Zhal began to walk when she saw the Skarabian come to her
“Hello young lass, felt that you were staring at me during the line back in Mekanik, what caught your eye?” The being said, she could finally see its face, two big orange eyes with a spiny crooked, toothed face with striking lines of Lazul color on its face.
Zhal moved her neck to face the being directly “apologies, am someone who is fascinated by unique beings and while your species is common on our home-world you elemental type stood out”
The Skarabian made a interesting grimace showing more of its numerous teeth, “understandable, especially since the ancient reputation of my elemental type”
Zhal nodded, “Which is unfortunate, well I am gonna go now, any suggestion for an apartment for Griffins or other place that is more or less suited?”
“certainly” the being shares a pathway to a complex he thinks suits her, “who is your father?”, “Its Sklulingordur, rymmederim,sayir” she says in a proud yet not egotistical tone
The Skarabian shudders in joy, “Your father and I are long time friends, ever since he went into Ket so many millennia ago”
Zhal perks up “wait so you know my name presumably then? don't tell me my father sent you” in worry, like a degenerate caught in its acts
His expression did not change “oh no no no, don't worry, it's just a hobby of mine to watch each generation grow up, am not suprised Sklulingordur dident talk about me and yes I do know your name” The being somehow grins even further “Your family knows their genealogy very well”
“I want to ask and yet not ask your age” she says, while starting to walk to the filtration area, The Skarabian follows
“I don't want to be in a museum again, name is Doroatus and I wish you good luck”
Zhal walks to the filtration area, waits, does some checks that she ha seen in many tutorials and instructions, name, dna, father, mother, reason for visit, checking of items, sees some beings refusing and be detained, everything she expects
She goes through and goddaim, buildings everywhere, tall as the eye could see, seeming to go past the red atmosphere, crossing into each other and over in archaic manner, which makes it look like cheese, lights, signs and ads on every area she looked, beings walk, some fly, there are even areas for burrowers and swimmers. She almost subconsciously took out her wings, but even though she watched and read on how to navigate in the air here, she wants to wait until she got a place to stay.
She follows the map Doroatus gave her and found the corridor, she crawls and finds the ad the map was pointing to, it was nothing special just a line saying ‘apartment? join this chat room’ with an image and funny colors.
She typed in a link that was in it and gets into a chatroom on her device, explaining who she is and her situation. After waiting a few secs, she hears the sound of rockets, later sees the being that is attached to it.
She finally properly sees the planet's first native, it was a Kisk, six flexible limbs, wings and storage on back, a body that bends 90 degrees up on the halfway point, that gives way for a long slit mouth with teeth both for crushing and tearing, two eyes on the side, two eyes on the back, quills on its head, each limb has 6 long fingers, two arms on it head, rest below its body, and skin looks chubby and squishy.
The skin is mud-green, but then colorful reds, greens, blues and yellows on the face and down its lower body, she had some light scars on her face and some decorative horns that curved inwards.
The eyes in front were different colors, dull green and gray, Zhal presumes it's a female based on her height of around 150 cm. The females are never above 170, the males always taller and stronger, due to how gender dominant the species is.
This species element are varied between solid, liquid and gas types.
Females are usually submissive to their male counterparts which makes Zhal shiver all over whenever she thinks about it, dosent help that she isent interest in sexual pleasures at all.
But even though female Kisk are that, the males are in fact lazy and just gives orders that the females do and their instincts forces them to obey, but in terms of hierarchy the males are low and aren't allow major power, the leaders of this planet the Trixtops-
Zhal snaps out of her thinking when the Kisk start to speak, “So how long are you gonna stay here for, Griffin?” She asks in a neutral tone with a hint of boredness
Zhal starts to speak “I want to find a permanent stay miss-eh??”, “call me Elina, carbon-monoxide Elemental, follow me” she says with intrigue and they start to walk with Zhal following. “My name is Zhal dirt Elemental”
While walking Elina starts to chatter “so what's the reason, family, friends or a lover?”, Zhal perks up “Have always had a fascination with other beings and their story and this is the perfect place and it's right next door basically”.
Elina perks her eyes behind her head “oh that's interesting, would love to be paid with your stories you have, also I notice you are talking verbally really well, was one of your ancestors not a Griffin?”
