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"WHA HAHA! The Jig is Up, Dr. Mean Lynx!!! We've found your secret underwater lair and have heroically stopped your master plan. Now Turn yourself over or I! The Armoured White Tip Will..... HEY!!!"
THUD! BANG! CRASH! MEYOOOWWWWCH!!!!
"HEY!! Armoured Leggy Nice Butt, Um... Stop beating the crap out of Dr. Mean Lynx?" Ankiah asked, jumping down from atop the roof scaffolding.
Private Antigone Caithen dropped the super Villain and looked at the angry spiky fox girl with a shrug. "Well, you got mad at me last time for letting him get away; Figured we'd catch him before he had the chance to escape this time."
"Well, letting him get away is half the fun... Oh well, anyway, let's get him talking, no way this guy could pull all this off by himself." The Armoured White tip valiantly stated.
Armoured Leggy Nice Butt picked up Dr. Mean Lynx and slammed him on the table pinning his arms to the side and readying him for the interrogation. "This good?"
"Uhh, sure..." Armoured White Tip replied, fighting back her laughter.
Walking up to the pinned super Villain, She pulled out her truth ray and gave the doctor a good zap. "Now, Dr. Mean Lynx. You are under the power of my Truth-Ray. Tell me all you know of your master! Or, I'll get Armoured Leggy Nice Butt to beat you up again!"
"Can we change my name? It's kinda long and annoying...." Caithen asked, making sure to hold the dastardly Villain against the table properly.
"Uhh... What about Armoured bendy legs?" Ankiah replied, poking the Villain with her finger.
Caithen sighed and pulled up some of her favourite fictional characters with her implant. She then worked on coming up with a battle plan she knew Ankiah couldn't resist. "Ya know what? How about I go by 'Armoured Lean Leggy extra Nice Butty.' But we shorten it to Allenby."
Ankiah's ears perked up, and she skipped in place at the suggestion. "Great Idea, Sidekick Allenby! Now, Dr. Mean Lynx, Tell us all you kno... Why is he dead?"
Allenby looked down at Dr.Mean Lynx and scanned his body with her hero visor. "Ahh... He ate some poison while we argued."
The Armoured White Tip deflated and once again poked the Villain with her finger a few times... "So what now, we lost all our leads?"
"Ahh, but you see Armoured White Tip!!!! He has a computer, you can use your super encryptor to unlock it, and we can figure out who he was in contact with." Allenby helpfully suggested.
"Ahh, but of course, Allenby!! With this, we can track his dealings and get to the bottom of this dastardly plot!" Armoured white tip exclaimed.
Allenby walked over to the computer and unlatched the control box. "Insert the encryptor here, Armoured white tip! The night is still young."
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"They're just sitting at the edge of the system. It doesn't look like they're willing to risk entering." The coms officer stated.
Chrarada, Admiral Miles, and Base Commander Brown stood in Leda's CIC, monitoring the two enemy ships as they stalked about just outside the system's gravity well.
Chrarada, in her anger, had put a new dent in the floor; Not even bothering to apologize though seemingly embarrassed at the mishap. "If they won't enter the system, then I'll personally take a battle group to destroy them." She stated, immediately pulling up a list of captains with her implant soon after.
"Don't act rashly. We have signal jammers within the system. I assume the best they can tell is that there is a star here, and that's it." Admiral Miles replied.
Commander Brown finished speaking with some command personal and entered the conversation with a smile. "The 'Pointy spear' and its package is ready and on an intercept course. Its captain has experience with talking down pirates. If they're here to talk, he'll take care of it."
"I don't want to talk. I want them dead." Chrarada smoothly stated.
Ethuci vibrated his hood in disagreement, earning him a look he didn't quite understand from Chrarada. "We should find out why they're here before we destroy them. If they want peace... They will not find it until they release all their slave species. If they refuse our kind offer, we destroy them."
"They will not release their slaves if what we witnessed from the recent butchery is evidence of their intelligence. I fear they are only attempting to discern what happened to their previous ship." Commander brown replied, accepting a new communication from the Pointy Spear.
"We cannot start a war just yet." Admiral Miles asserted firmly. "We must bide our time until the Star Navy arrives in full. That is, while we can thrash them in battle, we have no idea of their numbers or territory."
"Then what of the command ship we captured." Chrarada hotly replied. "The reports say they are close to an interface, but not much else."
"Unfortunately, that is the state of things. Their tech is so backwards it's taking time to even talk to the syst-"
This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
"The Pointy Spear is reporting it's receiving a radio transmission. Patching it through." The coms officer reported.
"Radio... You don't suppose... Do they still use radio?... Wait a moment, Com! Is it on the same wavelength the Eaenhreph use for their long-distance communication?" Ethuci asked.
"Confirmed. It's a match to known Eaenhreph transmissions."
"Well, That explains the lack of communication systems we've found on their ships." Admiral Miles replied.
Chrarada scoffed at the thought of talking through a slave and pointed at the enemy ships. "If they're using slaves to talk to us, I will have nothing to do with it."
The bridge fell silent as the Pointy Spear transmitted its first encounter with the enemy ships. The display slowly came to life, and a static black and white image of a relatively small, thin alien ball.
"Okay, so what does it want?" Ethuci asked, studying the picture.
Not having to wait long, audio kicked in, and the being began a series of loud stomping and snapping sounds. The seemingly random sounds continued to increase in frequency until finally the being stomped off the bridge, leaving the onlookers to wonder exactly what was happening.
Commander Brown looked at the incoming data and frowned. "It's obviously angry. We need a language expert here to figure out what the thing wants."
