Utr Zarya

My meeting with Arcturus and George started when they came to me as patients.

I wasn't always a traveler, you see. Well, I wanted to travel, but I had an obligation towards the colony I belonged to. Ever since the Exodus, Vyrnians were scattered throughout the galaxy, trying to find a place we could call home after we were kicked out of our home system due to some...unknown circumstances regarding our government, and the fact that our planet was not accessible. Guess Vyrnians were not that good in keeping a long-lasting rule.

The planet where we established ourselves was a desert planet. All the waters were deep underground, which were accessed by several pumps we installed on this planet. We also installed some moisture collector for recycling. Water was very important for us, especially on this desert planet.

However, unlike Earth, our planet was not backwater. We still got supplies from the other Vyrnian colonies while also being a trade hub, so we're practically connected to the rest of the galaxy. The colony was established long before I was born by the Vyrnian evacuees of the Exodus that happened around 500 years ago. Since then, the colony had thrived and become the cultural center for Vyrnians.

Regarding my meeting with Arcturus, it wasn't smooth at first. Like I said, I knew them as patients. He and George were riding on an Orian ship when said ship crashed near our colony. Vyrnians were not so keen with Orians given their notorious reputation as slavers and pirates. That, and they were opportunists who would try to trick a colony to help them, only for them to take advantage of that. Our colony had our share of pirates to deal with. We managed to repel them each time, but that made us rather wary, especially knowing that not all Vyrnians were kind. I knew they were desperate, but they had crossed the line. We did not tolerate that.

Of course, when we saw who emerged from the wreckage, we quickly assumed that they were pirates, even if it was rather clear one was a Vyrnian and the other was a soft-skin. That's our slang for non-scaled aliens like George. I heard from some of the soldiers responding to the crash site on the peculiar situation Arcturus and George were in.

The ship was too big for a two-man crew, and it was not automated. The ship crashed rather intact with the worst damage it suffered being the fact that it split in two. Also, when Arcturus did come out, he was naked. When he saw the soldiers, he told me that he raised his hands to the air, trying to tell them that he was unarmed and that someone was hurt inside the ship.

The soldiers did not believe him, thinking that he was luring them into a trap. He tried his best to explain, even telling the soldiers to put something he called a 'jammer' on him as a show of good faith. I did not know what a 'jammer' meant until I saw him demonstrate his ability, which was a forgotten combat-based use of our energy absorption biological process. In these post-Exodus times, no one used that ability for combat, because training for it was far too rigorous and time-consuming. The same application could be executed by energy weapons. I could tell from experience.

However, when it was used for medical purposes, it was a very invaluable asset. We Vyrnians could use our natural ability to help regeneration and purge infection, which was very crucial for one of the ship's occupants, who was gravely injured by the crash.

I only knew what happened when the soldiers escorted a naked Arcturus to our colony, with George in his arms. As one of our colony's best healers, I was quickly asked for an emergency healing, which George clearly needed. The crash was not so bad for a Vyrnian, but George's body was too soft and Arcturus claimed that George lost his grip and was hurled across the bridge towards one of the panels, which burned him and broke some of his bones. If Arcturus could not convince the soldiers to take him to the colony, George would not survive. The burns, coupled with the heat of the planet, worsened his conditions.

I gave him first aid on the spot by using my ability. With a condition that severe, my healing ability could only heal him enough to keep him alive, but for a full recovery, he needed the equipment in our clinic, along with a least two weeks regenerating his burnt skin and for a full recovery. We sighed in relief, knowing that he would survive. It took some time.

And that was when we finally returned to the more pressing matter: Arcturus. While the human, as Arcturus said, was clearly hurt and almost died, Arcturus was only superficially injured. Aside from the fact that he was practically naked, he commandeered an Orian slave ship, which essentially made him a slaver himself if it was his own ship. Arcturus vehemently denied this and claimed that he also hijacked the ship from the slavers and had also turned them to the authorities, but that also made him a hijacker, further complicating the situation. I felt that if he just said that he was a victim, he might be exonerated right then and there.

Arcturus was lucky that our colony's leader was a good reader of characters. Everyone in the courtroom, during his trial, seemed to feel something in him. Something noble and dignified. He hijacked with a reason, and not out of malice. He did admit that he was also driven by greed given that he turned in the Orians for a hefty amount of money, but he also said that not everyone could manage to survive without money, an argument everyone accepted.

Now, the thing that made me realize that something was wrong with Arcturus was when he mentioned 'The Secular Order of Kav Almun', which was an order that had been disbanded a long time ago. Before you ask, no, it's not something only a historian can possibly know. It is common knowledge that the Secular Order of Kav Almun no longer existed after the collapse of the Great Vyrnian Empire, which was replaced by the Holy Empire of the Eye, a bane to our history due to their rather closed-minded dogma of the Eye (which was the gateway told by the message Arcturus played before). Unfortunately, their mysterious, but rather predictable, collapse meant the total collapse of our Empire, and was the reason of the Exodus and the loss of our home planet.

