Chapter 57

I awoke to a gentle chime that turned off the moment I got up from my bed. After stretching, I made my way to the bathroom and took a quick shower. When I was done, I made my way to my closet and got my armor out, rather than my regular clothing. Once I was geared up, sans helmet, I made my way over to the bed where Vixa was still sleeping.

“Are you getting up?” I asked, scratching between her ears.

She batted my hand away with one of her front paws and curled up tighter, blocking her eyes with both of her tails.

“Oh, so you don’t want any beef then. I’ll see you later,” I said, turning and walking towards the door.

She made an excited little bark and then ran over to the bathroom. A minute later she came barreling out and jumped up on the door.

I laughed and opened up the door. She squeezed through the small crack and then began running down the hall. She quickly ran out of sight, but I found her waiting in front of the teleporter. She barked a few times as I approached, almost as if telling me to hurry up.

“So demanding... , “ I said, as I opened up the door so she could step inside.

I followed after her and then hit the twelfth deck as our destination. She bolted out of the teleporter and I lost sight of her again, only seeing her again when I finally arrived at the mess. She was sitting on the floor staring up at the huge pile of beef. I called her over to me and she obediently followed me as I got my own breakfast. As soon as I was done, I headed over and put a bunch of beef on the smaller plate I had grabbed for her.

She was hopping up and down as we made it to a table, and started absolutely devouring everything on her plate the moment I set it down on the bench beside me. I ate much more sedately, not being in any real rush. I still had about thirty minutes until we would be arriving in the Mezotis system, so I spent some of that time checking up on things on my phone.

The deck got louder and louder as more people woke up, trying to get some breakfast before their busy days began. I looked at Vixa beside me and saw that she was stretched out with her eyes closed, resting after such a delicious meal. I saw movement out of the corner of my eye, which ended up being my friends, sisters and Tessa.

“Good morning,” I said as they all passed.

Some of them returned the greeting, though others, like Mason, just grunted in reply and continued walking over to the buffet line. I went back to what I was doing, only looking up again when people ended up sitting around me. It would be a tight fit, so I ended up having to pull Vixa closer to me so everyone would be able to sit down.

Once we were all finished with our breakfast, we began making our way to the bridge to wait out the remaining nine or so minutes. The bridge already had more people on it than there were the day we saw the nebula, and there were likely to be more people showing up before long. Not a single member of the dragon council was present, though I knew they would be on their way to see their new home.

“Where are your parents?” I asked my friends.

“On one of the observation decks,” Ben said. “They got up a bit earlier so they could make it there before the rush.”

I nodded and continued to stroke Vixa’s fur as we waited. My mom and dad showed up only a minute or two after we did, with all eight dragon council members in tow, along with Selalea’s son, Ilnod. I saw his eyes light up when he saw Vixa, so I made my way over to him, kneeling so that both he and Vixa were at the same height.

“Hello, Ilnod. Have you met Vixa?”

He nodded and reached out to pet Vixa, who leaned into each pet.

“Oh, I’d say he knows Vixa pretty well,” Selalea said as she kneeled down as well. “He and some of the other kids have played with Vixa and Imuna in the mornings and afternoons. He’s been bugging me for one of his own.”

I nodded. I knew Vixa went with my mom when I was busy doing other things, but wasn’t aware that she had been playing with kids for a good portion of the day. It explained her lack of energy in the evenings.

“So are you going to?” I asked.

“I’ve been thinking about it. I have to admit that I am intrigued by their abilities. It seems like they would be very good for security. I’m surprised your people don’t use them in that way.”

“We don’t need to,” my mom said, entering the discussion. “As long as a Scyftan has scanned a Phenidae, then they are able to scan their surroundings themselves. The only difference, really, is that Phenidae do it subconsciously while we have to consciously activate the ability.”

“Wait, you can do that?” Ben asked. “We thought that Jonathan would have to switch to his Scyftan fox form or create a new form with Scyftan fox tails.”

“Not at all,” my mom said, shaking her head. “Some abilities do require shifting into a specific form, or taking on aspects of the species that have those abilities, but some just require some slight brain modifications in order to function.”

“Kiri didn’t tell me that,” I said. “She did show me a way to modify my brain so I would be able to process images from eyes different from our own, but nothing like a Phenidae’s ability to scan their surroundings.”

“It must have slipped her mind,” my mom said. “You’ll have time while we’re enroute to Veria, so she can teach you how to do it then.”

