Neirdith felt weak, but she was on her feet now, well, at least she was sitting up with her feet on the floor.
“Don't try to move too quickly, you sustained a lot of damage to your core muscles, you may not have the strength to stand at this time.” Tahj warned her with a frown.
Neirdith huffed with effort as she attempted to stand and pitched forwards with a yell. Tahj caught her before she hit the ground, lifting her to her feet he guided her back into a sitting position and asked "You must rest, why do you insist on pushing yourself so hard, you are just going to injure yourself."
Neirdith frowned and replied "We are almost at Highland Station, and I'm not going to lay here while Seth is taken to the hospital, I'm coming too. I won't leave him." She said looking over at Seth's peaceful form. "Creesh has already been discharged and is getting around on her own." Neirdith whined.
Tahj tutted and scolded her saying "Now that's not fair, you know that Creesh was not nearly as injured as you were, plus she isn't on her own, Jessie and Samantha have scarcely left her side since she was brought back aboard." The Gre'vahn said in a distinctly humorous tone. The jovial alien was always pointing out the bright side of everything and cracking jokes.
"Be that as it may, I have made up my mind, and you can't stop me." Neirdith spoke in a determined voice. She let out a frustrated grunt as Tahj eased her back into bed. She struggled and writhed weakly but was unable to match his strength in her weakened state. Finally, she settled for an acidic glare and said "Fine, you can stop me. But can you stop Skorr?"
Tahj chuckled and called to the doorway "Skorr, she is doing it again."
A glowing molten orange mechanical eye appeared in the doorway and fixed on her face, Skorr's rumbling voice echoed through the neat room "Neirdith, I agree with the doctor. You must rest, I will not be party to you injuring yourself further."
Neirdith sighed in frustration and asked "Well, if I can't go with him, then how will I be there when he wakes up?" She asked angrily.
Tahj replied solemnly "I know how much this means to you, I truly do, But I simply can't let you risk your health for such a reason."
Neirdith grunted in frustration and tried to rack her brain. Nothing obvious came to her so she decided to drop the subject. Switching tack she asked Tahj "So læce, what's the news, how long do I have to lay here?"
Tahj gave her a funny look and replied "You are persistent, if nothing else. Fine, if I don't find anything wrong with you by tomorrow, I will clear you for discharge, but you need to take it slow. If you are not careful you could tear your abdominal muscles completely apart. They are still knitting together from the surgery I had to perform to remove all eight bullets from your stomach, and the one from your shoulder." He tutted again as he looked at her readouts, which were beeping insistently from her earlier escape attempt.
"At least tell me if I'm going to have any scars." Neirdith fake whined.
Tahj snorted and replied "Oh you are going to have scars, I didn't have the technology required here to do non destructive surgery techniques. So there are going to be noticeable scarring patterns on your belly and shoulder." He said in a parental way.
"Sweet, gives me a reason to wear skimpy swimsuits. Everyone will want to know what happened when they see 'em." She said happily.
Tahj shook his head and walked out of the medical room. Neirdith waited a moment before starting to sit up, suddenly she heard a loud grumble and looked over to see Skorr staring at her. She folded her arms and laid back down with a huff as Skorr made an appreciative noise and stood again.
She decided that if she was going to be stuck in bed then she might as well try to get some rest. Leaning back comfortably she closed her eyes and slowed her breathing in an effort to drift off. As she lay there her mind filled with flashes of the last month, had it really been so recently that her whole life had turned around? She still hadn't called her mother to tell her the news.
Neirdith's thoughts turned to home, and with a last thought about her old pet shrij, Mrs. Fuffles, she drifted off into a deep sleep.
Neirdith awoke as the twisting lurch of a warp exit slammed through the ship. For as long as she had been working in space she would have thought she had gotten used to the feeling, but it was completely different when you were not expecting it. The feeling of wrongness lasted only for a moment, but it was enough to induce her still foggy mind to a near panic as she tried to bolt but managed only a limp flop to the side.
As her machine screamed in displeasure she heard the sound of running footsteps. Soon after she felt furred hands lift her back into a laid back position and she saw that Samantha had come to her rescue.
