To know the Unknown

by bajy

Basically my version of how the story would go if the events of the game were different, Fem Red Savarin, Male Elh. Fanfic summary: Redell "Red" often wondered what happened to her before being adopted, soon this would lead to one adventure none of them were ever going to forget, will this Young pilot and her loved ones survive In this strange new but somehow familiar world?

6. 5: Initial Emergence

Here it is, the True beginning of their adventure starts here!!!

I felt so lost and alone, could but could not tell where I was, all was quiet, the only sound heard was my footsteps echoing as I walked.

When I tried to call out for someone no voice came out of my throat, it was as if someone pushed the mute button on my voice box.

Another thing to note, not only was it dark, but the only other sound that could be heard besides my footsteps was a storm going on outside.

I knew I was inside but could not name what this place was, yet the nagging tick of familiarity was nudging against my skull.

Not to mention one key thing, it felt like I was seeing through the eyes of someone else, someone younger given the height perspective in a literal sense.

And I had no control over my actions.

Am... I seeing through the eyes of my past self? When I was a child? If so then where was this place?

Eventually I came across a door that had My name on the nameplate which meant that this was my room.

But as I opened the door I was met with a frightening sight, the window of my room was shattered but flashes of lightning could be seen as they illuminated the room but the figure that stood in the room was still completely black but his eyes still pierced through the darkness as they gave me a fright.

He smirked evilly at me as that was when I screamed.

"AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!!" I screamed as I bolted up from where I sat as I looked around wildly before I realized that I was on top of the deck of our ship and I was at the lone table and the chair pinned to the deck along with the radio that can easily attach and be unattached by The hands of somebody If they choose to remove it.

It was broad daylight as we were flying over Airedale as I started to the realize that I've been dreaming again, another frightening nightmare, or perhaps another glimpse of my past that's still fractured and hazy.

Though strangely I don't remember falling asleep, I mean sure I did a bit of an overnighter last night so perhaps that's why I dozed off as I recalled I came out here after breakfast to get some fresh air and relax on top of the deck before we got to doing an important mission for Québec.

According to him, the Kurvaz Guild stole a very important confidential file that he had on a case that he was looking into, and he absolutely needed it back or he and his buddies would be in serious trouble, his own ship was in the repair shop after a tricky incident with one of his colleagues and so he send a request for us to get the file back for him in one piece.

This was his way of saying we were the only ones he trusted to get the file back since all his other friends were very busy with their they're on agendas in their respective hometowns.

Of course we said yes, after everything he's done for us it's the least we can do, besides if it was really important then who are we to say no?

In fact the request was sent to us first thing this morning while we were having breakfast while we were still docked at the port.

Just then I heard the radio chime as I turn the knob a bit to tune into the latest broadcast as we slowly started to leave the town itself:

"Good morning everyone, this is your host, Mikail Fihn, here to bring you the latest news. The Western Shepherd Republic was shaken awake by an earthquake early this morning. No one knows where the earthquake came from or how it happened as the details are still not clear."

Actually now that he mention it, I do recall being woken up by an earthquake this morning before we had breakfast, thankfully it was kind of small but it was definitely startling.

"And the Envirospection Division has just released an announcement that this morning's quick may be related to the other simultaneous quakes that have occurred around the Shepherd Republic Early this morning. As I've said no one knows how it happened or or even why it's happening seemingly everywhere, For now we advise our listeners to take caution in case this happens again, And remember even earthquakes can affect planes flying in the air so pilots and hunters beware."

Okay this I did not know, the earthquake affected more than just this town? That was definitely rather concerning, as we all know earthquakes that occurred in more than one town simultaneously or seemingly so means that something big was going on.

I know that we have a mission that we need to take care of but I can't wonder what this means for us.

"With that being said, I'll now pass the baton to my lovely songstress radio master, Gigi Lovarana here to bring you your favorite hit tunes."

That's when I shut off the radio, as much as I like to listen to songs early in the morning, I needed to focus on the mission.

And just in time too as the comm on the deck suddenly lit up as I could hear Chocolat's voice:

"O-kay now, I just finished getting the coordinates of the ship that has the file for Québec, It will take a couple of hours but we will get there in due time."

"This will be the first time sneaking on to an airship owned by Kurvaz, those guys mean serious business, but still stealing a file from him without warning is not good. Nobody steals from the man who hosted us and taught us everything there was to know about hunters and gets away with it." I replied as I started to crack my knuckles.

