Earuu Resort, Earuu Mountains
Alade
16:09 Local Time
September 13, 2019

Vixa looked up at me and yipped softly, but turned and began sniffing the snow. The walkway had seen so much traffic that the snow was compressed into a hard layer, so I led her over to where there was some deeper, nearly-untouched snow. It was too tall for her to jump up on, but with a quick pop, she was up.

I burst out laughing as she immediately sank into the snow until only her head was visible, but it soon disappeared with another pop. Turning around, I saw that she had appeared back where she had been standing originally as she shook the snow out of her fur that was of the very same color. She gave me a look once she was done, which only caused me to laugh harder.

I coaxed her into trying again, and while she did sink again, she didn’t teleport back down. Instead, she jumped out of the small hole she created and tried walking on the surface. It was here that her small and light size was to her advantage, along with having six legs. While her paws weren’t that big, she did have six of them, which did distribute her weight a little bit better. As long as she was walking she sank very little, but as soon as she started moving faster, she hopped to stay on the surface.

Even so, moving through the snow was hard work, so after a few minutes she teleported back onto the walkway and shook off the snow that clung to her fur. When she was done, she looked up at me as if asking ‘What next?’ Aside from Zaszi and her team, everyone had already made their way inside, so I figured that we had better join them.

Entering the lodge, we found that we weren't actually on the bottom floor. Except for the fact that nearly everything was made from wood, it didn't seem much like a lodge, either. Instead, it looked more like a large shopping mall, with numerous stores to our left and to our right, with hundreds of people going into and coming out of them as they perused.

So it didn't look like a lodge at all, until you walked forward and looked over the banister. On the floor below there were even more people, though nearly all of them were more relaxed than the shoppers up above. There were more cushioned couches and chairs than could easily be counted, with many of them being filled by people that were taking a break from the cold and the snow.

If the upper floor was like a mall, then the bottom floor was like it's food court. All along the periphery were dozens of restaurants of various sizes. Some were actual restaurants that you could go into and be seated, but the majority were basically a counter that you ordered from. Once you received your order, there were hundreds of tables to choose from, all of which were also made out of the same beautiful wood that was used for everything else.

It appeared to be a major theme, which was probably influenced by the truly massive trees that were found outside. Rather than support pillars made out of metal or concrete, carved and stained logs were used instead. While they certainly drew the eye, they weren't nearly as impressive as the two sets of curved staircases that were on either side of the lodge.

As we walked down one of the staircases to the bottom floor, it appeared that the staircase was carved out of a single piece of wood. There weren't any holes for bolts or anything of that manner, nor were there any signs of different pieces of wood being fastened together in another way. Even after arriving at the bottom and examining it a little bit more, no seams or notches could be found. I couldn’t imagine how long it must have taken the carver to work on one staircase, let alone four.

---

While I had assumed that everyone had eaten dinner while I was at my meeting, that proved to be incorrect. The first thing that our large party did was commandeer a section of tables before looking around to see what kinds of food there was. Some of the restaurants were actually ones we had seen on Menseio Station, but many of them were brand new to a lot of us. Our draconic friends predictably went to a restaurant that was producing the smell of grilled meat, but everyone else was a bit more varied. Some went to restaurants that specialized in fish, while others went to restaurants that specialized in cuisine from different species throughout the galaxy.

In any case, all of us, including my dad and the rest of the people that had followed him, were soon chatting as we ate. The reviews were mixed all around, but were generally positive. Some people wanted to try new things but didn’t really like their choice, while others had no idea what they were doing. Usually it was humans in the latter cases, as none of them had much experience with alien cuisine and often could only point at what they wanted, being unable to read the menu. Ben’s father, Michael, had the worst experience, since what he ordered wasn’t what he was expecting at all. He was one of the few who went to one of restaurants specializing in seafood, since that was his favorite back on Earth.

What he received looked… less than appetizing, and smelled even worse. Based on the image displayed in the menu, he thought that it would be similar to something like calamari, but it was anything but. The smell was so putrid that it had all of us plugging our noses, and there was even one person that threw up before they even had a chance to eat, losing their appetite entirely. Even the phenidae didn't like what they were smelling, with many of them burying their noses in their thick fur to try to get rid of the stench assaulting their super-sensitive noses.