“Not that I know of, I was born with a ‘defect” that affected the muscles in my chest which my family believed would improve my verbal communication and insisted that the doctor should implant a vocabular that helps with that, later on it was improved on once I became older”
“Why did your family make the decision?” They got into a new corridor with many apartment complexes that are similar to those in Mekanik
“Because to make it easier for me in Ket, because most here don't use the clicks, screeches and the body language of our kind nor is familiar with it, the vocabulary word is powerful here” Elina blinked twice with her eyes and stopped and showed Zhal a door that opens like liquid to a decently spaced living room, it had a screen, a table, some chairs that were set in ‘Griffin setting’ som cabinets, shelves, and lights, with a door on each wall, in the right was a kitchen which led into a storage room. On the left were the sleeping chambers which had the bed on the ceiling, a hidden cabinet and shelves, and a small table and chair.
Bedchambers also had a bathroom with the basic necessities. Then the third door led to another bathroom, the rooms colors were the normal dull gray, but she can change the settings.
The apartment was quite big and she was happy with it. She started to put some settings into it so she became owner of the space and started to change the colors.
She made the living room darker gray, kitchen white, storage room red and bed chambers into a mix of blue with magenta stripes.
“Glad you like it, follow the rules that exist in the chatroom, complain to me if anything is wrong and I will do if its within reason” Zhal put her stuff but kept the amulet and decided to put on the wings once she is done settling in, “make sure to message me for 1 hour or more talking to me each week, if your gone for more than a month without a notice or reason then the apartment will become mine and all items inside” Elina says as she is staying in front of the door “do you understand?”
A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
Zhal happily nods “Yes and thanks for the warning, can you leave for a few secs while I install my wings?” She says as she prepares to install them, Elina moves away and the door closes
Zhal puts on her first wing and feels as if a lost limb has been reconnected, she stops for a moment until she installs the other one, the wings are laying flat against her back at the moment.
They are, how should she describe them? They have propulsion, glider parts and other things that makes her flexible in the air, however she does not understand exactly how it works, even after decades of usage, she just gotta be careful as to not accidentally yeet away and crash into a unknown flyer, last time she did in a new place, her cousin and bystanders were so freaking mad and worried of course.
“I'm done” she says and Elina walks in when Zhal opens it, “so what are you gonna do?” Elina aks, “I am gonna find somewhere to eat I am starving”
“There are many such areas, don't get in trouble” Elina says as she walks away “have fun”
Zhal starts to walk out as well “thanks”
She walks around and sometimes lightly uses her wings to hover, many other beings are close by but focused on finding a place to eat.
She sees a huge sign that says “Restaurant from the homeland and memories”
It's a place she has heard and seen, its food is focused on stuff from the world where most elemental and none-elementals can trace their ancestry to, Anleon, that still extremely broad but usually focuses on the food from how it is today, but not sure how faithfull it is to there, but does not matter.
She goes in and the door opens for her size. The place is huge, tables and chairs on the sides that are most likely remote controlled and morphable, so the controller can adapt it to whatever being is walking to it.
There is a line with beings going to the counter to order food, the workers seem to be mainly Kisks.
She waits in line until she is in front and orders some food, then she looks to find a place to sit.
Zhal finds an area with two other beings there and goes to ask “Can I sit here?”
One of the beings looks to Zhal and says “sure, nice to see new faces, how long are you gonna stay?” The being asks, she is sure they are another of the natives called Baba.
They are the most recent ones, relative speaking, six long limbs, four joints, long five fingers on each limb, long torso, neck and head, they are basically living turrets and can shoot out of their mouths, for their max height that could get up to 2 meters they are really powerful.
Their color usually is on the bright side, bright silver, yellow, pink, these two in front were bright pink and red respectively.
In battle position their torso stands upright, their four limbs on the bottom stretch out on one joint from either side like a X, then the rest of the limbs turn 90 degree downwards into the earth, their long arms prepared for anything and their head point forward and adjust their whole body accordingly, or least that what she has seen.
Zhal positioned herself and the chair adapts to her, “forever hopefully, I like to talk and look at interesting species and this is my first time seeing Babas in a while, I am Zhal, dirt Elemental by the way, nice to eat with you two”
The bright pink one perks up “Awsome, I am Tollerium and the red one beside me is my birth-brother Olleriom, we are light elementals” Olleriom pays his attention now on the new being.
