Eymali

Eymali sprawls out across her new bed with a deep and satisfied sigh.

The head of the Nagala mounted across from her bed completed her trophy wall perfectly. The toothy maw of the most lethal predator of the Yauya homeworld of Awauynis gleamed in the light of the flame emitter she'd set up for her meditation. The same flames cast shadows on other trophies of beast and sapient life alike.

While she didn't take heads from sapients as some huntresses, She never failed to take a trophy from a difficult hunt, be it as a bounty hunter or when she was hunting beasts.

A collection of weapons were her predominant trophies from her time as a bounty hunter, a trade she had been happy to surrender to take up her new family's banner.

"Though I suppose I can hunt again with the special forces units. Jerry's troops were quite surprised when I accompanied them on their exercise... most of them didn't even notice me. Save the little one Jerry calls "Top"."

Eymali considered the mysterious man the others called a "Gurkha". Their status as a celebrated band of warriors had been explained to her, and Jerry even found her a video and watched it with her, translating the narrator's words into galactic trade as they went.

They honestly sounded like huntresses to Eymali! Men who could move without being seen, walk without noise... and as Eymali had been taught, and was now fully approved to teach others, doing so without a drop of axiom.

Invisibility was a natural gift of her people along with other camouflaging axiom abilities. Near necessary to survive on Veyen Prime before the Yauya had tamed their jungle world. But without the skills to support one's natural gifts, one was really only relying on luck... and Eymali was of the opinion that she would rather be good than lucky. Luck ran out after all. The one time she'd been caught flat footed by a bounty's minion for example.

She'd been crouching in the open instead of properly finding cover. Fine enough to her young mind. The quarry was... unintelligent at best, unskilled in the arts of axiom or battle. Eymali couldn't be seen... but she could still be walked through. Which is exactly what happened. Someone had walked right into her, triggering a confused gun fight and Eymali having to cut a few more throats than she'd really wanted to.

Admittedly it didn't change her pay, but she'd still been disappointed with herself when she cleaned off her wrist blades and hauled the meat off to confirm the bounties. The leader of that little band of bandits' rail pistol was kept close to the rack for her wrist blades... to remind her that she can always make a stupid mistake.

Eymali had made no such mistakes with Jerry's unit on their training. She'd just wanted to observe them in the field, but Top had called her out, and used her to lambast his troops for a lack of awareness. So she'd come down to join the group, and ended up giving an impromptu class on stealth and tracking.

The memory drew a smile from the huntress.

She enjoyed that part of her work, and working with Jerry's elite soldiers was like a dream come true.

Professionals. True professionals. The galaxy was filled with so many fools, amateurs and other forms of miscreant that the sheer average level of incompetence kept people alive far longer than many deserved.

Getting access to war bands and organizations where true professionals lived either went against Eymali's morals, joining up with higher tier mercenary units for example, or impacted her lifestyle too much, hence why she'd never joined her people's military. Now though, she had all the benefits, a very receptive, even eager, audience for her well cultivated skills.

She quietly pinches herself by the wrist. "Honestly this is all too much, I'm married. I'm a Huntsmistress. All within the span of a few months. I thought for sure I'd only be able to hunt for a husband after being certified. Instead I found a husband and the greatest prey a Yauya huntress could ask for in a single fell swoop."

The door to her door slides open with a quick rush of air, and Wichen wanders in with a smile.

"Talking to yourself again Eymali?"

"What? How in the goddess's veil did you get in?"

Eymali wasn't exactly upset to see her sister-wife... but she rather liked the security of her bolt hole.

Wichen cocks her head, confusion written across her face.

"Oh the door. Right. Yeah security flaw, don't worry it's on my list to fix it. I only just noticed on my way to return these bad girls to you."

The Feli weaponsmith reaches into her axiom enhanced pocket and withdraws the familiar cases of Eymali's wrist blades, and all thoughts of annoyance or concern of Wichen being to so casually waltz through her door are immediately forgotten as she leaps up from her bed, crossing the room in a flash.