Admiral Miles wasted no time in summoning the station's two experts and a surprise guest. "I have made the arrangements. We will get to the bottom of this"
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Yirphayen followed specialist Koma into the odd enclosure. It carefully studied its surroundings finding many carbon forms present, none of the forms it was familiarized with, sadly.
"Yirphayen!" Admiral Miles greeted. "It's a pleasure to finally meet you face to face. Are you finding your stay here on Leda comfortable?"
Letting out a chime of confusion, Yirphayen studied the odd form, noting it had many mineral formations embedded within its fluid interior. "I am enjoying my time with Jack and the carbon forms known as Michael and Srettia. The one Known as Ankiah is..... I am unable to predict or understand her actions."
Admiral Miles let out a chuckle and motioned Yirphayen to follow him. "I have a request for you. And though it may be difficult, I think we may be able to gain some insight into what's happening."
Yirphayen followed the odd form until it came up to a mineral display with the picture of torturer on it. "I do not want to be here." It chimed in quiet terror, quickly turning to move towards the door.
"Whoa, whoa there, It's okay. It won't hurt you. It's just a picture." Admiral Miles tried, attempting to calm the being and realizing he had just stepped knee-deep into a trama. "I promise we will do everything to protect you, Yirphayen." Taking a deep breath, Admiral Miles placed his hand on its shoulder, thankfully finding it relatively warm and not painful "I need you to help translate what they are trying to tell us. You don't have to talk to them. I actually want you to talk to your trapped brethren on the ship; I think they are using it for communication. Once this is over, I promise you can go, and we'll do whatever we can to free the trapped Eaenhreph."
Yirphayen thought to itself for a moment before singing in agreement with the statement of the carbon form. "I will talk to my kind but not the torturers."
The coms officer relayed the message to the Pointy Spear, which reestablished communications with the ship. Once again, the stomping, humming, and odd vibrations came through the com.
Yirphayen hummed nervously and began a harmony of first meetings, waiting nervously for a few moments. Slowly, Its greeting was weakly returned by another harmony of first greetings, following by a plea for help.
"We will help it, Yirphayen. We will not let these beings escape." Jack sang in support, strengthening Yirphayens resolve.
The CIC burst into commotion as the officers began to look around in surprise, prompting Admiral Miles to motion for calm as Yirphayen continued.
"I am Yirphayen." It started humming soothingly to the trapped being. " We will do all we can to help you. But first, we need to know what the torturers want."
"I am Ceinsiltey." It chimed back in pain. "Will you truly help?"
"The Terran carbon forms have shown not to be hostile and instead rather violent towards the torturers. I feel we can trust them when they say they won't leave you to your fate." Yirphayen sang back, trying to soothe its suffering.
Ceinsiltey willed itself to be strong and sang the disgusting words of the Torturers to Yirphayen, informing it of what the slavers wanted and the eventual fate of this system.
"I will Tell the Terran forms of their words. Stay true until help arrives, Ceinsiltey." Yirphayen harmonized, trying to lighten its burden.
Yirphayen then turned to the Admiral Miles carbon form and radiated with anger at the words. "The Briolb Sky groupings want to know why you are in their rightful territory and fighting back. They say you're not supposed to do that as per their god's word. They say they were gifted this sector of the sky by the building god, and all who dwell in the sky are theirs to do with what they please. They want you to hand over all your skyships and working things and to help them reclaim the lost fo..."
"It's alright. That's good enough, Yirphayen." Admiral Miles interrupted, immediately turning to Commander Brown, whose face was red with anger. " Inform the 'Pointy spear' that Operation Bar Brawl is a go. I want stealth ops on those ships now."
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Wabs sneakily pretended to sleep on his rather uncomfortable comfortable bed. Wabs had decided it was for the best. Once the breathers sent in the larger ones in big food plates, he pretended to be in the hurt sleep in hopes they would leave Wabs alone. Wabs was happy to be a smart one.
Wabs was surprised they didn't eat him, though... A normal Briolb would. Wabs decided to open his eyes wide and look around the room stealthily.
He was happy not to see any of the breathers present. Sitting up straight, Wabs began to pull off the weird sticky things on his body. They were itchy...
Stepping down from his comfortable uncomfortable bed, Wabs looked around at his surroundings better, finding it full of tasty-looking materials. He took a bite out of the off-flat surface close by, one with odd devices atop it. Wabs let out a warble of glee, finding it rather delicious.
After devouring more than half of the flat surface, throwing the devices to the ground in a pile like the polite Briold Wabs was, of course. Wabs looked around for an escape. The door he thought would be a bad idea. He was sure walking out into the open where a breather could see him was a bad idea. And while it was the easiest way out, he would likely be caught by the breathers and eaten or maybe beaten than eaten. Or maybe they would eat pieces of him, then beat what was left, then eat that. Wabs didn't want to be eaten. He heard getting eaten hurt; Wabs didn't like to hurt.
After a closer look around the room, Wabs found that the only way out was, in fact, still the door. However, Wabs was smart. After all, Wabs was a part of the smart ones, the ones that thought things good. Stealthily hiding the fact he was smart was how Wabs got to be a sky sailor in the first place. The smart ones were always locked up and told to think things.
Wabs didn't like being locked up; he wanted to sail in the sky. Walking up to the wall farthest from the door, Wabs opened his mouth and took a bite of the material. It was a bit too bitter to be a real food. But Wabs figured bitter food was healthier anyway and continued eating.
After chewing a hole through the wall, Wabs entered the in-between and began his journey through the odd breather home.
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