"You got that right, plus he's doing something for us in return, we really do need that money for some of the repairs that we need on here so the payment he will give us when we get the file for him will be more than enough to get it done." She agreed and stated.

"This will be unknown territory Red." Tala told me, "Take the time to get prepared before we get to our destination, You better be ready, IF you can pull it off."

Oh no she didn't!

I smirked as I told her, ""If"?! Did you say "If"? Who do you think you're talking to Tala? When Dahak and I get down to work, there's Just no stopping us."

Both of the girls chuckled at my response as I got up from the chair and table and I made my way to the door to get back inside.

Time to get to work.

X

"Hanger decompression complete! Release systems, all green!" Chocolat's sounded as I finish getting mounted up on Dahak.

"Okay! let's do this!" I exclaimed as the exciting thrill course through me.

"We're ready Chocolat!" Dahak told her.

Thankfully after a while Dahak got used to calling The girls by their first names, though he still calls me Mistress no matter how much I told him that it was alright for him to call me by my given name. And he still gives honorifics to any people we meet. Baby steps.

"Okay! Starting to countdown!" She called out as The hanger door behind us finish opening up all the way as we can feel the brush of the fierce wind blowing from behind.

"10... 9. .. 8... 7... 6... 5... 4... 3... 2... 1!"

At that last number Dahak did a backwards leap as We were soon out of the darkness of the hanger and into the broad daylight of the sky as we can hear Chocolat call out, "Have fun and be careful out there!!" before we started soaring away from the ship as we glided down to the deck below us.

Ah, there's nothing like the thrill of the fierce winds of a new adventure to really get your blood pumping.

"Yahoo!!!" I exclaimed as We descended straight down to the ship below us, the reason why we had to drop down so high up is so that they wouldn't spot us right away, but nonetheless Dahak could take the impact of the landing with ease.

Bracing myself We soon landed with aloud simultaneous Kur-thump and Ka-klank sound. Rightening myself up as I looked around our surroundings as I could see that the deck we were on was very huge, the vast space of this made sense considering that The Hindenburg was a military cargo ship owned by the Kurvaz.

Especially when their turbines were as big as blue whales as I could see heaps of clouds soaring beside either side of the ship as they almost look like waves in the ocean.

And it was kind of true considering that the Cloud sea below us was considered by this world accounts an ocean, but one that's far more violent and suicidal then that of a regular ocean on earth.

The communit on my wrist chimed to life as Chocolat called, I pressed the reply button as her voice came out along with a miniature hologram of her, "How's everything? Were there any hiccups?"

"Nope," I replied, "Gotta say it was a perfect landing on The Hindenburg."

"Are you sure the shock from the landing didn't damage anything?" She asked in concern.

"Rest assured Chocolat," Dahak told her, "Everything is in perfect working order, I've never been better."

"Good to hear," Tala came in With her hologram as she then said, "The file you're looking for should be in a special room deep inside the cargo ship, If I were to wager, I would have to say in the lower levels."

The two chuckled before they said, "You know what to do guys!"

"Yes we do, we're going in now!" I told them as Dahak soon made our way over to the doors as we started to descend down a set of stairs, one of a couple we'll probably have to go down before we get to the room we're looking for.

Looking down at myself, I still can't get over how great this outfit is, It was like it was tailor made for me, as silly as it was to hear, the first time I saw this outfit I just went and got it and it fit perfectly like a glove, And there were also some spares exactly like these ones in case the first one that I was wearing got wrecked in some manner.

The same could be said for The girls outfit says well.

The reason why we got them? Well one so that we will be identified as true hunters, And two because they look like they were made for adventurers and thrilled seeking pilots.

To give you a summary on our new attires:

My outfit consisted of a navy blue and white turtleneck long sleeve shirt, Which matched well with the pants which stopped at the knees that were navy blue, grayish black, red and white outlines and at the ends With a gold like metal cup on both sides of my hips, a metallic breastplate over my chest with three pseudo green gems on top that could easily be decoupled by my own hands, a mini red cape-cloak with a high collar and fuzzy white ends kept on by a gold like chain and the ships emblem on my left side (This was something that Québec actually did himself to represent our team, Believe it or not he is really good at embroidering), brown gloves with white at the ends of the cuffs And on the surface of the glove was a red and gold like panel with a pseudo green gem on top which actually serves as a sort of knuckle duster that I can use to give me an extra boost of strength when punching, knee-high brown and white boots with a grey bolt like knee caps on top to protect my knees from damage with the heel, underside and round coin like cap on the surface being gold like, a pilot's cap which was red and had fuzzy white at the ends With my signature pilot goggles on top resting beside The front of my hair in front of my forehead that stuck out proudly, And lastly my signature necklace which I never go without was hiding underneath my shirt along with a black sleeveless undershirt in case I need to take the top off for some reason right away without any awkwardness.

