to pass the time as they waited for Alice to arrive, Almony was asking Alaine what had changed, she wanted to know how her brethren had been these 500-plus years she had sleeping
and Alaine was more than happy to answer, but of course, she had a hidden agenda, if she could make her society known to the federation, maybe she could strike a deal for protection like the Herion, they were in the Sun Federation's backyard after all, among all the powerful civilization around they were the closest
Alaine was talking "We are now a single society all citizens of Skuria II, even those who chose to continue to live in space, changed from being tribes to crews who abide by the laws and regulations we all voted for, they usually gather what we need by traveling and bartering in this eye of the forest galaxy and come back home to refuel, relax and exchange their products, like traveling merchants and explorers, while those that were tired of living on recycled air and artificial gravity, stay here doing anything from farming to scientific research, what we are the proudest about is the return of the art's and entertainment, that we had abandoned being refuges in space"
Almony asked "what kind?"
Alaine continued "well there's a new thriving community of musicians and actors, we are also trying to unearth our past buried in the archives of the old surviving ships, after we joined the satellite network of the Herions some of our young have started developing new videogames with varying degree of success, basically we are going back to the path of civilization instead of living day by day, one thing we promised to each other, we will never be space refugee and resort to dubious practices, on the new Skuria our women go out finding a mate instead of kidnapping one"
Almony said "that's nice, I never liked that, I never got to meet my dad after she used him mom just threw him out of an airlock"
Vincent said in a low voice "he, it was a garian good riddance"
Almony and Daniel turned around to look at him and Vincent coughed and said "well it must have been hard for you?" sounding more like a question than anything else
at this point, Daniel thought of something and ordered Tickles to use the geneticist toybox to reanalyze Almony genetic makeup with the sample he took when they first extracted her out of stasis, he wanted to answer a long-lasting question regarding who Almony was
in the meantime Almony answered Vincent "not really, it was normal for us, it's just that I think they could have spared the killing you know, just leave them at the nearest spaceport"
Alaine answered "that's right not just you but many others before thought the exact same thing, those that still wish to keep the traditional family we are used to are welcome to buy the necessary genetic material without the need for unnecessary bloodshed, of course, we are still young as a civilization, kidnapping aside there are many more details to smooth out, but as I said before we are finally back to the path of civilization some of our crew even go on exploration mission now"
Vincent said "well there's little to explore in that galaxy, it's already kind of crowded, in fact, this entire sector of the universe it's crowded, there are 5 tier 3 Civilizations and 2 overpowered overlords, each separated by a galaxy at most, or under the attack of unreasonable enemies like the hive creatures, not to count that the oldest galaxies full of dying stars and black holes are not that far away and form an insurmountable wall to the oldest depths of the universe"
Daniel asked "2 overpowered overlords?"
Vincent said "yeah it's not really a secret there's empress chaos whom you already heard about, and the emperor of death but he's not our problem, we share a border just with empress chaos, and he's never been much of a conqueror anyway if you don't bother him he won't bother you, he enjoys isolation, I really thought you would have asked about the insurmountable wall"
Daniel laughed and said "are you kidding? of course, I studied the theory of universal expansion in school, the closest you go to the center of the universe the older and more broken space is, impossible to navigate or make sense of, whoever tried never came back and their life totems went out without any exception"
Vincent laughed and said "sometimes I forget about that brain of yours, of course, it's still just a theory we would have to traverse that insurmountable wall and find the center to get any definitive answers" patting Daniel's head
Daniel smiled and said "in any case, a lot changed, when we found Almony we didn't even know what she was, it took a while to identify her and cure the poison, and all I managed to find out about the skurians was that they were pirates"
at this moment an old woman arrived and said "I will never be able to thank you all enough to have taken the time and saved my little girl"
Almony exclaimed "mom, I missed you"
Alice smiled and said "I missed you too, a lot, I should have kept the stasis chamber on my ship, spies or no spies, it was all my fault"
Almony replied with some tears in her eyes "it's ok mom, it seemed to have worked out somehow"
Alice said "no it's not ok, I thought that we had captured the attention of all the enemy ships, but when the cruiser never reached the meetup point, I knew something was wrong, and when I went back there was only debris, where did you end up?"