I nodded, just in time for Abi’s voice to come over the speakers.

“Good morning! We are just over two minutes from arrival in the Mezotis system. I will orbit Mezotis 4 to scan the surface before moving over to Mezotis 3 and repeating the process. That will only take thirty minutes or so. Those of you who will be working on the ground please be ready to disembark by 04:45. I will be taking us down through the atmosphere at that time. Thank you.”

“Are you ready to see your new home?” my mom asked Selaea.

“As ready as I’ll ever be,” she laughed.

“How about you and the other dragons go stand at the front. You’ll be able to see a bit better from there,” I said.

“I think I’ll take you up on that, thank you.”

I put Vixa down on the floor, allowing her to follow Ilnod and the other dragons as they made their way up to the front of the bridge.

[Have they arrived?] I asked Abi.

[About an hour ago. I received a message stating that they had secured the system but were going to remain shrouded. The remainder of the fleet and engineers will be here in roughly four hours. You know some members of the dragon council won’t be happy about this, right?]

[But the important ones will. It will allow them to be much more relaxed, knowing that their offspring are as safe as we can make them.]

[Well I don’t know about ‘as safe as we can make them,’ but it will take multiple fleet groups to crack the defenses in place when we’re done.]

I nodded, which was something that didn’t go unnoticed.

“What are you nodding about?” Ben asked.

“You’ll see.”

“Thirty seconds,” Abi said, only speaking to those on the bridge rather than the entire ship.

She started counting down when there were about ten seconds left. When we finally exited hyperspace, there were many gasps throughout the room. The two planets were absolutely massive, taking up the majority of the forward screens. Using the roll controls she rotated the ship while simultaneously throttling forward, taking us closer to Mezotis 4. Once we had speed, she rotated the ship one hundred eighty degrees and proceeded to slow down just a bit, so that we would be captured by the planet’s gravity, rather than just fly on by.

Once a stable orbit had been achieved, she pointed the front of the ship towards the planet and then waited. It didn’t seem like it from our perspective, but she was actually making micro adjustments as we moved around the planet. Suddenly there was a force that gently shook the entire ship, and a long crystalline rod could be seen moving away from the ship at a decent pace.

A portion of the screen changed to follow the object down, which quickly entered the atmosphere.

“What are you doing?! What did you fire at the planet?!” Bonanem screeched.

“Relax, Bonanem,” Selalea said. “Nothing was fired at the planet. Abi released a subspace transmitter that will allow us to maintain contact with those down on the planet, and those down on the planet to maintain contact with those on Earth. You can see it starting to slow down already. It will gently land on the summit of the tallest mountain where it will anchor itself down. There are hundreds of these transmitters placed on planets, moons and asteroids all around the galaxy. They are what allow nearly instantaneous communications across vast distances. One will be dropped on Mezotis 3 as well, just so there is a backup if one of them is destroyed or begins malfunctioning.”

“My apologies,” he said, bowing his head.

Everyone watched as the transmitter slowed down until it gently contacted the top of the mountain. As soon as that happened, four crystalline ‘arms’ folded out from the top, rotating almost one hundred eighty degrees until they were pointing down towards the mountain. Suddenly they shot forward, embedding themselves several feet into the rock.

It didn’t move after that, but below the surface something similar to a root system was being created, connecting each of the four supports to each other. By the time the process was complete, it would take the top one hundred meters of the mountain being utterly pulverized to destroy the transmitter. If even a sand-sized piece remained, it would reform, given time.

She began her scan of the planet immediately afterwards, making sure that there was no intelligent life already living there. The two planets had already been scanned, but the sensors used didn’t compare to the ones that Abi had. If there was a species living at the bottom of the ocean, or some object was down there, she would know about it.

The first scan took about twelve minutes to complete and then she broke orbit of Mezotis 4 and was captured by Mezotis 3. There were no outraged shouts as the second transmitter was launched, and the second scan was over just as quickly. With that done, she immediately slowed down the ship further, until we were steadily losing altitude.

She turned the ship until we were perpendicular to the direction we were traveling, just to slow down as much as possible as we traveled through the atmosphere. Most ships the size of Abi would be torn apart if they attempted a similar maneuver, but for Abi it was a walk in the park. There was a brief moment where our view was obstructed by flames on the outer hull, but by the time they disappeared we had a great view of the planet below.

