Jerry and Cascka seat themselves at a low table near the room Cascka had claimed as her training space, what most people were calling her dojo, and a few nerds were calling her praxum. Jerry had liked Star Wars as much as the next guy, but he'd had to have that particular one explained to him.

The waiting tea had a pleasant, fruity smell, different from the green teas Jerry preferred, but refreshing in the extreme.

"We were talking about blinders just now, do Nagasha have such biases?" Bridger asks, slowly blowing the steam clear of his mug before taking a delicate sip.

"Oh many hundreds if not thousands, broken up by subspecies, homeworld, clan, faith, both our own and the faiths of other species, and so on to an outright absurd degree. And that's without accounting for further cultural drift from marriage and the like. Some try to study these facets to an alarming level of detail. While I remain aware of them, I generally set them aside beyond seeking to eliminate or challenge my own. In the end, each individual approaches axiom in their own way. Their biases could fit one of the larger archetypes… or mean they can only do axiom after imbibing certain kinds of food due to cult religious indoctrination or something.”

Cascka chuckles and takes a long sip of her tea. “My mother was very strict about challenging my sisters and I's biases about axiom. If we had the touch for it, if we approached it via technology and science, we would be confronted with matters of faith, and vice versa, all to ensure my sisters and I had minimal blind spots from which we might be struck. Speaking of human cultural biases... is your pop culture perhaps why so many of your adepts carry a plasma sword? I notice you do as well."

Jerry lets a guilty smile spread across his face, Cascka had caught him flat footed with that sharp observation. "Well, not just our adepts. Plasma swords are very popular with pretty much everyone, and the reason behind that is pop culture based. Remind me at some point and I'll set up a ship wide showing of Star Wars. Back to the more salient discussion, my theory on what you’re noticing with how humans interact with axiom is that the combination of a firm grasp of how the world works mixed with an imaginative mind fed on a steady diet of scifi and fantasy media is what has made so many of the nerds such powerful adepts. They know the rules. So they can quickly find how axiom will let them bend the rules. They have imagination in spades, so when given a power that runs on the mind..."

"They take to it like fish to water, birds to the sky, or void whales to... well. The void."

"Exactly."

"That would indeed explain Commander Smith and Sorcerer Supreme Vernon Shay."

If Jerry had been drinking anything, he'd have spewed it across the room, his surprised cough turning into a barked laugh that had Cascka all tangled up in coils of confusion.

"I'm sorry, what title did you give Vernon?"

"Sorcerer Supreme, one of your human adepts told me that was Vernon's new rank."

"Ah." Jerry makes a mental note to remind people not to mess with aliens who don't actually know human culture. "He was joking, Sorcerer Supreme is the title of a comic book character from back home. Though the comparison is fairly apt if I recall the character right. Dr. Strange was more about subtle uses of power, using only as much magic as he needed. His opponents were usually like Franklin Smith if he had less self control and were raging dickheads. Achieving their goals through brute magical force."

"It sounds like an interesting series! And another to feature what amounts to ritualized axiom use! To think so much human media would basically feature adepts long before first contact. A lot of this appears to be rooted in your mythology, so we can't even explain it away with contamination from the psychic probe into Cruel Space Lady Eymali mentioned to me. I'll have to check the network and see if this Dr. Strange was in the massive data dump humanity has ‘shared’ with the galaxy.”

"I'm sure the comic books are out there. While you're looking at human media I'll have to send you the files for Dragonball Z and some other goodies from my personal stash."

"Excellent, I'm looking forward to it, Captain."

A slightly odd look crosses Cascka's face... so human, right up till one of her more serpentine features made itself known, like a motion that drew Jerry's focus to her reptilian eyes. From the waist up she was a woman of considerable beauty, you wouldn't guess she had a snake tail. Till you got to the eyes. Cosmetic contacts were one thing, the eyes of a human sized snake were something else entirely, and with the right emotion behind them, made the hairs on the back of Jerry's neck stand up.

A frequent problem for humans with Nagasha it seemed, despite the owner of said eyes being far more likely to want to snog the human she was looking at instead of snack on them. It cut right to the old instincts, a fear very different from the more practical concerns of an amorous or angry Cannidor... or even the hellish existence that were any of the various spider looking aliens to the Humans unfortunate enough to be arachnophobic.

Fearing a Cannidor was sensible, fearing a giant spider when you had a psychological hitch about spiders was compulsive. Some aliens though, in the right lighting, in the right setting, or just the right look on their faces, went straight to humanity's most primal instincts.

That had had unfortunate side effects a few times, primal fear, and in fact just about any emotion from a human outside of active violence being readily mistaken for arousal or desire. One man had ended up at the center of what he called a "breeding ball" of Nagasha more or less by accident after a hard shiver caused by random eye contact.

He was happy with his wives. Very happy considering the vast majority of the thirty or so serpentine women he'd gotten involved with were pregnant. Still he'd confided in Jerry that the girl's eyes still wigged him out occasionally.

The moment passes however, with Cascka's facial expression moving more towards ‘shy teenage girl’ than ‘large fanged predatory reptile’.

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

"Would you... perhaps, be interested in watching some of these together? I'd be interested to hear your commentary on the context of some of the shows and movies I've been viewing." A flash of panic crosses her face. "Purely platonically, as a movie night with your wives. I'm certainly not trying to make a move on you Captain, though I'm sure it might seem that way. I just thought it might be fun. I assure you my mother's words haven't had any serious impact on my mode of thinking about you."

