Chapter 79: Where the Old Meets the New.
The crash of the hammer meeting the metal between it and the anvil rang out over and over again reverberating off the walls of the blacksmith's before the smith quickly lifted the glowing shape and placed it back into the orange-glowing heat of the blast furnace.
The furnace itself was little more than a large porthole set into the wall of the smith's with a large anvil and tools set right next to it for ease of use and in this case speed.
"Good job Verimier, everyone look here how Verimier is controlling the temperature of the metal carefully, as I have said to you from the very beginning in order to work with this metal you cannot let it cool, short bursts only, pull it out shape and reheat before it begins to cool, it's also why it's important to keep heating our anvils to ensure that the heat transfer between the metal and the anvil is minimal as well as to prevent temperature shock," Jack Mason said to the gathered Beledon blacksmiths all gathered around him.
The large red-coloured long furred male Beledon called Verimier smiled happily under the praise of the human male who stood at his and who despite their massive difference in stature still commanded the rapt attention of all the massive bovine aliens present.
Suddenly a hand raised up from the back of the group and Jack pointed to them, "Yes Fenrier go ahead," he said.
"Forgive my ignorance Grand Patriarch but how does this metal differ from the others you have taught us how to make and smith these past weeks?' the brown-furred and slightly smaller male Beledon asked, in Jack's estimation he couldn't be more than twenty years old and was pretty new to this trade.
"A good question Fenrier, now over the last weeks I've introduced you to a great many different metals and taught you the skills you'll need to shape them but this metal is different, this metal is unique to this world and in all our time in space, we have never come across it's like anywhere else, so unique is it that our science hive has named it Masonite and it is a truly amazing metal to work with, because not only does it have the adaptability and flexibility of steel but it combines with it the lightness not to mention the strength of titanium, along with a whole host of other quirks, not to mention how beautiful the final product looks when you actually manage to pull off a successful melt and shaping of it," he said walking over to a rack on the wall where a few blades were hanging on hooks to air cool.
Jack lifted down a truly exquisite-looking long sword that he had personally shaped only the day before and lifted it so that the metal caught the light flashing in swirls of blue and gold that ran down the blade like ink mixing with gold.
"Russo pick up that steel claymore to your right," he said and the big back and white Beledon female picked up a large steel claymore sword that had been adapted to fit Beledon's hands, it was nought more than a practice piece made to teach them how to shape steel.
"Ok everyone back up a little bit and Russo give me your best battle stance," Jack said spinning the long sword in a figure-of-eight shape to gauge its balance before the big Beledon took a stance pointing the tip of the massive sword in his direction, Jack smiled and vanished before reappearing behind the big Beledon female.
All of them blinked for a moment before every head glanced to where now stood and then back at where he had been and then back to where he now stood their eyes widening in confusion, it wasn't often the Beledon blacksmiths got to see a display of Dream Warrior abilities and Jack turned smiled as he rested the still shining long sword on his shoulder with one hand before with the other he raised it and snapped his fingers.
The blade Russo was holding promptly spilt clean in two causing a loud clatter at the top half of the blade to fall to the floor leaving the amazed Beledon female standing holding the hilt and half a sword.
Jack promptly flicked the Masonite sword to show them how the blade didn't even have a scuff upon it and a burst of murmurs filled the room as they all crowed in to look at the blade.
"That's why every Seeker you see carries one not to mention nearly every bladed weapon every Clan Mason warrior from our speedy Seekers, to our mighty Hunters even to our stalwart Saviours has this metal in both their armour and their bladed weapons, hell if any of you have your eyes upon any of our sizeable Yautja population make your crush a set of traditional Yautja wrist blades out of this stuff or a nice war sword and you're almost guaranteed to turn their head, you'll be on the starting blocks of a mate hunt before you know it, trust me I should know," he said chuckling.
Before any of them could reply a thoughtful clicking noise came from the far side of the room and they all turned to find Tik eleth Mason standing there dressed in her shining golden armour grinning broadly at her husband.