Abi used the pitch controls again, this time pointing the nose of the ship back down while activating the reaction controls to continue to slow down. It took a few minutes and us traveling about a third of the way around the planet before she started maneuvering, flying us over to the first of the locations that Olmith had chosen. It had looked fine from her scan, but Olmith would need to look at it first hand to know if it was suitable.

We were about two minutes from landing when I called Vixa over to me. She arrived fairly quickly, allowing me to pick her up.

“Do you want to go explore the planet?” I asked her.

She immediately yipped and began licking my face.

“I guess that’s a yes. You can’t go outside like that, though,” I said. “There is a chance that you’ll get sick, or you’ll make other animals sick, which is why you’ll need to be wearing a special suit. Ready to try it on?”

She barked this time, clearly the least bit unafraid.

“Alright then,” I said, kneeling so I could place her down on the deck.

I took a cube out of my inventory identical to the one that Tamara displayed with Gurok, it was just a lot smaller. Placing it on her back, I pressed the button and watched as it spread over her fur. She turned her head to watch it, but didn’t move away, trusting that I wouldn’t hurt her. She did close her eyes when it formed over her head, but opened them a few seconds later when the process was done.

“How’s that?” I asked. “Go run around and try it out.”

She bolted in less than a second and ended up running into Imuna who had the exact same type of suit on. The only difference was the color, with Imuna’s being black and Vixa’s being white. They played around for a few minutes before the majority of the occupants of the bridge began filing out, heading down to the lower decks so they could disembark.

[Send a transmission to Tala Telar, requesting that her fleet stay shrouded until the remainder arrive. I’ll try to meet with the dragon council within the next two hours, and I’ll let them know what is going on then, ] I sent to Abi and Tich as I exited the bridge.

[What about Xigios and his daughter?] Tich asked. [Do you want them to wait until you give the word?]

[Yes. We might end up hopping around the planet if this location isn’t to Olmith’s liking. I’d like to wait until they choose a location before he comes down here. Besides, we just spent nearly two weeks cramped up. Anyone that showed up before I had a chance to speak with the council would stick out like a sore thumb.]

[Alright, then. I’ll leave you to it.]

There was a long train of people behind me as I led the way to the teleporter. After picking up Vixa and stepping inside, I hit the button for deck two, which is where we would be leaving from. There were people standing in the hallway when I arrived, but they all moved off to the side as I made my way to the airlock.

The airlock opened as I approached, but I didn’t head through it immediately. Turning, I gestured to the council members that they should be the first one down. They all spread out upon stepping off the ramp, and one by one began shifting into their true forms. Within thirty seconds eight massive dragons and one smaller one were standing next to the ship. They immediately stretched out their wings and jumped into the air.

Once they were all airborne, the rest of us descended the ramp as well. The forest around the first location was quite dense, so Abi had actually flattened everything beneath the ship as she landed. I placed Vixa on the ground who instantaneously teleported to another location, sniffed a tree and then teleported again. Imuna ended up following her example, and the two of them made a game of it.

After a few minutes of waiting, Bonakr landed and shifted back into his human form.

“Ah, it is good to finally be able to stretch my wings,” he said as he approached. “Olmith has deemed this site suitable and asks that no one leave this spot. We’ve got some work to do, but it should take much time at all.”

There was a loud roar and then massive trees began being ripped out of the ground as if they were nothing. They fell as soon as they were out of the ground, at least until there was an area big enough to stack them. The moment there was, Olmith and Shaemu flew overhead, each of them picking up one or two trees at a time with their telekinesis as they stacked them dozens of meters high.

As they continued to stack them, Selalea and her son flew over and unleashed their fire breaths on the trees below. While the wood was still wet, it caught fire like it was the driest of grasses. Linvalma was the next dragon to fly over, though she hovered in place, rather than just fly by. As she flapped her massive wings, the air around the trees began to swirl.

Within a few seconds there was a huge fiery vortex. As the vortex rotated, it kept the fire inside, while also injecting massive quantities of oxygen, ensuring that the fire burned extremely hot. Just to make sure there wouldn’t be any accidents, Pharomna flew around the vortex shooting a jet of water that completely soaked the soil around the massive bonfire.

There was another roar, and this time dragons and dragonkin began filing down the ramp behind us. They all shifted into their respective forms and then spread out to help accelerate the process. The Black and Chromatic dragons went around and carried fallen trees over to the bonfire, while the dragonkin focused on the smaller plants and moved rocks out of the way.