Thankfully, there was one person in the group that didn't find the meal to be objectionable in the least, a dragonkin woman named Sheimio. Specifically, she was the lone Blue dragonkin that was accompanying us back to Earth. She, like the majority of Blue dragons and dragonkin, spent the majority of her life swimming beneath Earth's oceans. Because of that, she was no stranger to eating sea creatures that humans would find disgusting or inedible. What would be considered to be a delicacy to a human, would probably just be an afternoon snack to Blue dragons and their smaller cousins. It only took her a few minutes to eat what had been Michael's meal, though she could have undoubtedly finished it in seconds, had she been in her natural form.

After Michael had ordered something a lot more palatable and everyone finished eating, we headed back up the stairs to one of the biggest stores; one that was dedicated to anything one might need to slide down a hill at high speeds. Surprisingly, there was nothing that was a truly foreign concept. If anything, everything they had was just more advanced than what was readily available on Earth, and it all came in wildly different sizes.

On one wall you had something that resembled a GT Racer that was big enough to fit a giant, and a few meters away there was one sized for a pygmaean… or a small human-looking child. While Ilnod had never had the opportunity to ski or snowboard, a sled was something that he was definitely familiar with. As soon as we entered the store, he ran over with all of the other kids and looked at everything that was on display. Aside from the aforementioned racers and sleds, there were also skis, snowboards, carpets and saucers, but I sincerely hoped that the latter weren't anything like Clark Griswold's.

While the kids were trying to decide what they wanted to use, my friends, sisters and I headed over to the wide selection of skis and snowboards. It was so large, in fact, that had they all been on display, they would have filled the entire store. To make it easy for potential customers, the most popular models were on the walls, but there were tablets that could be used to view the entire selection. To check one out, all you had to do was navigate to it, choose the size you wanted and whether you wanted to buy or rent, and then hit 'Select'. After a moment, that exact model and size would appear in an alcove nearby, allowing you to see if it was the right size.

Unlike skis and snowboards on Earth that use bindings to secure one's feet, the pygmaean variety used something else entirely: electromagnets. You still needed a pair of special boots, but all one needed to do was step on a board or put their foot in a ski and then activate their boots. As long as the small power cell in each boot wasn't dead, you were good to go for hours upon hours of fun. The main reason for doing it the way they did was mainly for convenience, but also because not every species in the galaxy has two feet. If an alien species with more than two legs tried to use an Earth board with conventional bindings, they would probably find it impossible. With the pygmaean kind, it was extremely easy since the metal core runs nearly the entire length of the board. Every species just needed to make sure that they had magnetic boots and they were good to go.

It took very little time for my friends and I to choose something that worked, and Tessa surprised us by already having her own board. It was my sisters that took a little bit more time, since none of them had ever gone skiing or snowboarding. While they had spent some of their childhood in frigid locales, they lived the majority of their lives up to this point in places that weren't conducive to winter activities.

Fortunately, there were six of us that had experience, so we broke into pairs and assisted with measurements and the decision on whether to go with skis or a snowboard. In the end, Alexis and Lucille went with skis, while Aleena chose a board. With that out of the way, all we needed to do was put on our boots and we were ready to hit the slopes. While there were boots in stock for nearly every species out there, humans and dragonkin were largely unknown, so we had to resort to other means. Thankfully we had known that pygmaean skis and boards were different, so it wasn't hard for Abi to come up with something for all of us.

The boots themselves didn't look much different than regular winter boots, they just had a slightly thicker sole than was usual. Inside that thicker sole were two electromagnets, one directly under the heel, and the other just behind the toes. First generation boots only had one magnet pretty much centered under the foot, but it didn’t take long for that to change, according to Abi. Apparently there had been issues with the magnets not holding when one wanted to make quick movements or they leaned heavily to one side, but two magnets changed that, and without making the boots too heavy when just walking around.

Now, one might wonder how one keeps their footing on Pygmaean skis or snowboards even with the electromagnets, considering that most skis and snowboards have a glossy finish on the topsheet that makes it quite slippery. While Pygmaean boards have that same glossy finish as well, it doesn’t cover the entire board. Instead, only the forward and back thirds of the board have a glossy finish, while the center has something that is more akin to griptape on a skateboard. With the electromagnets active and securing the feet to the board, it provides a no-slip grip. With a lot of effort one could probably change the angle of their foot on the board, but it would just be easier to disengage and then re-engage the magnets when their foot was in the right position.

As far as actually engaging and disengaging the electromagnets, that was actually quite easy. Linked to each boot were a pair of sensors that took on a variety of forms, but the most common was a set of rings. They could either be worn like regular rings or be embedded into a pair of gloves, but when the rings were in close proximity to one another, then a signal would be sent and the electromagnets would turn on. To turn them off again, one just needed to bring the rings together again.