"What were you doing Neirdith." The Yeown woman scolded her. "You should be glad that Skorr isn't here, they are in the comms room talking with Gloom."
Neirdith sighed and said "I wasn't trying to cause trouble, I fell asleep and was woken up by the warp exit, I guess it just startled me is all."
Samantha gave her another appraising look before saying "Well, we are here, Highland Station is just about twenty minutes away. I was coming down to tell you that just in case you were wondering."
"I wasn't, but I appreciate you anyway Samantha. I'm still stuck in here, læce's orders ya know." Neirdith said with some bitterness.
Samantha replied "Oh come on, it's not that bad, I got stuck in bed for longer than this."
Neirdith gave her a look, and retorted "And I seem to recall that it almost drove you insane."
Samantha opened her mouth to argue then closed it. Looking thoughtful she said "I could just carry you again. Would that make you happy?"
"Sure why not, but I want you wearing your armour when you do, that way we look like a couple of badasses instead of just pathetic." Neirdith said.
Before Samantha could say anything her assistant chimed and she joined the link with a nod to Neirdith. Gloom spoke through the device saying "We have been hailed by an SCU military cruiser. The CMS Artemis is asking for permission to dock, something about customs inspections." Samantha looked at Neirdith in a questioning way.
Speaking up, Neirdith said "Gloom, tell them they are welcome aboard, but to meet me in the infirmary as I am unable to greet them at the door."
"It will be done captain." Gloom replied as they severed the link.
Samantha looked at her and asked "Is this normal?"
Neirdith grimaced and answered "Not until a few years ago. The HIS rebellion and ongoing terrorist activity has set a lot of people on edge. They are probably going to check our backgrounds, so we will need to be upfront about it. They are also going to dislike the Knight's concealed weapons, but it's better to be upfront about that as well." Neirdith said with a frown.
Samantha lashed her tail and asked "What if they won't let us go to the station? Then what are we going to do?" She said in a worried voice.
Neirdith replied "That's not going to happen because I won't let it."
The two of them sat silently for a few moments before Neirdith said "Samantha, I want you and Jessie to meet the station security as they board and bring them here. Call Creesh and Grendel to meet us here. I'll call Tahj, Gloom will be able to see us so that's not a problem, That should be enough I think."
"What about Yquillan?" Samantha asked.
Neirdith thought for a second "Gloom, alert Yquillan and have him sit with you in comms, I don't want to have an issue with him." Gloom was silent but sent her an affirmative ping to her assistant on the table beside her.
As Samantha hurried out to fulfill her task, Neirdith grabbed her assistant from the table and clipped it around her wrist with some minor difficulty. As she got it on she linked with Tahj. "Tahj, I need you in the infirmary, we have guests coming aboard and I want them to see us all without any surprises."
Tahj replied "I will be there shortly, and Neirdith?" He prompted.
"Yes?" She asked impassively.
"Please take it easy." The Gre'vahn asked.
"No promises doc." She said with a laugh.
Severing the link she laid back down and waited for her guests to arrive.
**********
Lieutenant Calihan scuttled up to the airlock, this had seemed like a routine picket check when they had first hailed the Vinarfel pattern passenger liner, but as they got closer thay had noticed the upgraded hull armour and missile racks. It wasn't until The CMS Artemis was almost on top of them that the sensor operator had informed him that the ship had covered weapon ports on the front and sides, more weapons than a ship of its type and class should have even been able to power.
Calihan had ordered another scan of the ship and was alarmed when he was informed of just how much heat she was packing. If the scans were correct, then this ship was even more heavily armed than The CMS Artemis itself was.
The crewmember they had reached had said the captain was unreachable at the moment, but had fully complied with all procedures and had approved a boarding procedure. Calihan had been wary of a Hegemony trap, and had authorized full combat kit for those participating in the boarding.
Calihan twitched his antenna in trepidation as he prepared to board this potentially hostile vessel. The airlock cycled and he walked through onto the ship, he was met by a large Yeown female and a Human male with cybernetic arms. Both were unarmed and wearing casual clothing.