"Not giving away all of your seduction secrets to your students I hope my love?" she said striding through the crowd of massive Beledon with the confidence of a seasoned warrior and the grace of a true huntress, her presence was like a fire around her that simply gave her an aura that simply oozed power and control.
"Not all of them my love but I gotta give our newcomers a little leg up into the race now don't I wouldn't want your lot losing to all the Raptorian and Serpentinus girls I keep seeing all over the place now would you?" Jack replied with a grin as he placed the sword back on the rack and strode forwards to take his wife into his arms and planting a kiss on each of her mandibles before she seized his head and kissed him deeply.
When she released him she growled deeply, "I swear those little Raptorian girls are miniature Yautja in disguise, Eternal Huntress knows where they get their boldness from, only yesterday I saw a whole pride of them helping one of them to build a house, they were actually stood on his shoulders nailing up roof beams," she said and Jack laughed again and nodded.
"Yeah it truly has warmed my heart to see how the Clan has pulled together to welcome the Beledon into our midst, in only a few short weeks we have transferred them from homeless refugees into a proud and thriving community," he said.
Tik nodded her head and looked around at all of his students watching them curiously, "You all should be proud of the steps you have taken, you have done both your people and your deities proud with what you have overcome I am sure of it," she said and the Beledon around her all smiled and puffed out their chests proudly.
"Alright guys class dismissed back to your own smiths now and I'll see you again next week," Jack said and as one the whole group of Beledon smiths all saluted them with Clan Mason salute.
"Thank you for your knowledge and instruction Grand Patriarch," they all said in keeping with the Beledon traditions of honouring your teachers and mentors.
As they all filed out Tik turned to Jack and smiled at him, "It is good to see how well they are integrating and adapting to our ways without losing who they are at heart," she said and Jack nodded.
"Pretty sure Sela eleth would agree with you, her Saviours were pretty busy in those first few days keeping order," he replied as he watched the last of the Beledon close the door to the smith behind them leaving the pair alone in Jack's smithy.
Tik chuckled to herself and drew her mandibles up into a grin, "Pretty sure they learned pretty quickly the first time they all witnessed a little Raptorian pride of Saviours put that massive yellow-furred Beledon male on his arse when he tried to kick off a fight over land," she said and Jack chuckled.
"Yeah, and I'm pretty sure they got the message by the fact that no sooner had they put him down about a hundred more Saviors just popped out of thin air all around them that if you fuck with the Clan's laws or it's members we don't mess around with you," he said.
"Well thankfully it is all in the past now and the territories have been settled, though I am genuinely surprised by how many of their number have volunteered for the Hunters, it seems that they have vengeance burning bright in their hearts," Tik replied.
"Not just that, they want to feel both useful and productive, it's the Beledon way, they want to earn this gift we have given them, the way they see it this is our home and if they want to be able to stand as equals with us upon it they must contribute not only to the Clan but it's protection, though I'd be lying if I said that most of them do hold the hope that by joining our warriors they'll get the chance to strike back at those responsible for the destruction of their home," Jack said.
"And one day we will give them that chance my love," Tik said lovingly stroking the side of her husband's head with her mandible tusks, gently raking them through his hair.
Jack turned and gently reached up to nibble the bottom of one of her mandibles which made Tik growl softly, "If you keep that up my love I may have to find you something else to pound upon these anvils of yours," she purred.
"Seems I'm not the only one who can read minds," Jack growled softly making Tik purr and click as he reached up to nip at her neck.
But before either of them could get the other's armour off both of their comms units began to bleep in unison making Tik snarl in frustration, flaring her mandibles as she did, she pressed her to receive button both knowing that ignoring a call would mean someone would be dispatched to hunt them down.
"This had better be important," Tik said with obvious frustration in her voice as she straddled her prone husband as he sat upon one of the massive anvils.
