Hytar's Ship

First topic message reminder :

Vicky was busy setting up her quarters, after some negotiations and the like she had join Hytar group for a while. Busily she set up her gaming system, though knew since the new upgrade she wouldn't be playing all night. While many races found sleep annoying she found it delightful being able to do it now.

"He used his magic of creation to bring joy to the people," Tala said proudly. She looked at Shane, "His species of the star dragons, they are most excellent creators." Was that a secret? She didn't think so.

Shane dipped his head when Tala revealed what he was to them and hoped that wouldn't turn out to be a bad thing.

Toby blinked, nope, she had no idea what that meant.

Eleven shrugged. "A water park huh? wow." they didn't sound impressed.

"Star dragons can create the stars and planets themselves," Tala said proudly. "They are the species we are voyaging to rescue."

"You can make stars? Isn't that just asking for a catastrophic problems?" Eleven asked.

"If you can't see the space between as we do, yes." Shane said then shook his head "Even for us it's something that needs some learning to master before you just do it." He looked down, frowning a little "Space is not just emptiness, there's a flow to it, a guiding. We can see where a planet could go and the path it could be set on if made. We can see how many moons can stay stable with one body, where a sun can go to provide heat and light without causing destruction. We don't see the darkness that other peoples see, we see light."

"But aren't there like, gravitational things to consider?" Eleven asked. "Kinda like, plonking a stone in a river right?"

"Why do you make planets" Toby asked.

Shane blinked and looked to the two again "Yes, we can see where the planet would go, just as we can see where it would be detrimental to a system to put one." He said then looked to Toby "I can, but I have only made tiny stars to use as defense. I don't know why we can, it's just a part of who we are."

"That's weird." Toby remarked.

Eleven snickered.

Shane shrugged a little then smiled "Weird or not, it's just part of my people."

"I must go work out now," Tala said suddenly. "I have not done such in days." She looked to the others, "You are companions now. This is most satisfactory."

Toby looked at Tala dubiously.

Eleven looked bemused.

"Have fun" Shane said to Tala, shaking his head a little.

Tala wandered off, trusting that there'd probably be a sign or something to tell her where this rec room was. She could probably read it if she tried hard.
If it was rude to ditch her friends so suddenly, she didn't worry about it. She was odd that way.

---timeskip---

The days passed uneventfully for everyone, thankfully.
Lope wasn't as animated at meal times and Vicky's absence caused a bit of gossip among the rest of the crew, but otherwise it was pretty quiet.

As they approached the Keep Hytar gathered the crew to discuss tactics.

Tala enjoyed being aboard this ship, it was reasonably clean, and not too cramped. She tried to be friendly to everyone in the crew, since these guys were going to be vital to the mission. Besides, she liked some of them.
She headed to the meeting when summoned. She was looking forward to discussing tactics, she missed doing that. It had been her favorite part of the war, other than training and bossing people around.

Shane tried to help out where he could during the trip, just to not get bored. He came to the meeting when they were called though, ready to listen to the plans.

Hytar waited till everyone gathered, even Lope joined them, having found somewhere to put the ship into auto pilot.

Once everyone was seated Hytar began his lecture. Their mission, the priority of getting the slaves onto the ship, everything Rigel had insisted upon.

The fragment of Swarm who had remained with them carefully explained the layout of the keep.

Shane listened and nodded then pulled the dagger out of pocket space "If you kill the keeper you have to use this on him or he will just regenerate. As far as we know, he is the last free Family keeper at this time. Hopefully he will have just run away by now."

"That, or Shane can throw him in a star. That works as well," Tala said brightly. She nodded at Swarm's explanation of the hold. "Last time, we were able to just stay outside, and take Starr back before she was brought into the building. We won't have such luxury this time. Or goal will of course be to seize the star dragons as quickly as possible and get away, but we can expect considerable fighting to occur."

Hytar eyed the dagger. "Isss that a Dakkon dagger?" He asked, doing a remarkable job of hiding the awe in his voice.

Shane nodded and looked at the dagger before putting it down on the table "It is." He confirmed then turned it to show the jewel on the handle "With some modifications."

"And it worksss?" Hytar asked. "Curioussss." He made a mental note of this.
He nodded and returned to the briefing. "We ssshall sssplit into two groupsss, ssstorming their main entrance issss unlikely to go well sssso I ssssuggessst a distraction. Mr Brightssstar, do you think you can arrange that?" He looked to Lope.

Lope nodded glumly. "Yes boss..." his heart didn't sound in it.

Hytar sighed. "Misss Al Nadir, I exssspect you to take our their sssecurity sssytemssss."

the grumpy girl who'd shown Tala and Shane their rooms nodded. "You got it."

Hytar nodded. "The ressst, two groupsss, keep in radio contact, take out any guardssss you find. Remember, our priority isss getting thosssse dragonssss back to the sssship."

"The modifications are what keep the user from being killed by the magic the dagger absorbs," Tala said brightly. "It is a most satisfactory solution." She nodded at Hytar's orders, "How shall the groups be divided? We will wish to have a range of stills and abilities in each."

Hytar nodded. "You and your companion ssstick together, you are usssed to working together. Eleven, go with them." He looked around and assigned everyone to groups based on their abilities so they ended up with two balanced groups with a couple of front line fighters, a ranged attacker, magic and someone who was good at commanding a group. He recognised Tala's leadership skills and assigned her leader of her group, despite protests from a few of his own crew. She was a soldier and she had a vested interest in getting this right, that meant she'd do her best not to screw up.

Shane nodded and put the dagger away, back into hiding. He was ready to go

"Excellent," Tala said. She was happy to get to boss people around some more, and to carry out this mission. "We will attempt to take the guise of slavers, to obtain landing permission, I should think?"