Chocolat's outfit consisted of a Sapphire blue skin (near) tight sleeveless jumpsuit with black and two gold-like outlines at the collar and at the ends of the pants part of it which stopped above her knees, gloves which matched the suit itself as the gloves themselves were sapphire blue with the end of her long gloves which stopped right at her forearms being black with two gold outlines much like the pants part and color of her suit, on each of her wrists were a gold like metal com In case the other got destroyed, on her chest was a gold medal like weirdly shape round breastplate that also doubled as a mini tool kit and a plate itself was very durable, under her suit you could see a white collar sticking out as she wore an sleeveless undershirt underneath just in case, near knee high white baggie socks with gold at the top where it started, black shoes with gold-like heels and underside, And on top of head was a white pilot's cap along with a new set of brown and gold-like yellow pilot goggles since her old ones were misplaced during a mission last month And on the strap of her goggles you could see the ships emblem on it.

And as for Tala, Her outfit consists of a short white sleeveless dress with black at the top starting from above her chest to the collar of her dress, underneath was a long sleeve like gray shirt with violet stripes on the sleeves and white fuzz at the end of her sleeves, Her pilot black and violent goggles were around her neck like a necklace, black jeans, knee-high white boots with white fuzz at the top And unlike me and Chocolat She wore round topaz spear shape earrings around her ears. And the ships emblem was on both sides of her boots.

They fit pretty well and the best part was they were all very breathable so we would be fine no matter what environment we would be in.

They were also heat insulating which was good.

Especially as the ship itself felt a little cold, speaking of which, as soon as we walked through a pair of doors which led into what seemed to be an inner loading bay of sorts, The door behind us suddenly locked as we heard the sound of it locking by itself.

Turning around it was confirmed by the (used to be green) red light that flashed on top.

"Girls the door locked itself behind us." I told them straight away.

"We can see that, according to my readings it's locked up tight, all you can do now is go forward at least until I can figure out how to unlock it." Chocolat told us before We heard her gasp and shout, "Look out behind you!"

We turned back around and saw that it was two Kurvaz members, who were wearing Chinese like green armor With a strange black three-toed paw print on top of their hats in an orange and white circle, in robo's that kind of look like a mini metallic crocodiles but with shorter tails and mouths.

Oh, and the men were light ten Felineko's.

"You must be the intruder." The one on the left accused.

"Yeah, I wasn't exactly invited in but you know... like it or not, I'm crashing this party!" I told them as I smirked with confidence.

"Little punk! Got a smart mouth, huh?" The other said an irritation, "Get her!"

Bad idea bub.

The two of them came charging at us but Dahak was able to dodge and lift one of them up with some effort before slamming him down into the other guy and did it again twice in a row before I made him Dodge when one of them managed to get back up right away and was about to tackle us.

After a couple of minutes we were eventually able to wreck both of the robos beyond normal repair as The two soldiers were licking their wounds, metaphorically speaking, as they both scowled at us as they crawled out of their useless robos.

" Kuh... Don't think the Kurvaz are going to forget this girlie!" One of them shouted before they both ran off.

That only reminded me that we were infiltrating what is a military cargo ship, which means when it comes to the military you have to be extremely careful or otherwise it's game over.

"The guild is no joke, getting a fight with them would mean trouble, You both may have overcame this challenge for now sadly it seems you're going to have to fight through some of them If you want to reach the objective now that you've rattled the hornet's nest." Tala told us.

"Yeah." I agreed as Dahak nodded.

So much for trying to go in stealthily, oh well, we just have to be careful going forward.

We made our way to the door before we found ourselves on an outside cat walk bridge that led to another door on the other side.

Just then, the door behind us made the sound of it locking like the last one and almost immediately after another air ship, a battle cruiser that's jade green with the same Kurvaz emblem on the wing of it came up from below as it flew side by side with the Hiddenberg.

"I know girls, we see it too!" I told them as I beat them to the punch

"A battle cruiser?!" Tala exclaimed in shock and some bit of excitement, "You gotta be pulling my leg!"