If rings were used, then the norm was to put them on the fingers that were the furthest apart, so as to make it harder to accidentally disengage the magnets when sliding down a hill. For humans, or human forms in the case of my sisters, Tessa and I, that was the thumb and pinky, so we took a little bit of time to practice bringing those two fingers together again and again. Only once we were confident that we wouldn’t mess up did we head over to the counter to rent our selected skis or snowboards for the day.

I would be the one paying for everyone's rentals, so I went last, but it was interesting to see the process. As each person presented their board or pair of skis to the Pygmaean woman, she used a wireless device to scan each one. The thing was, there were no visible markings like a barcode or something similar in the slightest. When asked about it by Tessa who translated for the rest of us, the woman stated that chips were embedded within, allowing them to tell even identical boards apart, while also keeping track of a board's location. So much traffic went through the Earuu Resort that such things were essential. It was too easy to steal a board or lose one, otherwise.

As soon as we were all sorted, we met up with the dragons, who were once again looking after the herd of children and phenidae. Even from a distance, it appeared as if they were trying to herd cats. A child would run off to look at something that caught their eye, and a dragon would hurry to retrieve them. Then, once they were back with the group, another child would run off and events would repeat themselves. The phenidae being curious about their new surroundings didn't help matters either. One of them would run off to examine something, and more often than not, a child or one of the other phenidae would follow them. Vixa wasn't innocent in this either, as she was just as curious as the rest. After making sure that Selalea and the others who would be watching the children would be fine watching Vixa as well, we headed towards the exit.

---

Menseio Station, orbiting Veria
Menseio Station
16:17 Local Time
September 13, 2019

“Here we are,” Ercan said as he opened the doors to his office and waved in his guests.

While the meeting covering Draconic Space and The Stormbringers, among other topics, was going on, Ercan and Oya were entertaining a rather important guest, if a surprise one. Mizu Tuvanto had made the trip from Fa’iir space under heavy escort, arriving at the edge of Pygmaean space in the Tuvanto flagship and it’s entire battle group of some six hundred top of the line ships. While the entire fleet wasn’t permitted to continue on to Veria, the Azivu and it’s primary strike wing were escorted to Veria and Menseio Station. Although the Pygmaeans and Fa’iir were on good terms, the former were not about to let an alien fleet of such magnitude pass through unannounced.

Mizu Tuvanto himself was the brother of Xodinn Tuvanto, who was both the chieftain of the largest and most powerful tribe among the Fa’iir, and the military commander for the entire Fa’iir fleet. That alone made Mizu important, but he was also the Fa’iir ambassador to Veria, and thus traveled back and forth a few times each year. He had just traveled back home nearly three weeks earlier and was scheduled to return after a month or so, but for him to arrive back early, and under heavy guard, meant that something was wrong.

What that was, Mizu wouldn’t get into, and he instead wanted to see the progress that Oya had made on some space station designs. The Fa’iir were rapidly expanding as they claimed new systems, and they needed space stations both for defense and trade, so they went to the best of the best when it came to designing them. They easily could have done it themselves and at less of a cost. They were looking for a modular design that wouldn’t take too long to get up and running, but would be easily expandable as modules were produced.

It was a specialty of Warvyn Industries, as was seen with Menseio Station itself. While Menseio Station was primarily a shipyard, some of the outer rings could easily be removed and replaced with rings more suited to trade, or with rings that were basically weapons platforms. In many cases, interested parties would just pay for schematics that were readily available and then build a station on their own. The Fa’iir could have done that as well, but they were looking for something a little closer to their size and it isn't as simple as scaling everything down.

All in all, there were many different modules that Oya had to design, and though it took hours to go through them, one of Mizu's companions approved them all. The files were transferred one way and credits the other, but Mizu still seemed troubled. He barely spoke during their meal, and Ercan became concerned. He didn't want to inquire where someone might overhear, so he waited until they were within his office before he asked.

"What's wrong? I know you didn't come back early just to look at some schematics. I thought you were excited about heading back so you could meet your new son."

Mizu smiled briefly at the mention, but when he looked back to Ercan, his expression changed.

"Kaera is missing," he answered in a tone that clearly indicated he was hurting.

"What?! For how long?"

"We don't know for certain. As you know, this is the busiest and most stressful time for students studying at the university. It was no different for her, but she finished up the last of her exams five days ago. I had offered to wait for her to finish so we could travel back home together, but she told me to go on ahead. She sent a coded burst saying that she was on her way, but since then we have heard nothing and the transponder was turned off. That was a little over four days ago now. We sent ships along her flight path, but we didn't find anything."