"Hello, welcome aboard The IAS Shining Knight. The captain is this way, if you would be willing to follow us." The Yeown said to him.
He waved two of his upper arms in a 'go on then' gesture and fell in behind with the four soldiers that had accompanied him. He cast his compound eyes around for hostiles or potential traps as he followed the odd pair, after just a minute of walking the lead female turned and gestured towards an open door saying "Captain Neirdith is in there, please be courteous, she isn't feeling well."
A voice rang out from the room "I feel fine Samantha, you don't have to baby me."
This Samantha turned her furred head and replied testily "Then why are you flat on your back in the infirmary? Oh yeah, cause you got shot nine times for no good reason." She then turned to him and whispered "She's grumpy."
Calihan remained silent and cautiously walked into the room, he pulled up short at the sight that greeted him. There were three crew members on the white beds that filled the room, a Human, a Nerivith, and a Swanith. Standing near the Nerivith was a Gre'vahn doctor and Vinarfel with copious scarring.
The human with the cybernetic arms entered the room and sat on the bed beside the Swanith and Samantha went over to stand by the Nerivith. She nodded her head to the injured woman on the bed in a deferential way and Calihan realised that this was the captain.
"What iss going on here, why are so many of your crew injured, were you attacked?" Calihan asked before he could stop himself.
The captain replied "We had a run in with some criminals a few days ago, don't worry, you should see the other guys." She said with a laugh that devolved into a series of wracking coughs. The Gre'vahn made a displeased noise and moved to assist her but she waved him off. "I'm fine Tahj, leave me be. I've had enough of your prodding for today."
Tahj replied sternly "I advised you to be careful Neirdith, if you won't comply I will have Skorr talk to you again." Neirdith gave him a dirty look.
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"Now that's just plain ruthless, I thought you were supposed to be nice. Anyways, it's unimportant. What's important is making sure I can get to Highland Station. It's extremely important." Neirdith said, switching her deep indigo eyes onto his face.
Calihan realised that she was staring at him. "Hello, my name is Lieutenant Calihan of the Congressional Navy, I initially hailed you for a routine inspection, but was alerted to your ships' more unusual characteristics, which warranted closer inspection via protocol." He stated flatly.
Neirdith grimaced and replied "The hidden heavy beamers yeah, so true story, but I picked up this ship at New Dundas for a pittance as a thank you from the station authorities for taking down a notorious pirate in a cargo junker." Calihan's antennae stood straight up in disbelief at her comment.
He retorted "I don't see how you could have posssibly taken over this ship with the crew of a cargo junker."
The woman smiled and said cryptically "I didn't, Skorr did."
Calihan looked around and saw the faces of the other soldiers were just as impassive as his own as he asked her "And who is thiss Skorr that could take down a pirate frigate alone?"
She smiled even wider and said "Oh that's a good question. I can call them over to the medical room, but I have to warn you. Skorr is like nothing you have ever seen before, I rescued them from wreckage I found floating in deep space. They claim to be older than the SCU, than my entire race in fact, and I believe them."
Calihan didn't know how to react to that admission of insanity. What she had just told him was a fairytale, no such beings could exist. Waving an arm in a 'whatever' gesture he replied "Sure letss see thiss thing."
She looked at him and said "Okay, but don't shoot them when they show up, they find it annoying." She smiled at his expression.
Calihan watched as she raised her assistant and typed a message into it before nodding towards the doorway. He turned and observed the door while also watching her for any suspicious moves in his peripheral vision. He didn't have to wait long as the sounds of something massive slowly began to reach his hearing. Sensing the subtle vibrations of the floor through his multitude of legs, he started to wonder just what he had gotten himself into. As the noises drew closed he began to realise with horror that the titanic sounds were the footsteps of some monstrous thing as it drew ever closer.
He tensed his muscles and prepared for the worst as the noise stopped just outside the medical room, the other soldiers were looking at him and each other nervously. He reared back in alarm as a huge mass seemed to block off the entire entrance and then a single glowing orb moved into view. He found himself reflexively reaching for his weapon and noticed that the other four soldiers had done the same. The orb, no, the huge glowing eye, roved around the room looking at each of them in turn before he heard Neirdith chuckle behind him.