Those of us who stood back watching were speechless, never imagining that they could clear land so quickly. Within a five minute period, an area the size of a football field was cleared of all plant life, leaving only heavy stones dotting the surface, but not much else. Within ten minutes there wasn’t a single tree or shrub within two hundred meters of Abi.

Selalea and her son landed a few minutes later, quickly returning to their human forms before walking over. “So what do you think?”

“Very impressive,” my mom said. “I thought we were pretty good at clearing land, but I’ve never seen it done that quickly.”

Selalea nodded. “We haven’t done it in thousands of years, but it’s no different than it was on Earth. I don’t think we would be able to do it nearly as quickly without being able to harness the weather, though. The inside of that vortex is so hot that trees burn up in minutes, rather than hours or days.”

“So you’re happy with the location?” I asked.

“Very. The ground below our feet transitions from soil to granite after about ten feet, and it’s all extremely solid. We’ll probably excavate a large area inside the mountain for storage before setting up the teleporters. Speaking of which, Olmith will be ready to take a team to Zokyrth in fifteen minutes or so.”

“Zokyrth? You named them, then?”

“Yes. Yrranth and Zokyrth, named after the mother and father of all dragons and dragonkin who live today. We thought it fitting.”

“I like it. I’ll let Abi know so she can get the new shuttles ready. I do need to meet with you and the other council members as soon as possible, though.”

“The only one that is busy right now is Olmith, so we can meet at the shuttles as soon as he is free.”

I nodded, just as there were multiple crashes. Looking over to the mountain I could see a plume of dust and shards of rock flying in all directions. A second later there was another crash, the source of being one of two large Black dragons. They were each taking turns hitting the side of the mountain with their bulb-like tails, crushing the rock into much smaller pieces and forming the beginning of an entrance.

“That doesn’t seem very efficient,” Ben said. “It looks like it would take them days to excavate an area big enough to hold all the eggs doing it that way.”

“You’re right, but they’re just getting started. We don’t use explosives, so it’s just a more involved process. Watch.”

The two dragons continued to strike the side of the mountain with their tails a dozen more times before they walked away and two Blue dragons replaced them. They both fired a sustained jet of water for a good minute or so, before they moved off to the side and let two White dragons take their place.

Breathing in, the two White dragons projected a huge cloud of frigid air towards the mountain that got bigger by the second, eventually obscuring them from our sight. They didn’t walk away when they were done, instead leaping into the air and using their large wings to fan most of the cloud away.

The dragons weren’t done, apparently, as yet more dragons replaced the two that just left. Purple dragons this time, the two of them opened up their large maws, immediately firing a sustained beam of purple energy at the rock. As we watched, the entire portion of the mountain that they were working on almost exploded, sending rocks flying all over the place. By the time they closed their mouths cutting off the beam of energy, a neat entrance, perhaps fifty feet in length and diameter was carved into the mountain. There was still a lot of pulverized rock that needed to be excavated, but they were well on their way.

“We have a few tools to help with what you just saw, but we haven’t unloaded them from the cargo containers they’re in. In tighter spaces we use diamond-tipped drills that are rotated by Black dragons or dragonkin using their telekinesis to bore holes deep into the rock. When they’re done, Blue dragons or dragonkin replace them and fill each of the new holes full of water.”

“When the White dragons or dragonkin go in, they rapidly freeze the water, forming cracks as the water turns into ice and expands. Then it’s as simple as hitting the now weakened rock extremely hard, crushing the rock into smaller pieces or vaporizing it, like Purple dragons and dragonkin are able to do. Working together, a team of ten dragons or dragonkin can make a tunnel about five hundred feet in length every hour. Dragons usually take the big jobs, and dragonkin the smaller ones.”

“I assume you use portals to move the leftover rock?” my mom asked. “We use explosives, but need to use a bulldozer or another piece of heavy machinery to push the rock through a portal whenever we build underground.”

“We do, yes. You can see them doing that now, actually,” she said, pointing over to the hole in the side of the mountain.

The Black dragons had moved in again, and were moving large quantities of rock through a portal that was created by one of the Purple dragons. The portal’s exit was only around twenty meters away from the hole into the mountain, which meant that they likely needed the rock later on.

“That’s pretty damn cool,” Ben said. “I can’t think of a better way to do it if you don’t use explosives, even using abilities. Earth-based abilities might work, but I’m not sure how accurate they would be.”