"This planet is by far the largest we have ever been to, and still have life on it," said Olivia, looking over the planet before them.
"I'm finding some pretty incredible lifeforms down below," said Granny, typing in a couple things, and the forward screen lit up, showing what looked like a normal village of pre-space age aliens.
"What's so incredible about them?" asked Kitteral, squinting at the screen in confusion.
"The tiny figures that kind of look like bugs along the edges of the walls? Those are the Uz'En," said Granny.
They zoomed in, and sure enough, a group of people were scrambling along the walls like rats, pausing to hide from the giants before scrambling to a crack in the wall.
"How?" asked Olivia, scratching her head.
"It doesn't matter," said Dustin, changing the screen over to the planet again. "The planet has a unique atmosphere, that erodes metals. I could try and redesign the nanobots to prevent their damage, but that's a lot of effort. I've scanned the planet, and there's only the one group of Uz'En on the whole planet. There looks to be a crash site, not far from the village, where the ship they were on must have landed."
"If we could just fly down there, we could grab them and get back up in one go," said Granny. "Assuming we could protect the ship from the atmosphere?"
"The ship can be protected by using its shields, but the frequency needed will suck a lot of juice from the reserves, so I think I'll go down to round everyone up, while you guys bring the ship in fast to load and leave as quickly as possible."
"It's getting to be dark, so the giants might settle down for the night. If we can go in and get out before dawn, we shouldn't have to deal with them," said Kitteral.
Olivia sighed. "You are always going alone. I want to come with you. I don't want to have to sit up here waiting for you to get back. What if you have to fight some giant rat or something? Giant cockroaches are something we've already had to fight before."
"Alright, let's go," he said, standing up and heading for the air lock.
Olivia hesitated in surprise before jumping up in delight and darting after him.
"Be careful you two!" called Granny.
"They'll be fine. Let them have some fun together," said Kitteral with a yawn.
"But the shields haven't been calibrated!" she complained, turning back to her console.
"Then calibrate them. I'm taking a nap."
"You're really lazy, you know that?"
"Darling, I haven't changed much from the first time you met me," he said with a laugh.
"You used to care more," she said softly, not looking at him.
Kitteral paused at the door. "My wife died. I find it difficult to care about much without her. I can't seem to allow myself to die knowing I have a son still alive, but there are moments…"
"It's been two hundred years without your wife, and you didn't know your son was still alive, so that's a pretty sorry excuse."
"Oh, I knew. I could feel him. The same way you know that your mom is still alive, there's a feeling of knowing."
"I know my mom is alive because I have a damn belly crystal that glows when she wants me to do a chore. You don't have that excuse."
Kitteral looked at the floor, refusing to turn and look at her. "Did you know that there are certain abilities that some of us develop? I think Dustin mentioned the chrono skimming?"
"I recall him mentioning it, but what of it?"
"I can feel the life force of every Uz'En that's alive. I learned after my wife died, that I could turn that feeling off. However, every since I've rejoined society, so to speak, the only way to turn it off, is by sleeping more often. I can only handle feeling their deaths so much, before I…" Shaking his head, he left the room, and Granny let him go.
The man still blamed himself for her death so long ago, but Granny had no idea he could physically feel the deaths of his people. Sometimes being of the royal line sucked.
XxxxX
Dustin laughed as Olivia and he swept past each other, in an aerial dance. They were racing towards the village, keeping an eye out for other flying creatures, but really just having fun. He couldn't remember the last time he had this much fun with her. They had either been children, unaware of the struggles of life, or fighting for their lives to survive. Even when they had Kit, and things were calm before she left, he had thrown himself into his role as king. They hadn't had any time to play like this.
Grinning as he darted through the branches of an enormous tree, he settled on a lower branch to look over the area ahead of them. Olivia settled next to him.
The village below was quiet and dark. The huts were built with wood from the trees. Shifting his weight, he spied some of the survivors in the garden. With a nod from Olivia, they dived down together, landing far enough away to change before approaching them.
"Who's there?" came a soft call, as they got closer.
"We're rescuers. I'm Dustin, and this is Olivia. We came to get you guys off this planet."
"Slavers!" the guy cried and they all scattered.
"What was that all about?" asked Olivia.
Dustin shrugged and they looked around as the garden settled back into silence. They couldn't see any predators or giants, so what was wrong with them? There weren't any slavers around.
Making their way over to where they had been, they were surprised to see that they had abandoned most of their tools they were using to harvest some of the large plants.
"Could they have been scared of us?" asked Olivia.
"Maybe? There wasn't much of the ship left for me to scan. Maybe it was a slave ship?"
"That would explain why they ran. They thought we were slavers to take them back into custody."
"Let's go find them and explain the truth," said Dustin, grabbing some of the food they had left and following the tracks they had left in the soft dirt. This was a royal pain in the ass.