"So, what have you figured?" I lifted my arms above my head and stretched, my back popping in several spots. I had just finished taking everyone up in my space ship and the scientists were growing more and more excited each trip we returned from.
"There is so much data to work through!" Loril-ee's wings fluttered rapidly in excitement. "This is a massive scientific breakthrough! We will be studying it for centuries!" She was nearly vibrating and I twisted to the side with a slight groan as I stretched out the cramping muscles. My body was not happy that I had spent the last five hours in my ship and I made a mental note to limit my travelling for a while. At least until my body got a good amount of rest.
"You do not understand how important this data is for the Galactic Union. You have propelled us into an entirely new age of technology!" Hallee-tie's words were nearly breathless as she looked at me from the small computer set up they had on the landing pad and I raised an eyebrow before standing up straight.
"Which is awesome and all but what have you learned so far?" I wanted to know just what parameters my engines were running at. It was cool that they wanted to discuss future scientific breakthroughs using my engines but I kinda wanted to know what their readings said about
"The thrust of that singular engine is astronomical." Bof'jag's words were nearly a boom. "That amount of thrust could easily move one of our largest freighter's with thrust to spare and your ship has six." The Grog sounded overly excited and I could only imagine why. That much power, in a singular, smaller ship was something to get excited about, especially for a Grog. They seemed to revel in all things powerful and dangerous.
"So my ship is overpowered?" It sounded like that's what they were saying. We had thrown six engines into my ship to just make sure, I had three prior to the newest design. It was just a little bit funny that we might have gone a little overkill with it. To be fair that was pretty standard of humans, go big or go home and all that.
"Very much." Duntella said it slowly and I looked at the j'ygnt scientist. She was standing next to Loril-ee near the small set up they had made. "For a ship your size, you could do with eighth the amount of thrust and still maintain the current speed. As it was, when you pushed the ship to go faster, there was a concerning rattle. It just cannot physically handle the thrust from all six engines as you were only running off one." The explanation made me gave a slow nod. That made sense and I had noticed the rattle. I knew that even before I made it to this planet. I figured I didn't need to go that fast and had never actually
"Six of those engines could move a planet from it's orbit!" Bof'jag blurted it out, his big and bulky form looking far too pleased with the idea and it made me fight off my own smile.
"Let us not exaggerate, Bof'jag." Il'tig clicked his mandibles together and I glanced over at the k'gtar scientist. Both him and At'kat'vo had kind of gone a bit grey when we came back and the other scientists explained the rattle. Both had urged me not to test the speed anymore than I needed to and Mare-aidee has whispered at me that I needed to listen otherwise both of them would moult from the stress and worry. I had hastily agreed and their chitin had once again returned back to their previous dark state.
"A small moon then." Bof'jag nearly muttered it out, his arms crossing his chest almost petulantly. The sight of such a large and relatively intimidating alien doing that made me want to laugh but I forced it down.
"Let us not discuss the ability to move small celestial bodies just yet. We have a lot of data to run through but this is absolutely extraordinary." Kai-el-tee's wings fluttered with his excitement as he moved over to Loril-ee. "The implications of this data are so far reaching we cannot even begin to think about how it will change the technological landscape of the entire Galactic Union." His wings fluttered so hard I was surprised he hadn't started to float. Then again I could see Loril-ee's fluttering just as much.
"Can you tell me about how fast we were moving?" I glanced over all of the scientists and Duntella made a gravelly sound in the back of her throat that I was learning was similar to a hum.
"At your top speed, the one that caused the rattle, you are travelling, based on our calculations, nearly two thousand, five hundred times the speed of light." The words came from her and I blinked rapidly, my hands flexing slightly as I tilted my head.
"I what now?" I could have sworn she had said something that seemed almost impossible.
"Rough calculations only at this point, but you are travelling close to two thousand, five hundred times the speed of light. At that speed, your shielding is not holding up and it translates into that dangerous rattle we observed. Any faster and you would rip your ship apart." Her words were said slow and carefully so I knew she meant them, it was just fucking impossible.
"How the hell am I travelling that fast?" My voice pitched upwards slightly but I couldn't help it. Over two thousand times the speed of light? I should have been ripped apart at that speed. There was knowing you moved fast and then realizing how fast. It seemed dangerous given the numbers we were throwing out.