Tollerium wore baggy clothes but has a opening in the chest area that allows breather holes to take in and out air, but it also had symbols on his chest that is of a circle with a Baba inside in mid fire, there are worlds around it that roughly reads “For our efforts”, it's tells her that Tollerium is actively in support of Babas gaining more power due to their active role in security, stability and support they have given to Ket and other worlds, but haven't gained much in terms of actual power.
Tollerium also wore a headdress and some rings on his head.
His brother Olleriom is barely wearing anything and has a bag and some other small unremarkable decorations on him.
Olleriom speaks up “so, when was the last time you saw one of our kind?” He says in a rough tone, focusing intently on her, Zhal notices slight glow on the Olleriom head, she enthusiastically talks how she last saw a Baba a few months ago in Mekanik when watching it and other beings go out of the spaceship that landed.
Olleriom glows intensifies and asks further “have you ever had an unfortunate encounter with our kind?”, Tollerium immediately speaks up “Brother can you stop asking those types of que-” Zhal interrupts
“its fine, its fine, I don't mind, I haven't,”The brothers stop and listen “but like everything there are good and bad, but those who I have met, seen and talked to are cool and nice, and I bet you two are awsome aswell” The brothers calm down and regain their composure
Olle looks a bit guilty and says “sorry, just personal stuff, it's nice knowing that it's a rarity where you are from”
Zhal moves the topic to food “so what did you guys order?”
Tolle starts “Well I ordered spaghetti and my brother ordered fried steak with fries” Zhal did a short click “I ordered banana with meatballs with dressing and spice”
A kisk comes and gives the meals to her and the brothers, Zhal subconsciously licks the sides of her beak with her long rough forked tongue.
The banana is an fruit from elemental trees native of Anleon, meatballs from a variety of cells grown elementals, she takes the banana and puts it between her beak, her forked tongue are below to scoop the pieces up and down into her throat where her crushing teeth are, the shell of the fruit is tough but her beak is tougher and it slices a small piece, the tongue immediately picks it and scoops it in and then comes back ready again.
She eats the fruit and the meatballs and she starts to notice the decor on the restaurant, the table on her side having depictions of her people hopping between the moving island and fighting, hunting, building cities and alliances and killing Catchers, even showing famous historical events of her people.
The walls had horns, tusk, skulls of different beings on the walls all native of Anleon, either they are fake (artificially grown) from criminals or donated, she sees how the walls are painted, with colors showing the diversity of beings all types of elementals fighting ancient True Dragons, the perspective making the monsters look like mountains ‘Cant believe our ancestors fought those creatures to extinction’, she also saw depictions of war, racism, forced breedi- ’I am stopping right there, I can’t lose my appetite’.
Zhal and the brothers order some extra knowing the extra cost, they enjoy their food until something large walks into the door, Zhal moves her head to the door.
A huge broad being, which is a Rhinecere, a being native from one of the distant worlds she thinks, it has large imposing tusks, triangle shaped head, arms the size of Zhal torso, legs somewhat short but could crush her entire being with unusable tail, dark gray leathery skin, four fingers and toes, thicc west with holes for breathing, medals and other items of achievement attached to the clothing, feathery plumes on it head and sides of neck, big pointy ears with rings, some form of tattoos on its arms and face that are dark red.
Everyone is looking, even the waiters.
Zhal is scared, worried and wants to immediatly get the fuck out, but its in the way, however appearance is not everything and no one is being hostile even if everyone is intensly looking, before she can decide on an action, the being moves forward and then a cry is heard behind her.
‘we are fucked’ repeated over and over in her hed, Zhal is becoming really slippery her breathing is increased tenfold and she prepares to yeet away.
Zhal follows the being with her head.
The Rhinecere walks to the crying being and starts to say “is it okay?” it says in a surprisingly soft and feminine tone, Zhal hears another voice “Sorry sir, her origin is- wel-l-” before it can continue the Rhinecere gives the crying being a item and it crying lowers in intensity, it or she gives also something to the guardian, “if anyone tries to give this guy or you the guardian any trouble, message me”
Zhal feels incredibly stupid, sorry and immediatly cringes on few second younger self for assuming and being so frieghtend, but she assumes it due to all this new enviorment that effect her behavior.
The guardian says “thank you so much” while Zhal looks away and everyone resumes to their own thing, she notices some having had their devices pointed at the event.