The judges were left pondering Arcturus's defense. I must admit, they were thinking whether Arcturus was not right in his head due to the crash or he was a very good liar. We had never met a Vyrnian like him before, and he clearly was unique in the way that he was wearing jewelries that were different from what a Vyrnian of his age would wear.

Even then, while his guilt was still being determined, he was free to visit his friend provided he was being escorted by the guards along with me. Also, he was given some fresh clothes, for decency. Even if the desert was hot, no one walk naked around here. He was grateful for this, though he was not completely free yet.

I did not think he was ever guilty, just suspicious looking. You could ask the other colonists and they could say the same. Sure, from the look of his eyes, he had seen death, and had taken lives himself, but who had not? It was a bad time for Vyrnians, and we had our share of guilt of killing. Not for simple murder, but to survive. Why did we know an Orian slave ship when we saw one? We shot one down before. This was not our job, though.

Arcturus proved to be holding on his words rather well. In fact, I could tell that he was grateful to be back to civilization, as he said. Once he had become friendly with us, he finally told us what happened. The Orian ship he took over was already in a bad shape when he handed over the Orians. He suspected sabotage. Still, he did not miss a ship that he only used for two trips. Besides, he opened a galaxy account during their stop, so he could still access his credits anywhere he wanted, even in the colony. We set up a trading center a while ago. He sighed in relief for that.

Then, our conversation turned towards the soft-skin. He told me that he was a human and his name was George Atmell. Arcturus admitted having broken the Vyrnian law of interference just by crashing on the planet and got involved in their history, but he could not do anything. In a sense, he also admitted that had a choice to return George alone, without him, and without even involving the human to the affairs of the galaxy. I disagreed.

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"You gave him a choice, and he made a choice," I told him. "It is never fair to deny someone a decision."

Arcturus understood what I meant and wished he could talk with his father about it when he decided to put him on a ship and got him away from a conflict.

"He never gave me a choice," said Arcturus.

"If he gave you a choice, what would you do, then?" I told him.

"I would stand by him and protect the president," he said. "Even if it ends up killing me. I sometimes feel that I have abandoned my people by being saved. I...wanted to go back and set things right. Still, after I've lived among the humans and the dragons of Earth, I think my father did the right thing, after all."

"It's what a good father would do to his son," I said. Hearing about Arcturus's story, who was the victim of the Holy Empire's hostile takeover of the empire, made me sympathize with him. We also lost our home planet, so we both lose our ancestral home, even if I regarded the colony, Arkari, as my home. He was quite understanding, however, and I was glad.

He then asked about my ability, which was different from his own. I told him that it was something I trained for as a Healer. I also told him that no one in many years had ever had training to use our natural ability as combat. Guns had made it rather obsolete. Arcturus did not agree, saying that sometimes guns were not the best solution.

We became fast friends, which helped with his pending trial. Before long, three days had passed, and the juries had given a verdict. They decided to let Arcturus free, based on the evidences and his own defense. They even offered to let him stay on the colony. Arcturus, however, only wanted to stay until George had recovered, before he set off again. He said he owed George the wonders of the galaxy, and he would travel around with the human. He still needed a new ship, though. He decided to work it off until George was fully healed.

While he was at it, he also decided to ask around about what happened to the Vyrnians and what was Exodus. Of course, everyone was confused, given that it was common knowledge. Still, he was a Vyrnian out of time, so someone (I think it was the historian. Either Gameel or Pectar. I don't remember) decided to tell him what happened.

The Exodus was an event in our history where we lost Vyrn, our home planet. I happened somewhere around 500 years ago, right after the collapse of the Holy Empire's central government. No one exactly knew what happened, but the planet was closed from traffic one day. Everyone away from that planet decided to start new colonies, and we did not know what happened to the Vyrnians still on the planet when everything was cut off. It was horrible, to know that you've been indefinitely locked out of your home, only ever knowing it by form, but never what's inside.

Many of us, including my generation, was born when Vyrn was already sealed. I am one of the generation of non-Vyrnian Vyrnian (confusing, I know). We are called Okthaipan, or 'Children of the Exiled'. It is our role to be the first of the coming generations that would know that Vyrn is no longer their home.

It is sad, I know, but that's what it was. Arcturus did not like this one bit, but the one thing he could help was to describe Vyrn from three thousand years ago. The historian in question respectfully declined. While they had no doubt that Arcturus was telling the truth, they did not have a way to validate them. You never believe the word of the first witness, especially if you're working in a field where you need to interrogate people.