"I'm sorry to interrupt your private time Grand Matriarch but we have received a message from one of our evaluation and retrieval teams and well I think both yourself and the Grand Patriarch will want to see this," the voice on the other end of the line said and Jack saw his wife's eyes turn from frustrated to concerned in an instant.
"We're on our way," he said.
"Very good Grand Patriarch," the obviously human voice said closing the comms line before Tik closed her wrist comp and looked down at her husband.
"Once whatever this is resolved I am going to drag your sculpted ooman arse right back to this very anvil, I am not done with you this day not by a long shot," Tik growled and jack laughed.
"I never expected any less of you, my love," he said giving her rear a pat through her armour.
Moment's later the pair were exiting the smithing school and heading across the Beledon territory on one of the Raptorian-built and Xeno-improved surface skimmer bikes.
These versions of the rapid assault craft originally designed to ferry Raptorian Surface Stalkers across the surface of their homeworld were enlarged to be able to carry Yautja and humans comfortably, though a few Xeno variants now existed as well and it had become a very common sight within the Clan to see Xeno's ripping around on the things with a petrified looking human riding pillion while clinging on to them for dear life.
The Beledon territory had come on in monumental jumps over the past few weeks since their arrival here on the Clan Mason homeworld, they had gone from living essentially in a pop-up tent city to an actual city.
The way they had decided to run things these days was rather than having a single lord and lady ruling over a singular territory to all join together to form a council made up of all the saved Beledon lords and ladies so all would have an equal voice regarding the fate of their people and now all decisions were made by a voting system, with any tiebreakers decided by either Jack or Tik as the leaders of Clan Mason.
The first decision that they had made was for the entity of the Beledon people to officially join Clan Mason who while they promised them that they would respect their local authority made sure that they understood that this meant that they now answered to the Clan.
Given what the Clan had done for their people the vote was unanimous in favour of joining and even held a ceremony to crown both Jack and Tik the high king and queen of the Beledon which while it had made the pair kinda uncomfortable given their firm belief in each member of the Clan being as equal as any other had accepted to respect the traditions of the Beledon people.
And so the city of Beledonia was born, all around it were a series of small towns and villages set up to cater to the various races of Beledon, from the cold-loving long furs that were situated high in the mountains to the plains loving sun loving smooth furs who lived on the plains all with the city dead at the heart of the territory.
Transit links to the main Clan Mason capitol had been set up by the science hive and its army of engineers and for days after the pact had been ratified, signed and the coronation had been held Xeno's were crawling all over the territory setting up a large maglev transit train system that shuttled Beledon into the capitol for work and education.
Now that's not to say that the Beledon didn't have education centres of their own, infact Jack and Tik had been absolutely insistent on it, and schools had been set up to teach their younger members all about their people and their traditions, not to mention their deities with each of the schools having at least one shrine attached to it tended by the priests and priestesses.
No the education they received at the heart of the main capitol was of a far more advanced nature, like those who had signed up to become Hunters or those that Jack and his Seekers had sought out and brought into the ranks of the Seekers among many other things.
Infact since the integration the Xenos of the science hive had been hard at work on methods to help speeding up the beledon's understanding of their vastly superior technology and sciences, one method that had been found to be highly effective was using the telepathic link present in a hive to perform a kind of psychic download of knowledge direct from a queen into multiple students at once, much like she would do for her own children to speed up their development.
Infact so rapid was this process that the Beledon had begun to refer to this period as the dawn of enlightenment.
Jack sped along under the maglev tracks racing the train as it sped along from the territory heading for the city, now no normal person could hope to match the speed at which this bullet-shaped train moved, but Jack was no normal person.
His personal surface skimmer had been highly modified with a far more powerful motor than was found on the normal variants and one that was capable of being handled by a Dream Warrior of Jack's calibre, so no one.
Unlike the normal surface skimmer ridden by the Raptorian Stalker squads jack's had six large coils jutting out with three on each side kinda making it look like an oversized pond skimmer, this had the effect of adding more control for the larger engine as well as more control at high speeds.