"This had to go from bad to worse!" Chocolat yelped in worry.

We could hear what was going on from the battle cruiser as the speaker was on.

"Capt'n! Just received a telegram from the Hiddenburg! Another intruder sighted! This time it's some girl on a robot!" Said what I assume to be another grunt.

'Another...?' I thought briefly.

"Vha, vha, vhat?!" Exclaimed a older man who seemed to have a very heavy German accent and dialect, "...You, You mean zat buffoon over zere?"

"Hullo ladies! If you want a piece of that tail, come and get it cuz she and her buddy will wipe the floor with ya!" Tala hollered mockingly at them through the comm.

"Tala what are you doing!? Cut out! You know they're piloting a battle cruiser! You're going to get them killed!" Chocolat scolded her with urgency, "Don't anger them!"

"You do realize it would be really stupid If they shot at us knowing that the ship belongs to their guild and not to mention their grunts are still on the ship along with important cargo?" I brought out that fact, "They could very well be tried for genocide on their own men not to mention losing valuable cargo and wasting what I assume would be thousands of coins of profit on a ship like this."

I'm well aware of the laws given what we learned months before we started our adventure.

"She's got you there C," Tala agreed, "Besides they're all bark and they'll bite anyways, what are they going to do? Shoot at them or something?"

"SHOOT 'EM! FFFF-VIRE!!!" The captain shouted without remorse.

"WAIT WHAT?!!" All four of us exclaimed in shock as one of the turrets on the battle cruiser shot at us With a miniature but still powerful missile, thankfully on a part that wasn't crucial but it was still enough to leave quite a decent burn mark crater of sorts, rattle the ship a bit And was most certainly more than enough to scare us.

"TALA!!!" Chocolat screamed at her before smacking her in the head, "YOU AND YOUR BIG FAT MOUTH!!"

"They fired! They actually fired! They gotta to be crazy!" I shouted as my heart was pumping.

Obviously the captain himself didn't care about the consequences as one of The turrets fired another missile.

We had no choice, it was either us and the other lives on board that don't deserve to be gunned down like this or them, so, Dahak, Knowing what we needed to do, and I got to work catching one missile after the other and throwing them back at the other ship to cause enough damage to make them retreat which did take a good while as not only were we trying to avoid getting shot ourselves but also keeping the ship from getting hit again and trying to make sure we didn't accidentally kill any innocent seagulls.

Eventually we did it.

Smoke started to appear on the ship here and there as it started to descend lower and lower with each passing second.

"oh, now I am angry! I am vurious! Vire! Vire! Blow her up!!"

Crazy old man! This guy has got to be suicidally off hinged wanting to destroy us not caring that he himself is going to be at risk of going down with the ship with his men!

Thankfully it seems I wasn't the only one thinking that as one of his henchmen protested:

"Capt'n Grumpf, stop this madness! We're shooting at the Hindenburg Not to mention we're going down!"

"Vhat's one or two lost ships in ze line of duty?! Now vire!" He demanded.

Sure I am aware that the military or guild is willing to make some sacrifices in the name of duty, but I'm pretty sure that even they have some sense of sanity behind some of their madness.

Clearly this guy had none. Nor any self-preservation for that matter.

We could hear the henchman groan In irritated exasperation as he took the smart approach, "We've got no choice but to restrain the idio... uh, captain!"

Yes he is an idiot, thank you Captain obvious and sanity!

A loud scuffle could be heard as we could hear Captain Grumpf shout and demanded:

"Vhat ARE you doing?! Get your mutinous paws avay vrom me!"

"They're trying to save your life you idiot! Quit being an arsenic maniac and get lost!" I screamed at him at the top of my lungs as even though they were my enemies even I know that this guy was more insane then his crew, and I actually feel sorry for them as they have to deal with him.

"Shut up vou vlea bitten hag!" He exclaimed one final time before the speakers cut off as the ship itself started to go down but not before seeing an escape ship launch from the remains of the cruiser as it flew off while the cruiser itself descended down, ready to be swallowed up by those Cloud sea.

"... Looks like The Kurvaz have their paws full, Just like me." Chocolat said with a sigh as we all turned back to see hologram Tala who had a big bump on her head as she moaned an apology to us.

I can neither confirm nor deny that If it wasn't me then it was Tala who got us in trouble, rarely is it Chocolat that does.

We forgave her before Dahak and I continued our way in the ship.

