Zanora sat quietly on the wooden deck of her house, writing down her day. She stared at the ancient letters of the Lombax language and closed her eyes, stopping the familiar ache that came with it.

Her Lombax lover, Kaden, had taught her the language when she had been starting a family with him. She could still remember Kaden's face when she told him he was going to be a father. He looked so joyful and he had swung her around and whispered how happy he was and how much he loved her.

But then that damned cragmite came along and killed him, leaving her with a dead world, a dead husband and a missing baby.

And her baby… her Ratchet… she never found him. She scoured the universe for her child until Aphelion ran out of power and fuel, dying on her on Fastoon and leaving her alone again. She had used the last live teleporter to get to a peaceful fungoid planet, unwilling to stay on Fastoon for the memories and the pain.

She sighed and stopped writing, leaning back and looking into the sun. Zanora was half Lombax and half Nykril, making her a strange thing. Her baby had been fully Lombax, but he had her eyes and hair colour on his fur. But he had Kaden's attitude and stripes.

Zanora was a green eyed, blonde haired, fifteen-year-old human looking hybrid. Her Lombax heritage gave her the black striped ears on her head and black stripes, but her Nykril heritage dominated most of her. Nykrils were humanoids with animal parts, immortal beings that made their family immortal with them. But they can still die. Kaden was immortal, but he could die. He did die.

Zanora herself had a pair of large black-feathered wings protruding from her shoulder blades directly behind her and a pair of large white bat/demon wings sticking out a little closer to her, giving her double wings. She had nine tails. Four were furred and looked like foxtails, except they were long, could grab and hold things, and they were blonde with a black and white swirled tip. Four other tails were thin and sleek, completely white and acted like whips when she had them out.

Her last tail was black and scaled, a purplish tint to the scales. The end of the tail was a large blade with red vine-like patterns spreading on the broad sides of it. It was a large blade, curved and sharp. She could also grow horns and claws made of the same material as the blade, but it was obvious where they were. The claws could stretch to whatever length she wanted them to and her horns were straight and long, the ends used for impaling themselves in things.

She currently had her whiptails, her claws and her horns retracted, her wings stretched lazily behind her and remaining tails curled around her. She closed her journal; staring out into the forest beyond the clearing she created her house in with melancholy eyes. She sighed and walked inside, the door opening for her.

She walked into her lab, smiling at the place her old robot child used to charge himself. Zephyr was an old robot that she treated like her child. She could still remember his red coating and how they used to make old Lombax devices for fun. He was adorable. He left a few years ago, using an old jet to get off the planet. Last she heard, he had become the guardian of a secluded moon base.

She walked to the bedroom, putting her journal on the bedside drawer. She glanced for a moment at the portrait on the bedside table, a picture of her family when Ratchet was born, and walked out, intending to visit the Fungoid village for supplies.

She had just gotten her shopping bag when an almighty boom thundered across the sky. She looked up in alarm and saw it. A familiar ship, surrounded in flame, crash landing in the eastern forest. She dropped her bag and broke into a run, flapping her wings and lifting off the ground.

She saw it land easily, stopping in a time freeze. She landed and approached, just as the cockpit burst open. She jumped, running back into the trees and watching a man in green run out and start kissing the ground. However, it was the second occupant who caught her attention.

It was a Lombax. Blonde fur, brown stripes and bright green eyes, he was glancing around, a hand twitching in anticipation before relaxing. He then glanced Zanora's way and she jumped back, running back to her house in a daze.

For how could she think straight... when her son had just turned up in her old ship?