As they sped along Jack could feel Tik clinging to him tightly as they screamed over jumps and across rivers, he could also feel her periodically waving to people on the train above them as they raced alongside it, as he glanced up he could see a group of Beledon children obviously on a day outing to one of the schools in the city where they would be taking part in the day exchange program to learn all about the peoples of Clan Mason while some of their own cubs would be ferried to the schools in the Beledon territories to learn about their new friends and their rich history.
He couldn't help but laugh as he saw the little amazed bovine faces pressed against the windows their breath fogging the glass as the children saw their high king and queen the leaders of the whole of Clan Mason racing along next to them, this was probably not behaviour they were used to seeing from their lord and ladies, but Tik and Jack were not your garden variety leaders.
"Punch it my love let's really give these cubs a show and beat them there!!" Tik yelled from behind him and Jack grinned.
"Alright you got it, my queen, Dream Warrior mode it is, hold on to that succulent arse of yours here we go!" Jack yelled and he flipped a switch under the throttle which sent a huge burst of power through the six electromagnetic hover coils which responded instantly, there was a loud hum from under them as well as a glowing bright electric blue light, the coils crackled with electrical arcs sending them shooting forwards at well over two hundred miles an hour.
The coils weren't the only thing that was crackling with energy however, Jack himself was feeling it flowing through him as well as he tapped into the depths of his Dream Warrior power well, he felt the surges of power racing through his very nerves allowing them to move far far beyond their normal human limits, for him the world was moving at a snail's pace, hell right now it was going so slowly he could actually see the arcs of electricity forming before they burst outwards from the coils under them.
Jack could actually feel the Beledon children cheering as they sped off into the distance beating the train to the city where he slowed the skimmer to a far more sensible speed as to avoid any accidents as he negotiated through the city and headed up to the intelligence building.
As he and Tik entered they found Ryan and Sela eleth had beaten them there and were waiting with Liam Silver-Diamondscale jack's second in command of the Soul Knights.
"So what's so important that you needed to interrupt my hard-won private time with your patriarch?' Tik asked looking between her two cubs.
Ryan turned and pressed a button on the screen next to him bringing up an image on the large screen at the front of the large circular intelligence centre which was filled with SigInts and intelligence officers all busily working on data streaming in from both the fleet and sensors within Clan space.
As Jack and Tik turned Tik's mandibles fell open as she saw the massive image of a pair of faces on the massive holo screen and Jack felt his brow furrow as he instantly recognised the species as the same one as Deathtouch.
"Where was this taken?' he instantly demanded.
"That's the funny thing patriarch, it was taken by an evaluation and retrieval team at the end of the path, they actually followed the path of the Unchained Heart and completed it, they called us," Ryan said and Jack turned to him feeling his eyebrow shoot up as he did.
"Apparently the first thing they did as our Seekers of Balance approached them was to demand to speak to the Godslayer and the Breaker of Chains," Liam said pressing another button on the screen that Ryan had made the large image change to a video file.
"We are seeking the Godslayer and the Breaker of Chains, please it is of utmost importance, the fate of our species hangs in the balance and we were told that they would help us," the smaller of the two blatantly female beings on the screen said in perfect Yautja.
Jack suspected it was a translator at work due to the inflexions, you could always tell a native Yautja speaker by both the tone and inflexions, it was kinda like a regional slang thing.
He studied the now still image, the pair kinda reminded him of a pair of humanoid wolves crossed with porcupines in a way, they had a covering of quills that were slightly translucent but was a flushed dark purple and black which kind of matched what he could see of the skin under it.
Their facial features were almost canine in their structure with slightly elongated snouts that rose into two binocular purple eyes with vertical slit pupils, sat atop of their heads were sharply pointed ears like those of a wolf but shorter.
"What did our Seekers find out from them?" Tik asked curiously.