What happened next consisted of Us navigating through the ship, from coursing through hallways, some had particular mechanisms to activate certain lifts so that we could continue venturing forward, taking an elevator, until we came into another inner loading bay to which we heard the door lock behind us again as we were confronted by another grunt who was riding a robo That was similar design to the crocodile one but in the shape of a light indigo scorpion but with the stinger being a giant blade.

"Heard we had a Felineko sneaking around. You the leader?" He asked me, though it sounded more demanding.

"Felineko? Leader? What're you talking about?" I Asked in confusion as Dahak got into battle mode, ready to fight.

"Eh forget it, you're going down babe!" He shouted.

Babe? BABE?! EW GROSS!

Dahak didn't take it lightly as he knows I hate to be called that. Especially if it came from the bad guys or arrogant hotshots with egos the size of hot air balloons.

So our response, we clobbered them.

We did the same as we did with the other grunt's robo's, only we had to dodge more considering that we were dealing with scorpion and crocodile robos that kept coming here and there.

It took much longer to stifle them, but eventually we were able to destroy their robo's as the men, who were bruised up, crawled out of their totaled machines as they glared at us before retreating.

"Just you wait 'til I get out of the hospital ... Gaaargh!" One of the grunts announced before running with the others.

As soon as we were alone, Tala spoke, "Time to address the elephant in the room, it seems that we're not the only uninvited guests at this party."

"Considering what we heard earlier," Chocolat stated, "The Felineko intruder got here long before we did."

"Yeah." I replied, "Friendly or not, that's something we don't know presently."

"It's best to remain cautious for now, until we actually meet him or her, we should assume they have an agenda like we do." Dahak cautioned as we all agreed.

We continued on from there, activating mechanisms so we can form a bridge to get to the next door, long hallways, finally being able to actually sneak past a few guards without getting into anymore fights.

There was a point where I needed to get off of Dahak so I could stun the enemy robo I could get by to get to a control room while Dahak kept him at bay but that was manageable.

How I'd stun them?

Simple, I had my Stungun.

...Which really was a sword with a gun like taser mounted to it that I could use for sword play or briefly paralyzing opponents.

It was a gift given to me by Québec before we started our first official day as hunters 2 months ago.

He gave Chocolat and Tala one each too.

And each one was different.

Mine was in the shape of a Scimitar with a red outline to it.

Chocolat was in the shape of a Tanto with a pink outline to it.

And Tala's was in the shape of a big seemingly heavy looking longsword with a violent outline to it.

And handles and triggers on all of them were a goldish bronze color.

Fun fact these are each of our favorite types of swords respectfully, No surprise that Québec made these based on our preferences.

Back to now.

We had to lift up a giant metal crate to put on a button in order to open up the metal steel door like wall in front of us so that we can get to the regular size door on the other side of the storage room, traversing through more hallways, eventually we came on to a large vast space Which I could probably guess was some kind of meeting area for press conferences or something with large windows that showed the outside skies Which were turning orange in color meaning that it was getting to be around sun down.

"Woah have we really been here all day? We better hurry up." I said after getting out of my (brief) shocked state.

"We'll have a harder time trying to pick you both up if it gets too dark, so you might want to hurry, according to my readings the room you're looking for is actually In the room on the other side of the one you're in." Chocolat told us.

"Thanks C, just leave it to us." I told her as Dahak used his dash move to get to the other side faster in several short bursts.

Soon enough we were inside the room which looked more like a locker room than a specialized storage room. And it was dark in there with only a red flashing alarm like light overhead to illuminate the room itself and for some reason there was a big button on the floor like The one that we dealt with in the storage room earlier.

"You're in the clear Red, there's no signs of anybody within the room or even near it." Tala, who is still nursing her headache, chimed in with reassurance.

"Don't speak too soon T, We still need to find that confidential file." I told her as I got off of Dahak for the second time since starting the mission and went over to the lockers to start searching.

Lock picking definitely helps save time especially when these guys are not using locks with lock combinations on them.

After a while I finally found the file I was looking for, thankfully Québec told us that there was a hint to finding it, quite mainly it was from something kind of silly.

Brief backstory, he was babysitting a kid who was the daughter of one of his friends and she accidentally carved a rhombus shape hole into The file that he was planning to store his notes in, little girl who felt bad for doing it tried to patch it up herself using a black piece of paper and glue, Québec wasn't too bothered by it but was really amused so He pretended not to question and kept it as it was to not make her sad.

