Far away, in the darkness of space, two figures stare into the darkness.
On a ship that itself is full of shadows, the figures slowly speak.
‘Did you retrieve the orb?’
A figure covered in shadows asks with a raspy voice to the smaller figure, dressed in battle armor.
‘Yes. One of my knights managed to retrieve it.’
With a quick handling, the figure showed a red orb in its hand.
‘Good,’ the shadowy figure said.
‘Remember. The master has turned you down. This is one of your last chances,’ the shadowy figure said.
It turned and walked away, leaving the one holding the orb to overlook the depths of space.
Further away, the Tortoise slows down and floats through the darkness of space.
Djon looks out the window, seeing the emptiness of space and checking the coordinates.
‘This must be it,’ he whispers to himself before he calls everyone to the cockpit.
‘What is it?’ Veronica asks as she takes her place beside him.
The rest slowly enter the cockpit, wondering why they have been called.
‘We’re here,’ Djon says and he puts down the engine, letting the ship float on its own.
As the Tortoise slowly floated forward, nothing was there to be seen in sight, until slowly a part of the stars were disappearing behind something dark.
As the ship got closer, everyone could see what they had found.
A giant creature, bigger than most starships, was coming into view.
Curled up and moon shaped, it was laying there in the darkness of space.
‘Is that?’ Eto asked but his own amazement threw himself out of words.
‘It looks like one of the drawings back at Daisugi,’ Hawk said, also amazed by what they had found.
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‘The Ancient beast,’ Vanessa said who watched with suspicion.
TYO jumped on the dashboard and started to input data on the main computer.
‘Do you think it is dangerous?’ Djon asked as he turned down the lights of the Tortoise, making sure that they wouldn’t be spotted.
‘It depends, I think,’ Veronica said. ‘Back at the farms on Borner, most animals react dangerously because they feel threatened.’
TYO was still pushing different buttons but then he stopped.
‘It is not an animal,’ he said as he was still calculating something.’
'What do you mean?’ Eto asked the question everyone thought of.
‘It is mechanical, based on the scans I have done. Like a machine or a space station.’
They all turned their heads from TYO back to the view outside.
Still very slowly, the Tortoise started to enter the atmosphere of the Ancient beast. It was now that the rest could see that it was indeed mechanical, only shaped as a beast from afar.
‘What should we do?’ Hawk asked, mostly to himself.
Something showed up on the screens that TYO discovered.
‘Hmm. It seems there are loading bays on the Ancient beast. As if it expects ships to dock.’
'Save?' Veronica asked but Djon shook his head.
‘Can’t tell from here,’ he answered.
Eto punched his fist into his other hand.
‘Then we have to go in there and find out.’
TYO turned from Eto to the view of the Ancient beast and sighed.
‘I can’t even calculate how much trouble this is gonna be.’
The darkness of the Ancient beast slowly crawled over the Tortoise as it entered one of the docks they found.
It was at this moment, everyone realised the Ancient beast was way bigger than they thought.
Small light illuminated the interior of the beast and what they mostly saw were paths, hundreds of them, all crossing over each other in a giant open place inside the beast.
When the door opened and they slowly walked out, the first thing they noticed were shadows that filled the floors like mist. And not just the floors, but the machines and the walls too.
The outside of the Ancient beast seemed to be made of glass, giving view to the darkness of space behind it.
"It is huge,’ Eto said and Veronica shushed him to be more quiet.
‘It is indeed magnificent," Hawk said, who started to record what they encountered.
TYO slowly drove to one of the machines next to a path and scanned it.
‘Seems this shadow mist has completely drained the machines of energy. If we want to find out what it is or how it works, we need to find a way to get rid of these shadows.’
Eto heard TYO’s words and grinned.
‘Then let’s go in and find the source, shall we?’ he said and he wanted to walk further. Then, a voice reached him.
‘I don’t think you will find the source,’ a muffled voice said from a distance.
At first, the group looked around where the voice was coming from.
Vanessa was the first one to see who was speaking to them and pointed upward.
A few pathways and bridges above them, a figure stood, overlooking the group.
A figure they recognized by the armour and helmet it wore.
It was Captain Hanzou.