"Surprisingly not much other than their names and the name of their species, they're called Velons and they seem to have a rather strong resistance to our passive psychic probing and without going full contact invasive we were unable to penetrate their mental defences," Liam said making Jack look at him in amazement.
Never before had they met a species that had a seemingly natural defence against Dream Warrior abilities, this just jumped up the curiosity ladder a couple of rungs.
"Did they say why they were looking for myself and my husband?" Tik asked and Liam shrugged.
"Other than to say that it was the direst need that they speak with you concerning the fate of their people no nothing," Liam said.
"Where are they now?" Jack asked.
"We took them aboard the cruiser Unity and retrieved their shuttle so they couldn't vanish on us, they are be kept at the edge of Clan space in the system where the path ends," Liam said.
Jack glanced at Tik who was looking at the images on the screen curiously and upon feeling her husband's eyes on her she looked away from the screen and met his gaze, "Looks like our anvil is going to have to wait my love think we're going to need to take a trip don't you?" he said and Tik growled in response.
"Don't think you're getting away that easily my husband, I'll carry the pauking anvil with us if I have to," she snarled giving him a sly grin and making him laugh out loud.
He reached out and put his arm around his wife's shoulders feeling her grip his waist as he did, "One of the many many reasons I love you Tik eleth, you never let anything stand between you and what you want," he said giving her a toothy smile.
"Or in your case who I want," she said.
"You going to take the GMF patriarch? I can get her cleared for you she's already got her crew on board and is docked at orbital six?" Sela eleth said checking a holo screen projected from her wrist comp displaying all of the currently berthed ships.
"Don't think we need to break out the big guns for such a small run, we'll just take our personal Runner, been itching to take that damn thing out for a spin since the science hive gave it to me for my last birthday, it's been sitting in the damn hanger behind our house ever since," Jack said.
"And if you keep polishing its hull the way you do the cloaking systems are going to fail because the shine will bleed through it," Tik said with a playful growl making him laugh.
"Hey a man has to take care of the things he loves, you polish your trophies and I polish my ship and your arse," Jack shot back giving Tik a playful grin and dodging the playful swat aimed at his head from his mock offended wife.
"Just you wait till I get you into space, I'm definitely bringing that pauking anvil now, I'll give you polished arse indeed," she shot back and both Ryan and Liam snorted in unison trying to contain their laughs as Sela eleth just cringed hard enough to make her look like she was going to swallow her own mandibles.
"Promises promises," Jack said grinning like an idiot as Tik blushed as she realised what she'd just said.
"Oh before you go don't forget that we've got that meeting with both the Serpentinus Royal pack and the newly elected Raptorian governing pride in three days, they are going to be dropping into our space tomorrow, they are eager to see how the Beledon are faring under our care and to see how their relief aid was being used," Ryan said.
Jack nodded, "We'll be back in plenty of time just as long as your mother doesn't think of any more heavy metal objects she wants to drag around with us," Jack said and with that, he dodged another swat aimed at his head before quickly spinning around his wife and grabbing her massive arm and linking it in his.
"Shall we go dear?" he said looking up at Tik's surprised face.
"Alright, send us the coordinates and tell the Unity to expect us," she said directing that to Liam who nodded and went to work on one of the consoles as the pair headed back out of the intelligence building and headed for home.
Although the Runner class scout ship belonging to Jack and Tik was as heavily armed and equipped as any of its military counterparts this model had been designed more as a pleasure craft for the pair that could shuttle them to any diplomatic engagements in style but while affording them little more privacy than flying on something as packed as the GMF.
Jack stood admiring the craft as it sat in the personal vehicle hanger that was set behind their house, the hull had been painted in a deep black and red giving the craft a sleek and mean-looking visage.
As he stood there admiring the ship Tik appeared carrying her armour and some weapons for the trip, Jack glanced down at the bag with two large swords and a war staff sticking out of it, "You sure you don't want to bring the anvil pretty sure you've packed everything else in there?" he said playfully.