Good thing I wasn't like that, and it somehow helped ease Arcturus a bit when someone believed him. Well, this was not the only trouble he had. Unlike me, he was not an Okthaipan and did not experience the Exodus. He wanted to return to the home he was born and raised in. I thought it strange at first. Other Vyrnians my age did not even have any idea what Vyrn looked like, including me. While he was from an ancient era, his biological processes were stopped by cryo-sleep, so he was practically the same age as I was, maybe at least two years older.

We did not talk about the Exodus or the present day Vyrnian all the time, of course. We also talked about life on Earth, especially after George had gained consciousness. His wounds still need more time to regenerate, and by my prediction, it would take at least five days for him to fully heal. That's more than enough time for me to talk with him. I was rather interested with a pre-space's perspective in all this. As far as I remember, I've always live knowing what a spaceship is and how to fly one. I got a license and experience to fly a Vyrnian spaceship.

And that's how I started this travel and how things turned out to be. You see, talking with George reignited my childhood dream to one day travel the galaxy and see all the wonders. However, the one thing that made me convinced to brave the unknown was Arcturus. His desire to go back to his home and find out what happened to the planet he was born and raised to made me realize that it was unfair to even accept the fact that our planet was no longer our own. Sure, I know many of us are trying to get to Vyrn, but we cannot even get close to the planet's space. That does not mean we can't try. It's not like there's a law to prevent us to get to Vyrn, right?

And that was how we decided to travel, once George's injuries were fully healed. Before we departed, however, George had something of a favor. He wanted me to get a hold of someone in the colony who knew how to modify a weapon. I asked why, and he said that ever since their successful attempt in hijacking the Orian ship, he had run out of 'mana' reserve. He could use his own mana but was worried that he could only fire one shot before expiring.

As a scientist and a healer, I noted his concern and ran a check on him. We had been very open with the other warp-capable aliens ever since the Exodus, and we also knew how to deal with them in case they needed help. Of course, we never knew an Earthling before, so once I scanned him, I realized why he was concerned.

When I visited Earth later with George, I found out that Earth has a particle that is linked to their bodies as a form of evolution. While it is not essential to breathe this particle, it is very essential to keep one alive. Without it, you cannot function properly, and might even die. This planet is the only planet with an unlimited amount of that particle, which cannot be found anywhere else.

George, like us, has an ability to convert this particle into something else. Unlike us, however, it has a limit outside of Earth. Once he uses all of this particle outside of the Earth's atmosphere, he'll die. That was what I told him when I saw his body's scan results and advised him not to use his 'mana' until he returned to Earth. He thanked me for clarifying his concern.

I directed him to Kentores, our colony's head engineer who knew a lot about ray guns. I was there when he voiced his concerns, and Kentores gave him a simple solution: modify that weird gun-sword of his into one capable of shooting energy beams. Arcturus had given him an idea about energy weapons in the first place, so he immediately agreed. He even asked Kentores if he could modify his weapon so that it did not just discharge concentrated energy beams, but also for other purposes like 'coating the blade' or something. Kentores knew what the human asked and started to work.

In just three days, just when he was fully recovered, that old Vyrnian gave him the modified gun-sword. I was rather curious how such hybrid of a weapon could work, so I went with him and Arcturus to a shooting range to test the weapon. It worked as an energy weapon would, but then there was a twist to it. I was quickly reminded that it was also a sword, and the modification Kentores did to the weapon was to make the energy it discharged coated the blade instead. This made the blade acted like a laser scalpel in full power: sharp and could cut through anything, even metal. George demonstrated it, and even he was surprised.

As George reveled with the modifications, I asked Kentores about it. I think he said, "Well, you see. I got the inspiration from the member of an order of sorts. She's a Vyrnian, just like you and me, but she got this peculiar-looking sword. This sword was made out of pure condensed light energy. Imagine a laser scalpel, but far bigger and only sustained by a crystal in the hilt found only in a specific world. It would take a massive amount of energy just to sustain that kind of weapon! I asked her how she did it, and she only said, 'it is something you must find out for yourself, and only if you wish to join our order'. Obviously, I did not join, saying that I am needed elsewhere. She understood, and I had never heard from her since."

I thought that we would bound to meet someone like her someday during our travel. Unfortunately, that was not the case. At least for now.

I had been thinking about it for a while, and I told Arcturus that if he needed a ship, he could use my personal ship. On one condition: I would be the pilot. Naturally, he objected, saying that I was needed here instead of traveling with him. I simply told him that I was not the only healer on the colony, or even the planet, for that matter. I had said that I would be on an extended trip to the colony leaders, and he said I've earned it. Of course, he expected me to return from time to time, saying that the colony's doors were always open for me, Arcturus, and George.

That's what we did. Officially, Arcturus, using the credits he could spend to buy a used spaceship, decided to hire me as a pilot and a healer. Personally, it was my choice to travel with him and George. We quickly got off the planet and traveled to Vyrn (I did not tell anyone about that part). That's how our adventure...my adventure, began.