"They're done?"

Wichen nods smugly.

"Damn right they are. I'll go so far as to wager that they're the best set of Yauya hunting blades on this half of the galactic disk... and probably the other half too, but there always could be someone more genius than I am. It's unlikely, but it's entirely possible."

Eymali straps her weapons back on, flicking her wrist to test the extension and retraction of the hunting blades.

"Balance is good. Incredibly smooth motion."

"I did a little more than you asked for actually. You just wanted a blade upgrade... but these are a little bit... special."

Wichen holds up her wrist comm and projects a hologram of the wrist blade unit in the air, the model spinning lightly as Wichen highlights different spots.

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"While completely functional without axiom, the wrist blades have a variety of axiom upgraded components now, including a passive axiom cleaning field on retraction, that doubles as a molecular deburring unit. So every time you retract the blade, they'll be cleaned, preventing any mess getting into the mechanism. The blades themselves are the alloy you requested, with a slight addition of a few more elements so I could produce you a true mono-molecular blade. Hence why you need the deburring unit. You should be able to slice through armor like butter, but in the event that you catch on something somehow, the deburring unit will true and resharpen the blade, repairing it's structure and keeping your lethality and combat efficiency on the weapon's end in such a state that you're the only limiting factor on combat performance.”

The model rotates again and highlights a control that then simulates the flow of axiom into and around the wrist blades.

“To avoid breaking stealth, the passive axiom for the deburring and cleaning units mean they're just drinking out of the environment at a slow and small enough rate as can only mean 0. To even a talented adept these bad girls should read as unpowered. I took the inspiration for that from Hubby actually. That whole human thing where they appear axiom inert is tricky as hell."

The hologram rotates and shifts again, bringing up an image of the second half of the pair.

"The left wrist blade is as you requested in terms of special equipment, about two hundred meters of extremely light high tensile cord for weakness at the narrowest gauge I could find. You should still be able to suspend a light armored vehicle with it if you need to for some reason, and it's made of a clear material that's really annoying to see if you don't train yourself to do so. Winding this thing was a massive pain in the tail let me tell you! There's also your throwing knives, and a couple noisemakers in an easy access dispenser, and I crammed a miniaturized electronic warfare module in there too. Hacking, jamming, signal tracing. The only limit is range."

Wichen fiddles with her unit, and the hologram highlights a new module on the right gauntlet.

"On the right gauntlets you have your primary blades, and I decided to work up a small plasma grenade launcher. Natural point of aim, or you can integrate it with a HUD. Trigger is on the outside of the right gauntlet, so you have to reach over with your left hand to launch a grenade stock. You want to set it up for one handed operation, I can work that for you, just tell me what hand gesture you want. All of that is of course connected to an axiom purge system by the way, so you can use powered equipment on a quick plasma charge or imbue the blades and then discharge it relatively quickly. You'll have to vacate the area fast, as the local axiom will be disturbed, but that might actually give you more cover."

The Yauya woman's mandibles wiggle a bit as she takes in everything Wichen just spit at her at light speed.

"Goddess of the Hunt. They feel even lighter than before! Not heavier."

"Yep! Optimized all the internals, remade most of them from high quality alloys and I..."

The chime of Eymali's comm unit interrupts them. The alien huntress quickly triggers it, and Nadi's face pops up on the vid screen panel on the wall.

"Eymali, could you come up to the cloning facilities nearest the den? Your new pet cat is ready, and it's best if you're there when the kitten is decanted."

"On my way!"

Eymali is practically sprinting down the hallway in a flash, with Wichen hot on her tail.

"Wait wait, did Nadi say kitten?"

"Yep. That's what baby cats are called on Earth."

"Huh."

Wichen falls silent as the two women quickly make their way through the halls of the Crimson Tear, heading up and forward a few decks to make it to one of the primary cloning labs. Nadi greets them at the door, the small Kohb looking extremely professional in her lab coat with a set of glasses perched on her snout.