"Won't fit in the bag and besides I'm sure this ship has plenty of surfaces for me to ravage you upon," Tik said striding past him and heading for the loading ramp at the rear and Jack couldn't help but admire his wife's figure in the skin-tight body suit that she was wearing that really showed off not only every curve of her feminine body but every rippling muscle, he truly did love this woman with every fibre of his DNA.
Their Runner aptly named the Grand Patriarch's Peace was fitted with some luxuries that you wouldn't find anywhere near a normal ship of its class, like a massive single bedroom complete with a massive double bed and miniature trophy room as well as a walk-in bath that doubled as a hot tub, the thing even had a bar.
As Tik unpacked her armoury/suitcase in the bedroom Jack dropped into the pilot's seat and buttoned the ship up, running some preflight checks as he did to ensure that they were ready to get underway, to his joy everything came up green and the ship despite having sat idle since he'd received it from the hive was good to go.
The door to the bridge slid open and Tik appeared dropping down into the gunner's seat reflexively despite them not really needing a gunner on this trip, attacking the Grand Patriarch and Matriarch of Clan Mason was a bad idea at the best of times, doing it inside Clan Mason space where one of them could simply push a button and bring the entire weight of the Clan down on the perpetrator like an angry sledgehammer was a whole new level of suicide not yet realised.
"Ready to go my heart?' Jack asked glancing at Tik over his shoulder.
Tik looked up from her readouts and brought her mandibles up into a smile nodding as she did, "Indeed my love, I must say the hive has gifted us a fine little ship here, I am most eager to try out both that bed and that bath, we should have done this sooner," she said and Jack chuckled and nodded.
"Yeah well holidays aren't exactly something we're awash within our roles now are we?" he said softly as he began to press some buttons on the console before him to power the ship up fully.
"Indeed and this is a shame, there are days where I yearn I could just be Tik eleth Mason huntress and wife rather than Tik eleth Mason Grand Matriarch," she said and Jack nodded.
"Yeah I agree, we need to start making some days that are just for us, we could go hunting, hell I hear there's some interesting stuff on the new colony if the reports coming in from the War Angel's hive are anything too go by," Jack said before pushing the comms button.
"This is the Grand Patriarch's Peace requesting launch clearance tower, flight plan has been posted and we're awaiting a clearance window, over," he said.
The response was instantaneous, "Roger that Grand Patriarch clearance is granted and vector has been transmitted, go with the Eternal Huntress Grand Patriarch, tower out," a female Yautja voice replied.
"Roger that tower thank you and see you soon Grand Patriarch's Peace out," Jack said.
"Mmmmm a good hunt sounds wonderful, to run freely through the trees with you at my side again sounds like paradise," Tik said sounding dreamy.
"Doesn't it just? Well don't you worry my love I'll make it happen," Jack said lifting the Runner off the ground with a loud hum from the powerful engines.
"I'll hold you to that," Tik said.
"You can hold whatever you like against me my love I'm definitely not going to complain," Jack said playfully over his shoulder as he fired the engines right up and they shot vertically up and out of the atmosphere bursting through the brilliant blue sky and into the sea of black beyond it like a missile.
High above the planet the sky was filled with ships of all shapes and sizes heading to and from the multiple docking ports situated around the orbital stations, the six massive Dreadnaughts were easily distinguishable as they sat connected to their special berths by a series of tether arms affixed to their massive hulls.
Right at the centre of them was the Grand Matriarch's Fury a very aptly named ship if there ever was one as Jack had often teased his wife that its planet killer railguns which were not only capable of blowing off part of a planet's crust but under sustained fire actually able to shatter it were only slightly less powerful than her with a headache.
From deep inside the ship there was a deep resonating growl as the hyperspace jump drive began to power up, now this thing didn't have the range that the massive drive fitted to something like a cruiser or the GMF had but it could get them where they needed to go with no problems.
"Prep for hyperspace breach," Jack said and he heard Tik fastening her belt as the growl grew louder until with a flash the drive tore open a hole in the fabric of space ahead of them and flung them into it.
