Luna smiles widely as she dances onto a Skarli merchant ship. As the designation of the ship crosses her mind, she pauses with a pout while her tail skewers a Fire Lizard pirate that's coming up behind her. As it pulls itself off of her tail, which failed to puncture the rear of the armour its wearing, Luna turns around eager for the upcoming fight.
Everyone, I want a few live ones, as they look perfect for our hive.
As the lizard discards the gun it was using in favour of it's armoured claws, Luna smiles as she can see the wound in its stomach already starting to clot over. Dancing to one side, she swipes a claw out experimentally, pulling it back sharply when the humanoid lizard reacts far faster than she expected. As it steps forward with a lightning fast swipe, she elf pops behind it and swipes at the unarmoured tail.
Using some unknown sense, the humanoid lizard twitches it's tail to one side before bring it back to slam into Luna's trunk, trading a minor scratch for a solid hit on its foe. As Luna bounces off the wall and launches herself at her opponent, claws first, it easily leaps off the ground in a backwards somersault before grasping the ceiling with it's feet, its hand claws slashing out at her back, scoring deep gashes in her skin.
As the acid of her blood starts to eat into the armour covering it's claws, it recoils backwards to re-evaluate its opponent. At the same time Luna lands in a crouch and looks up at the lizard crouched on the ceiling.
"Ow, that hurt, good hit. I think it's my turn now."
As Luna shifts to her natural form, the lizard on the ceiling grumbles something incomprehensible that sounds like swearing. Now filling most of the corridor, Luna leaps towards the alien on the ceiling. In turn, it pushes off towards the discarded weapon, only to stumble in confusion as the weapon disappears from the ground in front of it. Turning the stumble into a forward roll, the lizard reaches to a concealed control panel underneath the back of its armour and activates a forcefield.
After several minutes of brutal fighting that would put Chinese martial arts films to shame, the fire lizard slams face first into the floor as its legs straighten and lock themselves together. As it tries to get up, it finds that it's stuck to the floor. Luna turns to an empty part of the corridor as she shifts back into her human form. Her phoenix blood already healing her wounds.
"Oh poo, why did you do that? I was having fun."
Arry carefully pulls back the hood of her cloak as she steps forward and taps Luna on the nose, "You forgot that we're here to rescue the owners of the ship."
As the two of them talk, the lizard on the floor starts to reach around behind it, to the concealed control panel. As it does, there's a slight pop and then it finds itself floating in the air, its arms being spread to either side. Through a doorway it can see a dozen xenomorph eggs sitting on small mounds of resin. It starts to struggle as it feels its hands being turned away from the wall behind it, and some how stuck in place.
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Narcissa giggles softly to herself as she holds a broken nailfile up to the light and stares through the long rent in the hardened metal. The laughter that's bubbling up the culmination of all of the body blows her world view has taken since that fateful, desperate, request on platform 9¾. Placing the ruined file on her vanity, she stands up and walks over to a window that overlooks the gardens from her dressing room. There she giggles once more as she watches her son practicing with his combistick against some of her hive mates. A son that only a year ago wouldn't have been seen dead doing something so 'barbaric'.
As she turns back to the vanity, she notices that her nailfile has been replaces with a sapphire nailfile of a similar design, "Thank you Tisky. It is most appreciated."
"You are most welcome Miss."
Narcissa smiles softly as she sits back and continues filing her nails while Tisky prepares her hair for another day in court as the regent of the Malfoy family.
Suddenly she snaps out, "Dobby."
Dobby appears in the dressing room, wearing an apron, with flour covered hands, "Yes Great Mistress?"
Narcissa smiles at the slightly wary expression she can see in the mirror, "Dobby, are you still visiting Hogwarts occasionally?"
Dobby's head and ears droop, "Yes great mistress."
"Excellent." Dobby looks somewhat surprised by this, "As regent of house Malfoy I give you permission to join a hive if you wish. You may also start a family if that is your desire. I'm sure that there are many wonderful elves that have caught your eye."
Dobby straightens up in alarm as his ears lay back against his head, his eyes darting to Tisky and around the room, "Are you sure Mistress, I do not wish to neglect my duties."
Narcissa smiles as she turns her head to face Dobby, "Of course I am, that's why I checked to see if you still had time to visit Hogwarts. That is all, and I hope you enjoy your free time."
Dobby disappears from the room with a loud pop, and a shower of flour. Meanwhile Tisky continues to brush Narcissa's hair in preparation for an elaborate braid.
Thank you Mistress.
You are most welcome Tisky, but again call me Narcissa, as we're both family now.
That would be inappropriate while I am your chambermaid mistress.
Then maybe I should take you to Madam Primpennlies and have you fitted for court robes. Then you'd be my companion.
You wouldn't dare, Tisky is a good house elf, and house elfies should be unseen or heard.
And family should be treated with grace, understanding, acceptance, and caution. Look where that got me in the past. Now we have our Queen and her praetorian, and all others are equal, that includes you.