Also the contents itself was held together by two blue and white striped rubber bands to keep any of it from leafing out on its own.

"Found it!" I cheered as I held the file of contents up over my head like it were a trophy.

The girls cheered while Dahak nodded and said, "Excellent, now we can make our exit and return it back to Québec."

I nodded back as I stuffed the file into my shirt and undershirt to keep it safe since Dahak did not have enough room to store Items such as this on his (robotic) person.

"Before that though," Tala spoke as curiosity was clear in her voice, "What's the deal with that button on the floor?"

We turned back to the curious thing as she continued, "Doesn't it look like the same one in the other storage room? And that wall there, it's the same as the one before."

We turned to said wall as she said that, realizing that she was right, it was the same.

"Makes you wonder what they're trying to hide in there." Tala said.

"I don't know Tala, somehow I got a bad feeling about this, besides, at this point we're snooping where we shouldn't be. We should leave." Chocolat told her and us.

"It's not snooping if we're just observing as if we were inside a museum." Tala argued, "We'll Just take a quick peek and then leave."

Both bring up a good argument but...

... Now my curiosity was rising high, so one quick look wouldn't hurt right?

"I say we take a closer look, we'll just see what it is and then get going, besides who's to even say that what's behind the door could actually be something dangerous that we need to be on lookout for." I told them.

Chocolate groaned while Tala cheered.

Dahak, though apprehensive, soon nodded as he made his way over to the button and got on top of it, Which instantly opened the wall as I turned to him as he told us, "Since I cannot see any heavy metal objects we can use to put on top of this, it would be best if I stayed here to keep it open while you investigate."

That made sense given what I saw before I started searching.

I nodded before I turned back to where that wall was before I was met by a ... very weird sight.

On the other side of the room there was literally nothing but some kind of pedestal with a glass case on top that contained something shiny.

Upon walking closer to the thing in question, I realized that it was some kind of necklace with a very large pendant as the centerpiece, But the pendant itself was kind of odd.

It was gold and round like a large cookie with a pattern on it. The centerpiece was a red gem and it seemed to be surrounded by five green dots that formed the sides of a pentagon And the whole thing itself seemed to be in a dark gold color ring.

Then I saw a card inside that messily read, "Necklace we stole from some snot face punk, paws off!"

Ok... really?

"Whoever wrote that note is so going to get fired." Tala stated the obvious sloppy work here before saying, "Apparently Québec is not the only victim who got robbed."

"Whatever they're going to use this for, it can't be something good, I mean if they were willing to go through the trouble of stealing a confidential file from Québec then this thing must also be important to somebody just as much as the file is to him. We should take this with us and head it over to the police so that it could be returned to its owner." Chocolat told us.

We all nodded as I started to undo the lock on the case, getting it open as I removed the pendant from its display case.

"Looks more like a medallion then a pendant up close, though one thing is for certain, this thing looks even fancier than the case it was in." I Said as I was about to put it on and hide it under my shirt to keep it safe.

But before I could even do that, without warning the red gem in the center flashed like a brightly lit firefly.

"Huh?!" I yelped in surprise.

I did not even get a chance to say or do anything, nobody had that chance, as immediately without warning the whole ship started to shake and rattle even worse than the earthquake that we had earlier that morning And worse than what happened with the battle cruiser.

"What's going on?!" I yelled as The tremors were powerful enough to knock me off my feet as I landed on my rear end as the alarm could be heard throughout the entire ship..

I got my answer as ear piercing screams of horror and fright snapped me on my shock as I turned back to the hologram projections of them, but their faces portrayed That of deep-seated fear and disbelief as I could see them both trembling.

"Girls talk to me, what's going on out there?!!" I yelled in worry.

"A MONSTER BIGGER THAN KING KONG JUST LITERALLY APPEARED OUT NOWHERE FROM OUT OF THE CLOUD SEA!!" Tala screamed, Waving her arms frantically in fright.

"WHAT?!?" I exclaimed worried and very confused.

"NO TIME TO TALK! YOU GUYS HAVE GOT TO GET OUT OF THERE BEFORE THE SHIP GOES DOWN, THAT BIG MONSTER JUST KNOCKED INTO THE SHIP ITSELF AND IT'S GOING TO CRASH AND BURN!" Chocolat urged us, now with tears in her eyes.

When she gets terrified to the point that tears formed, and when Tala starts waving her arms frantically in fear, then you know that this was deadly serious!