"Sorry, I was in the middle of finishing my thesis."

"So you'll be Doctor Nadi soon?" Eymali asks as Nadi shows them over to the tank.

"Yes." Nadi grins, clearly pleased with herself. "I should have done it sooner, but Ms. Sylindra paidd me well, and I didn't have a desire to open my own practice... or indeed go into space of all things! I'm not some brave or adventurous Khob. I just have my little dreams, my little hopes, and my little wishes. And in the meantime I can make other wishes and dreams come true."

The little reptilian woman's smile lights up the room as she claps her hands and draws Eymali and Wichen's attention to the tank.

"Now, the actual star of today's show, one Savannah Cat, a small Earth carnivore, this is an F2 hybrid, a blend of a domesticated cat and a wild cat, of the second generation. They're prized by their owners for their size and intelligence, as well as their attractive spotted coat. She'll weigh around seven to eight kilograms once she's full grown. In addition to all the usual items which I gave you yesterday, you'll need things for the cat to clim..."

"I'm sorry. I. What in the actual fuck."

Eymali and Nadi look curiously at Wichen, who's wide eyed as she looks at the kitten in the slowly draining tank.

"That looks just like a Feli!"

"Well. Minus the thumbs. Different legs and shoulders. And hips. And significantly smaller."

Nadi gets waved off by Wichen as the Feli continues.

"That's. Sure details but it still looks just like a Feli kitten! I bet they're ambush predators too!" Wichen rocks back on her heels a bit. "Holy shit. I know Syl said that humans have been bonding with animals that look like our precursors for thousands of years but holy fucking fuck! I mean it's obviously a Feli kitten, just look at it. Eymali can I hold her once she's out? She's just so precious and I..."

As Wichen goes on at length, exalting the glory and beauty of the kitten that might as well be a Feli for all intents and purposes, Nadi strokes her chin, leans in to Wichen and takes a light sniff of her scent. A little more thinking and she pulls out the bioscanner she keeps on her belt, calibrating it and scanning Wichen.

"Ah, that's it then."

Wichen stops mid sentence.

"What's it?"

"Wichen, you're pregnant."

Nadi flips the bio scanner around to show the excitable Feli.

“That’s why you’re fixating on the kitten, it looks just enough like a Feli kitten that it’s hitting your instincts just right while your pregnancy hormones are ramping up.”

There’s a pause.

A silence.

Then all hell breaks loose, quickly drawing in Syl and some of the other sister wives who were working nearby.

In the ensuing chaos, the tank flashes red, and Eymali quickly retrieves her kitten, vanishing under a cloaking field after a quick check of the kitten’s vitals by a nearby aide.

She tickles the tiny creature's stomach as they ghost through the halls together, leaving the joyous chaos of her sister's good news behind. It was a bit too... loud... for Eymali. She was a quiet woman by nature. Introverted perhaps.

As she makes it to the door of the Den Jerry calls out to her.

"Eymali."

Surprised, she drops her cloak, stepping to her husband.

"How did you manage that? I didn't even sense you use Axiom."

Her heart flutters as he gives her that damned crooked half smile of his.

"I've been practicing doing it by eye. I figure it'll help me as I keep practicing disappearing. Is this the kitten?"

"Yes, I named her Espirit."

Jerry steps in close, tickling the creature's belly to an adorable "mew".

"Always been a dog person myself, but it's a cute little critter I'll say that."

"She won't be little for long, Nadi says up to eight kilos I think."

"That's a big damn cat."

Eymali grins as she watches her husband playing with the little kitten as it slowly becomes more active. She was a huntress. Her prey was already captured.

"Husband. Speaking of your training in the arts of stealth. Would you perhaps... care to disappear with me for a little bit? I have felt myself... lonely for your companionship, and I'd like you to tell me more about these cats."

Jerry's answer is to vanish before her eyes, the soft sound of boots on metal deck plates heading towards her quarters as she quickly pursues.