"We are uncertain but what we saw was the more you suppressed the one side of the polarity of the magnet, the faster you went. The correlation is clear. Monopole magnets, theoretically could result in infinite speed." Hallee-tie said it excitedly and I blinked rapidly as I turned to look at her.
"Infinite speed?" I nearly dragged out the words and she nodded, her ilithari swaying around her head.
"Instant teleportation. From one edge of the galaxy to the next in the blink of an eye. The implications of this are far reaching, we could potentially create teleportation from anywhere in the galaxy." She fairly wiggled as she said it, even her ilithari moving a bit more rapidly and I blinked again and then again and then again. This was... it was a lot to take in.
"But wouldn't that bend space and time?" I felt a little mind blown at the moment and I knew the question came out a little faint but I couldn't help it. Moving that fast had to break some sort of space time continuum, or something. It had to break physics.
"You already do so in your ship." Il'tig's words made my start blinking all over again. I really needed to stop with that but I couldn't help it. It was like the indication for my brain buffering.
"I do what now?" I bent space and time in my ship? How the hell did that work?
"You are travelling so fast, you are moving through space and time, not with it. As a result I can guarantee the time slippage would be minimal for you." His explanation made minimal sense and I crossed my arms over my chest, frowning in confusion.
"Time slippage?" The term was familiar and I could guarantee I had heard it before but at the moment I didn't have the mental capacity to even think about what it meant.
"Yes, the time between you standing here and travelling here, versus the time back on your planet being different." Loril-ee explained it before looking at me. "We have to work heavily around time slippage when we travel between planets. Everything has to be planned out and we have reduced it to, on average, about a month time slippage per year of travel. For those of us on the ground, for a ship to reach the furthest planet in the Galactic Union, it takes six years. But for the people on board, it will take about five and a half years." I slowly nodded, processing the information slowly in my head. That made sense and the more I thought about it the more I realized I had heard about it.
"Okay. The scientists back home mentioned that. Told me to keep track of how long I had been gone for because they wanted to compare when I got back." It had been in the quick training they had given me for my flight away. They wanted me to keep extensive logs about what I did and everything that happened while I was out in the universe. "So you are saying I could have been completely unaffected by time slippage?" I looked over the scientists and Il'tig clicked his mandibles together.
"Precisely." He waved his creepy long fingers and I nodded slowly.
"You are moving so fast; you have managed to move virtually untouched by time and the gravity that pulls it. If we were to design a ship to go even faster, you could move, in a theoretical sense, almost instantly from one place to the next." Hallee-tie's voice was pitched upwards in excitement and I gave a slow nod at that.
"Well that's pretty cool." It honestly was. I didn't realize that my ship was already bending gravity and time around it. That was pretty cool. It made me want to know what time variance there was from what I knew and what there was on earth. I wanted to know how much time I had lost.
"It is very interesting and it has massive implications within our transportation sector. However, we implore you to not travel at those speeds. Your ship cannot take that type of force." Il'tig said it quickly, clicking in his throat with nervousness as his chitin started to dull.
"The rattle." I nodded slowly at that and he tilted his head, clicking his mandibles together.
"The rattle." He tilted his head the other way, his big multifaceted eyes glinting under the sun. "If you would give us leave to look at your shielding and your hull. Perhaps we could minimize it but with our tech capabilities, it might be a bit before we could create a ship that could handle moving at those speeds."
At the words I shrugged, "Oh if you guys wanna play around with it to make it a bit more structurally sound, by all means, go ahead." I didn't mind them crawling around my ship. They had more advanced technology, if anyone could make it more sound for space flight, they could. I wasn't opposed to upgrades by any means.
"We might have to take it apart. You would be stuck here for a while." Kai-el-tee said it slowly and I shrugged again.
"And?" I gestured to them all and all eyes were on me, making me slightly uncomfortable.
"You would be unable to go back to your planet until we finished the study of your ship." Hallee-tie said each word slowly, as if she was unsure if I actually understood what they were implying. I knew full well what they were talking about.
"Listen, I just flew for five hours and my body is hating me right now. A long flight back home is the last thing I want to do right now and would be hell on me physically." It would be and I did need a break. Plus I still wanted to explore and see everything that I could. I wanted to explore the new cultures and learn all I could about them. I wasn't going to spend a week and go home. I wanted to do everything I could.
"You wish to... stay?" Mare-aidee asked it slowly and I nodded quickly. Of course I did. I wanted to stay and learn all I could, let them look at my ship, let them do upgrades, that sort of thing.