"Did she sound odd when you talked to her?"

"She sounded like she always does. She was a little stressed out, but she was also excited that her school year was over. She didn't use any of the secret codes indicating she was in trouble, either."

"You think that she was intercepted?"

"What other explanation could there be? We have confirmation from our people at the embassy that she was on the ship when it took off, and she wouldn’t go dark without sending an encrypted databurst beforehand.”

“Okay, let’s assume that your suspicions are correct and her ship was forced out of hyperspace, disabled and then captured. Do you have any idea who might have done it? Why come to me, for that matter?”

“You’re the most well-connected person in this area of the galaxy, and we also have reason to believe that the abduction occured within Pygmaean space. We were hoping that you could use your connections and help us find her.”

Ercan smiled.

“Well, you’re in luck,” he said as he walked over to his desk. Pressing a button, he spoke into the air. “Good evening, Abi. Do you have a moment?”

“Certainly, Mr. Warvyn. What can I do for you?”

“I’m here with a friend of mine and the Fa’iir ambassador to Veria, Mizu Tuvanto. His sister, Kaera Tuvanto is missing, and we think she may have been abducted. If we send you the details, can you take a look for us?”

“Absolutely.”

Ercan looked back over to Mizu, who gestured to one of his attendants. That attendant retrieved a tablet from their dimensional storage and then handed it to Ercan. It only took a few moments, and soon Abi knew everything the Fa’iir knew. The difference was that she had hundreds of sensors scattered throughout the galaxy that made it supremely easy to track a ship, if she was looking for it.

“Data received. I’m looking now and should have something for you in a few minutes.”

“Thank you, Abi.” Ercan replied before hitting the same button again.

“Who was that, if I may ask?” Mizu asked.

“What do you know about the Scyftans since they arrived in our galaxy?”

“Not much, I’m afraid. I know they were fleeing something and there was a coup several hundred years before we were discovered by the rest of the galaxy, but not much more than that.”

“They were fleeing from a massive alien armada, but that’s not the important thing. Shortly before they detected that encroaching armada, they discovered a number of crystals deep beneath the surface of a planet. Those crystals ended up being an artificial lifeform that was created by an incredibly advanced race. When bonded with someone, the crystals quickly grew in size, and in only a few hours, grew into small ships. Over time, those ships continued to grow, and by the time the alien armada arrived, they were around the size of a cruiser.”

“The Scyftan king and his children used the crystalline ships they were bonded to to fight back and try to slow the armada to great success, at least initially. The problem was that they were too few and they didn’t have enough time. Had they had more than a few weeks, they probably could have chipped away at them enough to force them to change direction or turn around. As a last ditch effort, the king and all but his youngest child jumped into the heart of the alien formation in an attempt to destroy the central ship.”

“They discovered that the aliens were of a hivemind, and that the majority of their forces were likely controlled by a single, incredibly powerful mind. The goal was to jump in and open fire on that central ship, and while they were successful in jumping in, for some reason they didn’t open fire. The last sensor readings that the Scyftans were able to gather indicated that the ships were being pulled towards the alien mothership, before there was a tremendous burst of energy, which was likely the self-destruct of those crystalline ships. The alien ships kept coming, so it was clear that the mothership escaped with little-to-no damage.”

“The Scyftans fled after that with roughly three billion people out of a little over three hundred billion. Among that number was the queen and her seventh month old son at the time, along with a single crystal clutched in that little boy’s hands. Eventually he bonded with the crystal and it grew into a large ship, but when he passed, the crystal shrank down until it would easily fit in your hands. Since then, that same crystal has bonded three more times, each with a descendant of the first Scyftan king. The most recent bonding was a little more than a month ago, actually.”

“So Abi…,” Mizu began

“... is an artificial crystalline lifeform, currently bonded to one Jonuth Kidravia.”

“A Kidravia lives?! I thought they were all killed in the coup!”

Ercan shook his head. “He was spirited to safety and spent the majority of the last fourteen hundred years in stasis. The general population isn’t aware of that though, and it isn’t exactly something that Kaldrus Dhir wants known either. When the time is right, however, the entire galaxy will know the truth.”

As Mizu opened his mouth to ask a question, a chime sounded throughout the room and Ercan once again pressed the button on his desk.

“You’ve found something?”

“Indeed,” Abi replied. “Sending over the sensor data now.”