“I did warn you they were unusual, please, lower your weapons, they are quite friendly.” Calling out to the monstrosity she said “Skorr, you are scaring the nice Lieutenant, back up a bit so they can see you better.” At her request the mass shifted and moved back, as it did so he began to make out the true size and shape of the being he was currently in awe of.
At well over three meters tall and almost as wide, the thing seemed to occupy the entire space of the hallway, even though it had over a meter of spare room. This being that the captain has called Skorr stood erect on two pillar like legs and had feet that ended in wide stabilizing talons. Its body was massive and almost completely featureless except for the two glowing eyes and a small series of lights on the lowest part of the hull, and they had two thick arms protruding from armoured shoulders. The right arm ended in a massive five fingered hand that was analogous to many of the hands that he was familiar with, but the left arm ended at the wrist with four equally spaced claws that could be used to crudely manipulate objects, but looked designed only for ripping and tearing.
As Calihan took in the giant’s features it spoke in a deep rumbling voice that rattled through his body like a tidal wave of raw force “Hello, My name is Skorr, Neirdith has informed me that you are here to check if our intentions are benign before we enter a heavily secured and populated space station.”
It took a few seconds for him to process the deep tones into their component words and then to grasp the statement's meaning as a whole. But as he realised the implication he responded “We are here as a routine checkup of SCU citizenss, as of now you have complied with every requirement we have asked of you and so far have no reasson to suspect you of any ill will.” he felt a slight twinge of fear as the massive being watched him silently with those burning eyes.
“Then please allow me to welcome you aboard protector, may your honor be sung through the infinite void and may Oblivion bring you home to rest for all eternity.” the creature intoned with significance that was wholly lost on the Vinarfelien Lieutenant.
Nodding in mock understanding he replied “Yess thank you Skorr, uh…” turning back to the captain lying in her hospital bed he reholsted his gun and asked more seriously “So what are you doing at Highland Station, and can you please tell me why you are as heavily armed as a cruisser for some Motherforsssaken reason?”
Neirdith smiled and said “I got this ship from the New Dundas security command, as well as a full deputization as an auxiliary ship. These weapons are unorthodox for a ship of this class, yes, but are fully legal. Sorry about them being concealed but discretion is sometimes needed when dealing with criminals and other such unsavories you know. I should mention, we are packing nuclear torpedoes as well. I also have a permit for those.” she said, smiling as he lurched.
“Nuclear tor…. What in the Mother’ss name do you need nukess for?” he nearly shouted.
“Hey, don't ask me, they came with the ship. I just took everything I could get, you never know when you might want to make a temporary sun for some reason.” she said defensively.
Calihan relented, she handed him a data slate from the table next to her and said “Here, documentation of our deputization as a fully licensed auxiliary ship, permitted to fit such weapons as our ship is capable of using for the purpose of attending to bounties and the general upkeep of law and order in the fringe systems.” she declared as he took it from her.
He read over the document and paused before reading it again. “Thiss sayss that you can equip arms up to your shipss ability to handle, you can't possibly convince me that you can power five heavy beamerss with a civilian power plant.”
The Nerivith female smiled as she answered “You are entirely correct, that's why The Shining Knight doesn't use a single civilian reactor, we have two medium industrial reactors linked in a tandem setup, crude but incredibly effective. They should do it on all ships if you ask me.”
“A tandem setup, that's incredibly inefficient, what's that limit your range to?” he asked genuinely curious. The CMS Artemis was larger, but more lightly armed and thus drew less power. It had a range of five weeks, a little on the low end but still perfectly respectable.
This time she frowned in earnest and replied “Yeah, range is our biggest drawback, we only have a range of about two weeks, a little less actually.” Calihan sputtered, two weeks? That was almost as bad as the first generation warp drives.
“That iss abysmal, is the drawback of such limited range really worth the upside?” he asked her.
