Tier 3 Chapter 3 Version 2
Rallen, Jeena, and Isaarf approached a large metal spacecraft in the NPP hangar. It was in the shape of a teardrop and had two curved wings coming out of the sides. It was slightly rusted and didn't look to Rallen like it was fit for space travel.
"Feast your eyes on the Starship Terror 11-A," Isaarf said in its sophisticated voice. "This battle cruiser has seen some nasty action in its time, but now we just use it for casual missions."
"That's nice and all," Rallen said, "but what're we riding in?"
"In this of course!" Isaarf replied, easily sensing Rallen's opinion of the ship through his thought patterns. "It may look ugly, but it's gotten me more places than you've even heard of."
"Are you coming, Isaarf, or am I gonna have to take off without you again?" A voice that strangely resembled Jeena's but was much more shrill called from the ship.
"Hold on a second, Quid!" Isaarf shouted in an oddly gruff voice. "It's hard to get humans to try new things, you know that!" Isaarf then turned to the two cadets and switched to his casual voice. "Sorry, that wass my copillot, Quid Larra. It doessn't like being kept waaiting."
Once onboard the ship, Rallen and Jeena were introduced to the crew. Isaarf was the captain of the ship. Quid Larra, who was also an Ooblajig but had a stange frill growing from the back of its head, was the copilot and weapons specialist. Ha'adak, a miniature version of Isaarf except with fewer violent details, was the ship's biologist. Lokiim, another frilled Ooblajig, was the main medic. Jindar, Luuki, and Zind'orlo were the other medics. They were small green creatures with three legs, four eyes, and odd tusks. They couldn't speak the same language as Rallen and Jeena. Pulsarri Rigidibus Pius Antion, a short blue creature with four arms and large feet, was the head engineer. Rigidibus's underlings weren't important.
"You Ooblajig sure know how to build ships," Jeena commented as they returned to the cockpit. "Though the exterior suggests otherwise."
"Why make it pretty when it should be practical?" Isaarf responded in its gruff voice. The trio entered the room and Isaarf went over to the navigation console in front of his captain's chair. "Quid, how long should it take us to get home from here?"
"Depends, we going the fast way or the fun way?" It responded with a wry smile. Quid Larra was now speaking in a lower, more mischievous voice than the shrill one Rallen and Jeena had heard before.
"I'm gonna say... the fun way," Isaarf smiled back. It then addressed the two humans, "I suggest you two buckle up. We Ooblajig are known for our intelligent stupidity!"
Almost as soon as the ship left Kollin's orbit, it began moving faster than any ship should be able to.
"The Arcturus star system is approaching us, Sir," Quid Larra said calmly.
"Oh goodie," Isaarf smirked to itself and leaned foreward, "enemy territory. Let's see, what gifts should I leave them this time?"
"We could always use this time to test our experimental parasitic clusterbombs," Pulsarri Rigidibus Pius Antion said over a video communicator. No sooner had it said this, than Isaarf began pressing buttons and turning dials on his console.
Rallen and Jeena, who were intently watching the windows, saw a quick blur as a bright star whizzed by at enormously high speeds. They then ran to a window near the back of the spacecraft and watched as the cluster bombs went off in the fleeting blur of the star system.
"I thought I told you two to buckle up!" Isaarf shouted in his gruff voice. "Not that it matters now. That was the only 'fun' part of the fun way back to Sol. Now you can just sit back as the stars fly by."
"How is it that your ship is able to move so quickly?" Jeena asked after about twenty minutes of sitting in silence.
"It's not us that's moving," Pulsarri Rigidibus Pius Antion, who had come in shortly before Isaarf dropped the bombs, explained. "It's the space around us. Through a marvel of engineering, we Thugo found a way to move the universe without moving ourselves. It enabled all sentient beings to travel much faster than the speed of light. The trick is making larger ships, such as this one, able to do the same thing without the insulation killing the device that moves the space."
Jeena didn't know where to begin with her questions from there, so she just sat there and tried to imagine a way to do something similar.
Nearly an hour had passed since the ship had left Arcturus, but the navigational display still only said that they were 34% of the way between Nanairo and their destination.
"So, I'm guessing you two are related," Quid Larra suddenly said in a soft, conversational voice.
"No, It's obvious that they're mates!" Isaarf said in his gruff voice before either of the human's could respond. "They can't be related anyway. They're features are too different."
"Like you said before, Isaarf, you Ooblajig are stupidly intelligent," Pulsarri Rigidibus Pius Antion cut in. "You jump to conclusions to quickly. They are simply partners in the business sense, nothing more."