"Got it!" I told him as I hastily got back up by my feet and ran back to Dahak, who immediately took off towards the doors as soon as I got into his cockpit, both of ignoring the wall that came back down after getting off the button as I hastily put on the medallion and hid it underneath my shirt.

As soon as we got out of the room we started making our way to the other side of the press hall when suddenly through the broken windows on our right side came in a strange black ball creature the size of a bunk bed with a glowing red tint around it body, it had three rotating pointed legs and on his head with some kind of weird sash and flat headdress that were The color of blood.

"What is that thing?!" I yelled as Dahak had us dodge as it tried to attack us.

"I don't know, I've never seen anything like it before!" Chocolat exclaimed.

"All I really know is that it seemed to have came out of that big monster!" Tala pointed out as she was now clenching the area where her heart was trying to calm herself down.

"Whatever monstrosity this is, obviously it's hostile, we must take it down if we want to escape with our lives!" Dahak pointed out as we all nodded.

They were just as difficult as a scorpion robos we faced earlier, Yes I said they as there wasn't just one as several more of them started coming in, Not to mention that unlike the robo's we face before, these guys could expand extra spikes to try and pierce us with and shoot at us with dark orbs.

This was bad! We need to get out of here before we die!

Those were my thoughts as me and my faithful robo worked quickly to take down the monsters which seem to disintegrate into black lights after they've taken enough physical damage, which was relieving.

Eventually we managed to take them all down.

I could only give a small sigh as we weren't out of Danger yet.

"Quick! Get out of there! The ships losing altitude really fast!" Chocolat urged us as We did immediately as we were told as we made our way to the door and the other side and started quickly traversing back through where we came, thankfully the doors that locked behind us were now unlocked.

It seemed to go on forever as not only was it dark with only flashing red lights guiding us here and there but also several parts of the ship started to catch fire and smoke was starting to build up.

My fear kept building up the more we traveled.

"Hurry guys!!" Tala urged us as now tears were starting to well up in her eyes too.

Oh no, you know it's gotten really bad if she started crying now too.

"We're almost there! We'll be at the deck in a minute!" Dahak told them as I was focused on trying to not inhale the smoke as I stuffed my snout into my shirt as the fumes got even worse with every second that passed.

Just then, as we were nearing our rendezvous point, We spotted a young man that laid unconscious on the floor.

This caused us to stop as I quickly hopped off of Dahak In order to check his pulse, to my relief it was still there, but I knew that we had little time to question why he was still here and would have to assume that he got knocked out during the evacuation, and given the fact that he wasn't wearing the same uniform as the Kurvaz it was safe to say that He wasn't with them and he was the other intruder that came before us given the fact that this guy was also a Felineko.

Hastily I picked him up in my arms, and with Dahaks help We both got back into the cockpit as he resumed the running.

Since we were going to be flying I made sure to strap myself in (Yes robo's have seat belts, so don't you dare assume) and held on to the man as close to me as possible so he wouldn't go flying before I gripped One of the handlebars as tightly as I could.

Soon enough we were now on top of the deck as The night time sky above us was in hues of dark blue and purple and gray and black with smoke mixing it into it along with some red from the burning embers flying in the wind.

"Guys! It's too dangerous for us to pick you up on top, You got to jump and land into the hanger, we'll catch you from below!" Chocolat notified us before another tremor hit us as this time it caused the comms to go out.

Jump out of a burning cargo ship into our own?! I may be a thrill seeker but I'm not suicidal. But I knew we had no choice!

With no time to waste Dahak quickly ran to the left side of the ship before he leapt off of it as we began descending down.

It felt like my life was flashing before my eyes but I knew I had to keep my focus in trying to find our ship while fighting through the piercing wind.

No words could describe how much my heart leapt With relief as we finally saw the Acquilina coming at us as We freefalled towards it, aiming carefully so that we would land in the hanger.

3... 2... 1!

Yes! We landed as we heard the familiar Kur-thump and Ka-klank sound.

The fierce winds that were still present as the hanger door behind us started to close, but not before I turned around to look back, only to see what had to be the monster that the girls had told us about.

It both looked terrifying and definitely something that came out of a monster movie.