This time it was the Yeown named Samantha that answered, drawing his attention “It's a drawback for sure, but we have a class one drive so it could have been a much worse setback.”
“Ah, well that would help I guesss.” he stated. A class one drive had a maximum attainable warp coefficient of 5,000c, the CMS Artemis was equipped with only a class 3 drive as it wasn't really meant for protracted long range travel and only had a warp coefficient of around 3,500c. Much slower, but it made up for it with a much more fuel efficient design than the fuel guzzling monster that was equipped to this ship.
“Allow me to introduce my crew.” Neirdith said to him with a small flourish as he finished speaking. Pointing at the Yeown whom he had already sort of met she began “That is Samantha, our engineer, she takes care of The Knight and keeps him running in tip top condition. Standing next to the bed there is Jessie, he is an incredibly talented pilot and skilled engineer in his own right. Seated on the bed is Creesh, she handles our information gathering and intelligence for our operations, she is also an excellent markswoman and saboteur. Beside me is our temporary medic Tahj, he's here to help with the man in the other bed, his name is Seth and he is my second in command.” her voice changed dramatically as she switched to Seth.
Calihan could see the raw emotion trying to tear its way through her and as he looked at the sleeping figure he could see why. They appeared to be in a peaceful sleep, but Callihan knew the signs of deep unconsciousness and recognised that he was in some sort of coma, the devastating head injury that was partially healed on his head seemed the most likely cause for his condition.
She continued as the thoughts flashed through his mind “He was injured during a boarding action that went bad and we were able to save him, but we lacked the medical tech and experience to fully repair the damage done to his brain, he is the reason we are here, I am hoping I can get him the proper medical treatment and a replacement eye here so he can… so he can be with us again.” she cleared her throat and paused for a second before pointing at the grizzled Vinarfel in the corner “That over there is Grendel, he is a passenger we picked up on New Dundas, and a spectacular cook. The last crew member I have on board is here already, they are a Jeseo named Gloom and have been patched into the ship's computer systems throughout this whole conversation. Say hello Gloom.” she said to the air.
Calihan twitched his antenna in mild surprise as a synthesised, genderless voice emmited from the wall speaker over the doorway “Hello Lieutenant, many call me Gloom, I apologise for my absence but find it difficult to extricate myself from the ships systems and only do so during dire need.” the disembodied voice said impassively.
“Ah hello.” Calihan replied to nothing in particular.
He looked back to Neirdith and said “That's quite the squad you have here, I'm assuming they are all hand picked for their abilities and completely vetted by you?”
She looked at him and said “If not for each and every single one of them, I would not be here today and Seth would be long gone, I trust them with my life, and would put myself at risk for theirs, clearly as you can see I already have.” she said, indicating her condition.
“Understood, May we have a brief tour of your cargo hold to check for contraband?” he asked politely.
“Of course officer.” She replied graciously. “Samantha and Jessie will escort you if that is permissible.”
He nodded and ordered the soldiers to move out, the two crew members of hers followed them into the hall. The soldiers still glanced mistrustingly at the massive immobile figure of Skorr but the titan made no move towards or away from them.
Nodding in the direction of Skorr he asked her “So, what iss the story of the big metal thing? Skorr, you called them.”
“Ah, funny story actually. So I used to be the engineer on a small cargo junker called The Arctic heart, the captain was a grumpy old Atraxses, but a great captain. Anyways we were on a regular old boring transport run when we detected a signal, it wasn't familiar but it had the looks of a distress pulse, so we dropped out of warp to investigate. We found a gutted Slaaveth cargo vessel, all the crew had been slaughtered by plasma fire.” Her eyes darkened at the memory and her voice grew harsh, but she continued unabated “It was there that I found the scrap that I would later save Skorr from. It was not like anything I had ever seen before and clearly foreign to the vessel so we claimed right of salvage and brought it aboard.” Callihan nodded at this mention of scrapping, it was a very common practice out in the fringe systems where manufactured goods sold for a premium.