Tisky withdraws from the conversation, leaving Narcissa to continue reflecting on the memories of her new family that have punished her world view so badly over these last weeks. Not that it has been all one way, her own childhood and youth as a Black have been plumbed repeatedly, especially her lessons on occlumency and Legimancy at the knee, and occasionally the wand, of her father. Idly she looks at her finger nails as she comes across memories of times where the hives ancestors have had humanoid members. Maybe she could commission some finger jewellery to excuse having longer, and sharper, nails.
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Somewhat later, Narcissa sits in the Black seat, that the Malfoy's have held since 1986 when Arcturus died. In the centre of the court sits a Mundungus Fletcher, a common thief and conman, all around her are her fellow members arguing about the appropriate punishment for the thief. With a sigh, she glances over at Amelia in commiseration, as the woman, by custom, cannot interfere with the sentencing once someone has been found guilty.
Smoothly, she rises and pulls upon all of her training to glide gracefully down the stairs to the floor, rather than stalking or strutting as though everyone else is prey or beneath her. Once she reaches the speakers podium it takes a few minutes for the chief warlock to bring the house to order.
"Regent Malfoy, what is it you have to say on behalf of the Black family?"
Narcissa smiles at the old wizard before looking around the benches, first at the permanent seats, and then at the elected seats. "Lords and Ladies, Wizards and Witches. We have here an unrepentant thief, one that we have already found guilty on this, and other prior occasions. Before I approached the podium I heard arguments about whether we should send him to Azkaban or demand weregild from him. According to our own laws, we cannot hold any crime for which he has already paid weregild against him if he is sentenced again. Yet, a single count of petty thievery is not a sufficient crime to warrant feeding our citizens to the dementors in order to appease them." Narcissa pauses to the calls of 'hear hear' from around the court, "What I propose instead, is that Mr Fletcher is sentenced to three days in the Auror cells and a deferred weregild of double the value of his theft. You will note…"
Narcissa pauses at the sounds of angry shouting, attempting to restart a few times, "You will note that this is less than we would normally demand. This is because I suggest deferring the expunction of his crime for a year and a day. If, during this period he appears before this court again, our good-will will be overturned, and we will have cause to send him to the shivering isle for a period of 10 days. As you all know, a stay in Azkaban is permanently recorded in the Auror's record.
"As this is a new punishment, it will need to be debated and voted on during a regular afternoon session. As the weekend starts tomorrow, I propose that we provisionally assign this punishment on the understanding that if the proposal fails during Monday's afternoon session, Mr Fletcher will be fined the appropriate weregild, and the crime expunged."
It takes a few minutes, while the court is discussing this new option, for Mundungus to think through this proposal, and the fact he gets caught two or three times a year, before he blurts out, "'Ere, I demand my right to pay weregild!"
At that exclamation, the whole court goes silent as everyone looks down at the defendant. As the silence draws on, the chief warlock bangs his gavel, "Show of wands, green for the Black's proposal, red to reject it."
Mundungus swallows hard as he sees the sea of green lights from the elected side of the court. Of the permanent seats, only those in the light faction raise their own wands as green. This, however, is enough to sway the vote to the proposal to acceptance.
With a smile, Narcissa curtseys to the court, "Thank you for your faith in this proposal, I will ensure that the draft for this punishment is ready for this afternoon, along with the proposed guidelines for use."
As she walks back to her seat the chief warlock calls out, "Mundungus Fletcher, you have been sentenced to three days detention in Auror cells, and 12g9s1k in weregild deferred for a year and a day. If the motion fails, you will pay the full 31g5s17k weregild for your crime, and it will be expunged immediately."
Once the final parts of the sentencing are dealt with, Narcissa discretely leaves for the Black office in the Wizengamot in order to start writing up the draft of the new punishment, and rational behind not taking the Ministry's cut in lieu of deferring the fine for a year and a day. In the guidelines she includes instructions for the lower courts, including the recommendation that it is only used for defendants of low moral character. Something that the traditional block should like, and will probably end up written into the main article this afternoon.
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High above the earth, on the dark side of the moon, an Arbiter walks out of the sensor suite and kneels down with the hunt mistress and other senior hunters, including one spear master. Bowing his head for a moment as he considers what he's just seen, he looks up again, "You called me in to answer a dispute, and I have now seen the evidence. Hunt mistress, I find that your honour is intact. You saw the build up and called a grand hunt. Spear master, senior hunters, your honour is also intact, as this is a new strain of R'ka. Henceforth, these will be known as Halkrath kiande amedha, Red Blade clan will gain great honour when I send details to the homeworld once I leave."
Around the room all the hunters bow in acceptance of the judgement, once they rise the hunt mistress lays her weapon in front of her, "Red Blade clan calls off the grand hunt, and opens up the planet to its allies for the remainder of their stewardship. Red Blade clan also requests that all hunters seek signs of these new kiande amedha, and report their location. If they prove to be worthy prey we will seek to transplant them to other reserves."