And definitely 10 times bigger than King Kong as the monster itself was in different hues of blue and turquoise, had eerie yellow glowing eyes and looked like it's outside exterior look to be made out of rock and stone though I could tell even from a far distance that it seemed more biologically natural, it's face looked like it had the face of a menacing robot while it's pseudo hair and beard look like it was made out of clusters of stalactites, on its back it looked like a giant turtle shell but with lots of rocks and jagged edges that could tear your ship to shreds in a fraction of a second along with what seems to be weird shapes of technology sticking out of it and on its head was a long horn that looked like A rock like Lance.

No wonder the girls were panicking and screaming, this thing looked absolutely monstrous.

Soon enough The hanger door closed completely as the wind's finally died down and I was able to finally let out the biggest sigh of relief I've been holding in.

"That was way too close." I murmured after getting My snout out of my shirt which I forgot to do as we were free falling.

"You got that right." Tala came along with Chocolat, "Thankfully our ship was not damaged and we were able to get the autopilot engaged so we should be fine for now."

"I'm definitely going to be having nightmares tonight." Chocolat moaned as Dahak helped me get both myself and the man who we rescued out of the cockpit and safely back on the ground.

As I held his head close to my chest I was able to get a good look at him.

As said before he was a Felineko.

The man looked to be around 18, His pattern and coloring were exactly the same as Tala's but there was a key difference between them besides the obvious difference in gender as his stripes were more darker and The main color palette of his fur had more of a bluish tint to it and as for his hair the highlights in it were definitely darker as they were a darker shade of purplish blue and the length of his hair was shorter than Tala's. And he wore a different outfit than her, He wore a silver gray hoodie jacket with dark gray highlights around the pockets and sleeves and the ending of it, wore black fingerless gloves that looked like they had seen better days, his pants, And this sounded near impossible, were even blacker than hers and he wore silver gray cargo boots that look like have been very thoroughly used for years and years.

Besides this and the fact that his ears were slightly bigger than hers and his tail was a little longer than hers, Not to mention that presumably he was a year older than us, you would think that he was her near identical twin brother.

He definitely had some injuries as he had some burns, bruises and some scratches and probably had a bump on his head from getting knocked out.

"Is he okay?" Chocolat asked as she approached us while gesturing to Tala to grab the first aid kit Which she did so quickly.

"Besides a few bumps and bruises he is breathing, It seemed he got knocked out during all of that, and considering that his outfit is nothing like that of the Kurvaz it's safe to assume that he was the intruder who got on the ship before us." I told her.

"Why was he even there in the first place?" Tala asked as she brought over the kit we needed as I gently laid him down on the floor, taking off my long sleeve shirt, gloves, googles and hat so that I can fold it up and put it under his head to use as a makeshift pillow while being careful to pull out the file and lay it down on the floor along with my gloves, goggles and hat.

"Do you think it has something to do with the medallion that we found there?" Dahak spoke thoughtfully as we got to work patching up his injuries after carefully getting his hoodie jacket off of him.

"Considering the card that I read in the case before getting the thing out of it, it's the only thing that makes too much sense." I said as I looked down at the medallion which laid on my chest against my black shirt With my emerald pendant, "If it was that important that he was desperate to sneak on the ship to get it back, It must be something incredibly valuable to him. Why? I don't know but perhaps we will find out once he wakes up."

"Still..." Tala said in worried confusion, "What was the deal with that giant Rock like beast? Where did it come from?"

"That's the question there." I said as We put the last bandage on him and as I declared, "We'll tell all of this to Québec and see if he has any information about what we just saw."

Everyone nodded in agreement before Dahak went to go to his resting station while we proceeded to head back into the living area, carefully carrying the The young man so that we could lay him on One of the beds so that he could rest, thankfully we had gotten a sleeping bag a while back just in case so one of us could sleep in that while the others took their own beds and our guests one of ours.

As for the file itself I made sure to put it in the bookcase for safekeeping.

Even though We completed the mission, knowing that we came very close to losing our lives this time and seeing The very thing that was causing the ship to catch fire has left me with more questions than I know what to do with.

What was that thing? Where did it come from? Why did it appear like that? How did it survive coming through the Sea of clouds knowing how dangerous they were to normal people?

And so on.

Even as we made ourselves dinner before retiring for the evening, something told me that something big was going on, and what we were about to learn and face would change our lives yet again.

Done!!

Yes, Tala's outfit is mostly based on Fem Elh's original outfit. And Yes for this story Elh is a (physically) 18 year old male who's chronologically over 300 years old.

I hope you enjoyed this chapter! Tell me what you think in the reviews.

Until next time, TTFN!