"For as long as you'll have me. I need a break and while the scientific community back home might be a little leery of me being gone for so long, I really do need a break." I did. I was honestly a little glad that I had stumbled across Torin when I had. I had been getting a little cabin fever in my ship. I was okay but humans did need some interaction, even us introverts.
"You will stay?" Dunnerton shifted slowly on his feet and I turned to look at him.
"As long as you guys don't mind." If they were happy to have my stay for a few months, I was down for it. I didn't want to overstay my welcome by any means but I would love to stay and take more time to learn all I could. I wanted to bring back information about the cultures and everything about them so I could share it. I knew there would be hold outs on earth about aliens but I wanted to reassure everyone that they were friendly, that they wanted to be friends. That meant getting to know them more, learning their histories, all of it.
"Mind? We would love to have you stay!" Liress nearly barked it out and I grinned at her in excitement. I really did want to stay, at least for a few months.
"This would give us a lot of time to coordinate with the Supreme Council to write up a revised Accord agreement for your planet." Hint said it quickly and nudged Liress slightly and she nodded as well.
"Also give us a lot of time to study the capabilities of the engine and this new field of study." Loril-ee's wings fluttered with excitement as she grinned, showing off her rather sharp teeth.
"Which will help with the Accords." At'kat'vo clicked his agreement and I beamed at all of them. I was super excited but I paused quickly.
"I mean it's up to Mare-aidee. She's the one who had to let me crash at her place." I looked at her, nearly clasping my hands in front of me, ready to beg and Gal'rug grunted, narrowing his eyes at the ilthi.
"If you say no, I will hurt you." He grunted it out and Mare-aidee snapped her head to look at him with a rather outraged gasp.
"Gal'rug!" Her voice was sharp before she patted her ilithari. "As if I would say no! You know me better than that." She scowled at him, her silver glowing eyes narrowing at him.
"Sorry." He did look a bit abashed but I appreciated him coming to my defense to get me to stay.
"Sorry is right. Now I do not mind, however if you do wish to stay for longer, we can get you your own place. It is no worries for us and setting up your own space is very easy." Mare-aidee gave a rather prim nod and then gave me a rather serene smile as she smoothed her hands down her robes.
"She would have to stay within the delegation block." At'kat'vo clicked almost quickly, a worried sound and when I looked at him, his creepy long fingers waved nervously.
"Yes, At'kat'vo, she would." Mare-aidee gave a small hum of agreement.
"Could we figure out how to write her into the Council?" Hint gave a rather thoughtful sound that came out almost like a growl and had that prey instinct inside me go on alert. It would definitely take time getting used to those vocalizations but I knew I would get there. A few months with them and they would even begin to look normal.
"We need to discuss with the Supreme Council what her place might be." Dunnerton's gravelly voice was thoughtful and I nodded. Whatever we needed to do, I was more than willing to do so.
"Should we let them know of what we currently know and the plan for her to stay longer?" Mare-aidee asked it to the others and I watched as there was nodding through them all. With the exception of the scientists who were having their own conversation around the terminals.
"I am not joining. I wish to remain and study this more." Loril-ee called it out over her shoulder and Mare-aidee frowned slightly.
"I do so wish to pull more data from her storage banks and try to enter what is factual about her planet from what type of fiction her species has." She gave a wistful sigh at that and I wanted to tell her we could wait on the technical stuff for a bit if she really wanted to go through the data with me.
"I wish to take her to the arena." Gal'rug sounded excited and when I looked over he had bared his tusks and looked like he was practically vibrating with excitement.
"Gal'rug, I implore you, no, we implore you to not do that." Liress's voice was even and imploring and Gal'rug almost deflated.
"Hey, we will go to the arena eventually." I gave him a reassuring smile but he still looked a bit deflated and sulky at Liress's words. I could understand she was probably trying not to scare me off but at the same time. I was down to try something at least once.
"We need to take our data and equipment to the lab. We have much to work through." Hallee-tie started picking up some of the equipment and Loril-ee nodded.
"I agree. We have enough data to start making a report. I think we could probably get Int'gaf hanger cleared out to bring the ship in to study it." She gave me a small smile and I nodded.
"By all means, go ahead. Just let me know when you want to move it and where you want me to take it and I'll do it." I stuck my hands in my pockets and smiled.
I couldn't wait to get to learn all I could about the cultures that I was now aware of.