There was another chime and Ercan moved around his desk and sat down. A good portion of his desk was covered in a single large screen, and he quickly navigated to new data he had received. After tapping on it to open it, he gestured towards the middle of the room and the holographic generators around the room activated, displaying a three dimensional image of local space.

“I don’t have one hundred percent coverage in this quadrant of space, but I believe I know what occurred. Four days ago, at approximately 02:58:23, there was a gravitational anomaly detected at the following coordinates,” she explained as a pulsating red dot appeared along Kaera Tuvanto’s projected flightpath. “The anomaly disappeared at 03:03:47, and then energy waves consistent with ion weapons were detected moments later, at 03:03:56. The ship’s transponder was still transmitting at that time, but at 03:12:09, the transponder ceased broadcasting.”

“I believe the ship Ms. Tuvanto was on was then captured by the attackers and taken inside a larger ship, because only one hyperdrive signature was detected leaving those coordinates. They turned coreward, away from the direction she had been traveling in, and into a blindspot here,” she continued. A new line was created, showing the path that the attackers’ ship took, leading into what looked like a void. It wasn’t an actual void in space, but was an area that the transmitters Abi had seeded around the galaxy didn’t extend into.

“Hmmm…” Abi said. “Looking back, it appears that I did have a transmitter covering this area of space as well, but it has since been destroyed.”

“Destroyed? Was it recent?” Ercan asked.

“No. It happened a little more than 293 years ago, but I was unable to replace it. I am rectifying that now, but it will still take several hours until it is up and running. Going back to Ms. Tuvanto, in the four days and roughly fourteen hours since she was abducted, twenty-three ships have exited that blindspot, with none of the hyperdrive signatures matching the one that we’re interested in. That ship is still there, but they may have moved her to a different ship to try to avoid detection.”

“Of the twenty-three ships that passed through the blindspot, nineteen of them did not have time to stop and pick up any passengers. The other four emerged from that blindspot after remaining there for various amounts of time, one being only a few hours while others having been there for days or weeks. As you can see, all four of them headed in different directions, and all four of them seem to have arrived at their destinations. Those being Orilia 2 in Scyftan space, Brarun in Dvergr space, Zubaub in Staevian space, and Ginuthea in Qhaal space.”

“So you’ve basically narrowed it down to five different locations. Is there any way you can narrow it down further?” Mizu asked.

“Unfortunately not,” Abi replied. “The hyperdrive signature of the ship that was used to attack and capture your sister’s ship was consistent with that of older Riotanian cruisers. Specifically, Zruk-class heavy cruisers that were in service approximately two hundred years ago. When they replaced them with new designs they stripped them of their weapons and auctioned them off, but it is clear that this one has been re-fitted.”

“The other four ships are newer, and based off of the drive signatures, all of them are cargo ships. I cannot tell the exact model of each, but two of them are equipped with a Warvyn Industries X3003 Hyperdrive engine, one with a Warvyn Industries X3001 Hyperdrive engine, and the last with an Itrul Corporation’s N53 II Hyperdrive engine. I believe the first three are between twenty and twenty-five years old, while the latter is around thirty-eight years old. I don’t believe any of this information helps you, however.”

“Perhaps not. Do we know what is in the area that your transmitter doesn’t reach?” Mizu asked.

“A dead system,” Ercan replied as he brought up an image of the system in question. There was a red giant at the center, with a number of planets and moons, in addition to three different asteroid belts of varying size. “A thousand years ago, it was one of the busiest and most mined systems for many different types of ore. Now, the majority of those resources have been mined, and only small-time prospectors still go there. It would definitely be a good spot to build a hidden base; many different places to hide, very little traffic.”

“Once the new transmitter arrives in the system and activates, I will be able to tell you exactly where a hidden base is, if one exists,” Abi said.

“I believe we have enough to go on,” Mizu replied before turning to one of his aids. “Dispatch ships to each of those four planets, we’ll get them precise coordinates while they’re enroute. Make sure our fleet is ready to go as well, we’ll be leaving shortly.”

“It will be done,” the aide nodded before he stepped away and began speaking into a communicator.

“I have to thank you as well, Abi. Without you, I fear we wouldn’t have known the first place to look. I am in your debt.”

“Don’t worry about it, I was in a position to help. My bondmate did express some interest in your species, and I am sure he would be excited to meet you. At your convenience, of course.”

“If these leads pan out and we recover my sister, I would be delighted,” Mizu said. “Ercan, pass along my information to her, please. And thank you for contacting her for me. Apologies, but I had best be off.”

“Go, and if you run into any trouble, don’t hesitate to contact me. I have some friends in the area that could be of assistance.”