hit skull on the other side she yanked it out and repeated it on the other side, then on the middle eye that had opened as she killed it.
The lemur stood up, throwing the Dweller to the side like so much garbage.
"Better, sister?" the lemur asked her.
Natraya nodded.
"Yes."