Hyperspace jumping was quite a brutal affair when you thought about it as the drives not only tore open a hole in the fabric of space itself but it folded two points of space together to create a wormhole-like tunnel between the two points that the ship would pass through going far faster than the speed of light.
As they entered the brilliant swirling blue and white tunnel of pure energy Jack could feel his nervous system crackling and buzzing with the energy bleeding off the place, from behind him Jack felt tik's massive hands slide over his chest, "Set the autopilot, my love," she purred and he couldn't help but smile as he punched in the course commands to the console before Tik practically lifted him out of the chair and carried him towards the bedroom.
By the time they arrived in the right sector both of them had managed to use both the bed and the bath for more than their intended purposes leaving them both a mixture of exhausted and refreshed.
"We must go on more private flights my love, there are so many surfaces in here yet to be explored," Tik purred as they dropped back into their seats in the cockpit both now dressed in their armour.
Jack laughed and shook his head, you could always count on a healthy Yautja woman to be planning ahead when it came to loving her ooman, the comms suddenly bleeped and drew his attention to the little screen under the main controls where a little icon flashed to get his attention.
"This is the Grand Patriarch's Peace go ahead Unity, over," he said upon pushing the icon and recognizing the transponder code of the sender.
"Good to hear your voice Grand Patriarch we've been expecting you, you are cleared to land in bay three over," the Unity comms operator said with a distinctly Xeno voice.
"Roger that Unity on approach now, how are our guests?" Jack replied.
"Ummm restless to say the least, Unity over and out," the comms operator replied and Jack turned the Runner to align itself with the upper rear section of the large vaguely bullet-shaped cruiser ahead of them hanging in space awaiting their arrival.
Jack slid the Runner into bay three following the received guide path transmitted to them by the flight traffic controller, hovering across the open bay until he managed to place it down gently down on the landing pad designated for them.
"Time to go to work my love," he said rising out of his seat to find Tik already on her feet and checking her armour and weapons like she was about to rush into battle, the only thing missing was her hunting mask which hung off her belt.
"When isn't it my heart?" she replied with a grin before turning and heading for the rear of the ship with him in tow.
As the loading ramp lowered they found a team of Seekers and Hunters waiting for them both easily distinguishable by their armour, "Welcome aboard Grand Matriarch and Patriarch it's good to have you here with us," the leader of the Seekers said saluting the pair and Jack instantly recognised the Seeker as Richard Fish one of the Seekers of Balance.
"Good to be here how are our guests faring, managed to get anything more from them?" he asked as he and Tik took up formation with the two teams and began to walk through the ship towards the holding area where the two aliens were being held temporarily.
"Negative Grand Patriarch I thought it unwise to do an invasive dive against their will without you present to either authorize it or perform it, as they have not shown any form of hostility towards us or the Clan and technically they have completed the Path," Richard said brushing one of his curly brown bangs back over one of his ears as his green eyes met Jack's.
Jack nodded, "You did well Seeker and you acted within the guidelines as I set them out as I would expect, myself and the Grand Matriarch will take things from here, now let's see what our guests have to say for themselves shall we?" he said and with that, he pressed a panel to the right of the door they'd stopped next to and stepped into the living quarters as it opened with Tik right behind him.
The two Velons were sat at a table in the centre of the room and they jumped to their feet as the pair entered the smaller one-eyed them nervously while the larger one of the two met Jack's stare with as much fire as he knew he had in his own.
"I believe you wanted to talk to us, my name is Jack Mason and I am Grand Patriarch of Clan Mason and this next to me is my wife and Grand Matriarch of Clan Mason Tik eleth Mason we are..." he began but the smaller of the two yelped with a surprised squeal that sounded highly feminine.
"The Godslayer and Breaker of Chains!! Finally, we've found you!!" she exclaimed in perfect Yautja as her face lit up in what seemed to be a mixture of joy and relief, now this was going to be an interesting conversation.