Jerry resists calling Cascka out for lying, considering the circumstances. Did it really matter if she was interested in him? There were plenty of men around, any of which might catch her eye. Why squash a harmless crush? And if the crush didn't fade... well. She did work for him, but she was senior staff, so it's not like private or some random blue jacket was hitting on him. He could always just... let her join the family.

The absurdity of that thought makes Jerry bite his lip to suppress a giggle. Alien men truly didn't appreciate the sheer opulence they had. He could go pick up wives by the dozen if he wanted. Adding Cascka to his marriage would have likely been a two sentence operation... and that bothered him, even as it amused him. His mind settles quickly on his choice, if Cascka actually was interested, she'd just have to come get him. No sense making it too easy on her right?

"I'd like that Cascka." Jerry says, more or less on autopilot as his brain finishes processing his thoughts. "I think Wichen has the Den's media room all wired up and ready to go. She was hauling in all manner of ridiculous equipment in there, so I'm expecting something pretty phenomenal from my favorite wild eyed engineer."

Cascka clasps her hands together with a 1000 watt smile.

"Wonderful, I'll look forward to it. I admit, I am rather looking forward to having a look at your quarters, some of the crew say the Den is something special indeed." She cocks her head for a moment, setting her fiery hair shimmering for a moment. "Hmm. I just had a thought. I've never really done much space travel outside of relatively brief passenger hops. How do crew accommodations work on the Tear for other large families? Surely they can't all have facilities like the Den."

"That's a good question, they don't. First of all, most full clans don't ship aboard someone else's vessel. That's quite a rarity from what I'm told. In fact the only time I've heard of it was the men of the Earth Foreign Legion. They married the entire original crews of their new ships, more or less to a man, so we took a degree of inspiration there for billeting people on future Undaunted ships. The Tear's a bit different again, but we're a civilian vessel first, and more specifically, this is my family's property. When a clan hits 100 girls or more, they generally are in the financial territory to elect one of their number as a skipper and get their own ship instead of crewing for someone else."

Jerry takes a moment to take a long sip of his tea. "We basically decided to set up mini dens. Husbands will maintain a larger state room, designed for himself and the first wife or two. That'll be all they have if it's just them, with an adjacent large nursery room if the family has any children. If there's more wives, they'll be assigned to the nearest general barracks with the normal quarters for their rank or position. Apparently that's pretty normal galaxy wide in the rare cases that women take their menfolk and children to space with them. Which is to say it's rarer than a Cannidor gardener, but it's a functional balance of making sure everyone has the space they need without burning all our budget for space in the ship on personnel. We also have set up a series of "clan halls" that a family can reserve for group meals and the like. Family time is important to humans, no matter how big your family is, and as a human starship, we'll at least provide the option for all of that to our crewmen and women."

"Yes, perfectly sensible... though I suppose children could become a limiting factor."

"They very much are, but most clans joining us, the few that are full clans any way, are split clans to start with. In the sense that only a few of them will be, say, crewing on a starship and the children will mostly stay home. It's our understanding that most military spacecraft don't have provisions for dependents, certainly not like the Rear does, but we aren't just a warship. We haven't decided where to home port the Tear yet, quite possibly on Zalwore, it's centrally located, off Centris, and the Undaunted are trying to secure rights to build our own arcology there complete with supporting orbital facilities."

"Not a bad spot at all to keep one's children safe. I had heard the Undaunted had opened offices on Zalwore, I didn't know they were lobbying for city foundation rights. Very exciting."

"I feel like I've been dominating the conversation though, tell me some more about yourself Cascka, it's not often you get to talk to an axiom prodigy."

Cascka rests a hand on her upper chest, clearly fighting down a proud expression in an attempt to remain demure.

"Prodigy? You flatter me Captain, but I'm afraid most of what I have gained in the axiom arts is from hard work and discipline."

"Surely to be an axiom master in so many disciplines at your age, you had to be something of a child prodigy. Or at least training from a very young age."

"Hmm? Maybe, I did have a leg up from my parentage I suppose, but I struggled like any other novice once upon a time. I have since gained all the will and discipline I need to do anything in my estimation. I first became a student of learning, and once I learned how to learn effectively, there was nothing left to stop me from devouring libraries of information. Especially while I was at the Grand Temple. Master instructors tend to take several decade sabbaticals to and from the Grand Temples, both for a change of pace, and to continue their own studies. I've been blessed with excellent timing to study with almost all of the masters at the Grand Temple on Centris normally, and around several dozen visiting masters over the time I've been there."

"How many masters are usually in the temple at any one time?"

"Depends sometimes, but the actual grand master teaching staff that I took instruction with is usually only around twelve to twenty masters strong. With a total roster presently of some one hundred women and maybe a dozen men."

Cascka gives Jerry a look a bit like Jerry was suggesting they both evolve to walk on land, as Jerry starts to mentally run the math in his head. He quickly finds his assumptions are not adding up at all. He didn't expect Cascka to be quite as young as she looked, his first wife was just shy of her 150th birthday after all, Cascka...

"I hate to be impolite, master, but if I might ask a blunt question... how old are you?"

"I've been studying at the monastery for well over two centuries after finishing my advanced education. I was of course a student at a smaller monastery near my university while I was taking my various doctorate degrees."

"Two centuries!?"

"Yes, I'm 335 on the galactic standard calendar I believe... hmm. Birthday... three months from now... yes. 335 years old."

Jerry, caught flat footed by the oldest alien he'd met besides her own mother being as fresh and youthful as a girl decades his junior, defaults to what the Marine Corps taught him to do best besides copious amounts of violence. Being a smartass.

"I guess even a snake can be a cougar huh?"

"What is a cougar?"

"...Let's get another pot of tea on and we'll talk about it."