Almony responded "somewhere in hive territory, in a dead section of space"
Alice said " you'll need to be more specific, the hive territory expands in every direction, except for the frontier of powerful civilization, in any case, their territory expanded a lot in the last 545 years
Vincent at this point said "the coordinates are 321.5456, 543.7896, unnamed planet, of the contended Tryuren galaxy, but it's no longer important there was a conflict with the hive when we went to retrieve her and the planet exploded, there's nothing left there"
Alice looked at a screen for a while then said "that's really really far away from the last known position, our ships are not even capable today to travel such a distance, it must have taken years to reach there, but the debris, this doesn't make sense"
at this point, Daniel received the data from Tickles's analysis of Almony's genetic makeup, e looked at vincent and hinted at him to go out for a moment
Vincent said "I'll leave you girls talking, I need to answer a call, Daniel let's give them some privacy"
Daniel nodded and they went out
they entered Vincent's office and he immediately asked "why did you want to talk privately?"
Daniel said "when we opened the jar, grandma had already found the cure so I never analyzed the sample extracted, as we didn't need to find a cure, but then today something hit me, her father was garian, curiosity had the best of me and I had Tickles analyze the sample, if my xenobiology lessons aren't wrong the garian are nobler the more Silverium is present in their bloodstream right?"
Vincent said "that's right they are divided in noble caste not by family but by the amount of silverium in their bloodstream, you aren't trying to say"
Daniel answered "that's right, her values are off the chart, if she was completely garian she would e a princess but"
Vincent brought a hand to his forehead and said "Garians consider hybrids abominations, normally they wouldn't bother hunting a nobody but if she had a high silverium value they wouldn't allow her to stay alive, her father was probably someone of high rank"
Daniel said "I'm pretty sure the garians are listening in their conversation right now, if we let her leave, shell never make it to Skuria II alive, we should have the mother come to take her back, this would allow her to reach federation space alive, and at the very least they can meet, but they won't be able to leave, the moment they're out of our space the Garians will attack with no mercy"
Vincent asked "why do you care so much if they meet?" usually Daniel wouldn't be this caring
Daniel responded "I just thought that if I was in the same situation I would like to see you guys"
Vincent patted his head and said "then let's find a way to make Alice personally come to fetch Almony"
as they walked back in the living room they saw Almony talking with Alaine
Almony saw them come in and said "my mother left she said that she's coming to pick me up, she should be here in a little more than a month"
Vincent looked at Daniel and then said "that's perfect, I'll warn the frontier guards so that she can have a smooth journey here"
Alaine looked at Vincent that was leaving and said "sir, can I ask you something?"
Vincent turned around and replied "sure"
Alaine took a deep breath and said "I talked with my counselors, and we would like to officially request the Sun federation protection, I know we are still a long way from entering your radar, but I think we have something to offer, our technology may be primitive in your eyes but the potential of it especially the potential to be used together with cultivation formations it's very high, so we may be of use in the future"
Daniel said "that's true, even if it's not true life, their tech has high compatibility not only with formations but also with puppetry and alchemy, at least for the little I know"
Vincent said "alright, I will put up your official request and discuss it with the others, in the meantime, you should put together a presentation and send it to Alice before she's out of your communication range, so she can deliver it here without risking these piping toms from getting their hands on it "
Alaine replied "that won't be a problem I will give her also a hard drive containing the principles behind our technology for the young master, thank you, sir"
Vincent replied "don't worry about it, I got a good feeling about this"
Vincent left to take care of these few things and after Almony talked a little more with Alaine they closed communication, while Daniel had long gone back to his lab, back to concentrate on batteries