The Nerivith captain continued “I first noticed it was unusual when I saw Skorr’s hand sticking out of the metal scrap, I cut them out and stood them up before they awoke, much to my amazement and utter shock. I managed to make an impression on them and communicated my name and got theirs in response. Before I could do anything else though the pirates returned and boarded us. Skorr saved our lives without hesitation or thanks, and it was then I knew they were a good person, no matter how menacing they might look.” She smiled at the distant figure fondly and waved, Calihan saw the massive figure wave back and smiled. He waved as well and got a thumbs up in response. In spite of the situation he chuckled. “Like that one huh? I taught Skorr that before they even knew how to speak common.”
It was time for Calihan to ask another question as he said “Didn’t speak common? You mentioned something earlier that I didn't undersstand, you said that Skorr wass older than your entire race? How is that posssible?”
Again he was surprised as Skorr piped up from the hallway outside “It is possible, I am by your standards functionally immortal and have lived for many millions of your years. Though I admit most of them were spent in hibernation as I was trapped immobile in deep space.”
Tahj let out a surprised noise and stared out at the huge figure, apparently Skorr’s abilities were not common knowledge as Jessie and Creesh made similar exclamations of surprise.
“What the fuck? You are how fucking old?!?” Jessie said with a disbelieving look.
Creesh made a high trilling whistle of surprise and said almost on top of Jessie “What? What do you mean immortal, where are you from? I thought you were just some recently discovered race I hadn't heard of yet, there seem to be more of those every other year.”
Skorr seemed to pause in indecision before answering slowly “My true age is unknown to even me Jessie, but I am indeed many millions of years old at the least, as for your question Creesh, I have a more concrete answer. I don't hail from this area, nay even this galaxy. My origins lie far from here across the boundless void of intergalactic space. If I were to calculate my remembered trajectory and telemetry data I would hazard a guess that my origins lie in what you call the Andromeda galaxy. Though that is just speculation.
Calihan tried to suppress his shock but failed, he noticed that even Neirdith seemed surprised by this latest development, as if she herself had not known that.
She spoke up “Wait Skorr, if you knew that why did you tell me you were unsure when i asked you that back when we first met?”
Skorr looked at her and replied “I did not know this myself until very recently, I was in hibernation for so long, my memory is… scattered. Hard to access, it takes considerable time and effort to piece things together from the morass of my mind, but I have been working on it near constantly since the moment you awoke me on The Arctic Heart.” Neirdith nodded and the others seemed to accept that as well.
Calihan looked at Skorr and asked “Well, you know nothing about your originss so I suppose it would be too much to ask if you knew your race, or even what you look like under that armour.”
Skorr agreed “Correct, I know nothing that I have not freely told to you. I have nothing to hide, I am as a stranger in my own shell.”
Calihan thought for a long moment and stated tiredly “Well, ancient immortal beings aside, my men reported nothing unussual in your hold and are on their way back now. It wass nice to meet you and all, but I really musst return to my duties. If you get a chance to stay in the system, look me up, I would love to hear more about thiss ship and its adventures.”
Neirdith smiled at him and said cryptically “I'm sure I could ask the crew to recount their experiences and make a log of it all, might just make an interesting story to read, maybe I'll publish it and call it tales from the shining knight or something equally cheesy.” she said with a far off look as if observing some distant future.
Calihan smiled and said “I would love to read it, anywayss please take care, and I wissh you luck on your journey.” He waved to them as he made his way out into the hall, tipping his antenna at the massive Skorr, he then made his way back to the airlock that connected their two ships together.
As he neared the airlock he found his men already there and nodded his thanks to the two crewmembers of The Shining Knight saying “Thank you for your cooperation, I will make a log of it in my report. Maybe it will bring you some attention, get you a few choice assignmentss, who knowsss. Have a good one, and may the Mother shelter you under her armour.” he said with a cheery wave.
With the procedure out of the way the CMS Artemis uncoupled from the IAS Shining Knight and made its way along its regular patrol route. Calihan was in deep thought about all that he had learned. With just a few short statements his entire notion of the universe had subtly shifted in unexpected ways. He made a note in his personal log to go see a therapist as he feared he might be suffering from some sort of mild existential dread, and then walked the small mess hall for a snack.