"Oh?" Isaarf questioned in his sophisticated voice. "Then why did they share a bed in the medical wing of their headquarters?"
"W-wait, how do you know that?" Rallen and Jeena asked almost simultaneously.
"It seems as though you forgot to inform the humans of your intriguing abilities," Pulsarri Rigidibus Pius Antion said slyly to the two Ooblajig. "I'll just explain. Ooblajig have the rude ability to accidentally tune into the thoughts of nearby beings. It's similar to when you're standing near two people who are talking and you only catch parts of the conversation. Obviously, Isaarf has seen some image in one of your minds of the two of you in the same bed in a medical room."
Isaarf then turned a bright shade of green with odd pink splotches. Quid Larra smirked smugly and watched the humans blush as well.
"You can be even worse than the male humans sometimes, Isaarf, did you know that?" Quid Larra said in her shrill voice. "It probably comes from that little bit of human DNA that still runs in the family." This caused the color in both Rallen and Jeena's faces to quickly drain. "Oh, no it's not like that. Y'see, several of our ancestors were ambassadors to early human colonies. To become an ambassador, they had to go through a series of genetic alterations that made them temporarily human. There's an old story that once you go human, you can never completely change back. It was just an innocent joke."
The awkward silence that ensued was... well... awkward. The navigational display showed that only a couple hundred light years remained between them and their destination.
"So what's with the voice thing?" Rallen asked to get everyone's minds turned towards something else.
"Get ready to get your ears talked off by six people in two bodies," Pulsarri Rigidibus Pius Antion said with a groan.
The tall blue creature wandering the icy wastelands of Io sighed loudly to its heavyset monolith of a partner. It was getting tired of having to go to every body in this star system and search for life.
"If your eyes were working right, we wouldn't have this problem!" The blue creature screamed at its companion. "Why is it I get stuck with all the useless krawl!"
The large, rocky creature let out a depressed moan of sadness at its partner's last comment. This only seemed to make the blue creature more infuriated.
"Don't give me that!" The blue creature screamed. "You need to learn that crying doesn't get you what you want."
"You're one to talk, Inzi," a feminine voice said from behind the creature. "I remember that just a few days ago you were crying over the fact that Krux wouldn't give you your human form."
"Yarui," Inzi said as it turned around to face the spiny high krawl. It raised its mechanical arm to point a thick finger in her direction. "Why are you here you selfish wannabe?"
"Look at the pot calling the kettle black!" Yarui shouted back at ther still genderless underling. "For your information, Krux sent us here to keep an eye on you." As she said the word "us," a muscular male form walked out from behind her. He was wearing a robe that hid many of his features.
"Who's your friend?" Inzi asked with a glare to the man. "I don't recall seeing him at base."
"Meet my partner, Hegion," Yarui said. "He's one of master Krux's new experiments. Why don't you show Inzi your face, Hegion?" Hegion removed his hood. Inzi was shocked by what he saw; a humanoid face, similar to the other high krawl, but with a metallic look. His eyes were glowing red and one appeared to be separated into three sections. "Y'see Hegion is master Krux's new mechanical krawl, and I get to test him out."
"Let's see how he protects you in battle!" Inzi shouted his threat.
"Let's!" Yarui responded.
"I'd advise agains-" Hegion said in a mechanical voice.
"Shut up, Hegion!" Yarui said as she began her transformation into her krawl form. Hegion followed suit. Once done with their transformations, the two high krawl took their battle positions.
"Gunkii," Inzi said to his companion, "remember to stay out of my way this time."
Inzi slammed his mechanical arm into the ground and prepared to send a supersonic pulse that slowly cracked the ice. This put Yarui, who's only support was a needle-like leg, slightly off balance. Hegion, however, had three legs which supported his weight beautifully as he aimed his gatling gun arm at Inzi's arm.
Just as Hegion was prepared to fire, the ice split completely through. The crack grew larger as four claw-like hands pushed it open.
"What is that thing?" Inzi asked in astonishment as he lifted his arm from the ground.
"Sensors indicate spectral abilities along with high electron activities," Hegion reported. "classification: spectrobe; genus: semi-legendary; species: unknown."
The immense creature climbed out of the moon's core and spread fin-like appendages on its back. This creature was not happy about being woken from its nap.
So what do you guys think? Too long? Too cliché?
I can't wait to see what you guys want to happen next! Please leave comments/reviews telling exactly what you guys think should happen next.
I owe this idea to my good-ish friend: zapdragon555
Once again, I need people to contribute so please do! I'm trying to type faster than one chapter per week, so get 'em out there!