Scott was becoming used to waking up unsure of his surroundings. His cell was small and dark, barely big enough to hold him and another. Felarnians lived, and trained in the open air of Felarnia's wilds. To be confined was torture. A tattered, emblemless home mound sat in the corner, and across from it was a hole for a prisoner's toilet. The lighting was dim, and the air was stale. Scott had been in worse pits before, but that did nothing to alleviate the pain in is chest.
"Good, you're not dead," Ivory's voice said from across the hall. Her cell looked spacious in comparison. "I had to give you CPR twice."
"Twice?" He touched his chest. The dull pain was organ-deep, and not going away. "I think my nano is still damaged."
"Yeah, you're definitely not at a hundred percent."
Scott growled. He wasn't angry at Ivory, merely the situation. Imprisoned on a backwater world ruled by heretics. Grabbing the bars of his mundane prison, he pulled. Muscles strained until they reached their natural limit, then nano poured in, sending a jolt through his system and amplifying his strength. The feeling was welcomed, but the pain in his chest intensified even as his muscles grew more dense. The reinforced bars groaned, but didn't budge. Scott pushed himself until it became hard to breath. Defeated, he leaned against the wall and slumped to the floor.
"You okay, big guy?"
"...yeah..."
"Bullshit."
Her silhouette moved around in the dark until Scott lost sight of her. He leaned forward to get a better view, but the pain grew sharp. He fell back, gasping for air. Through blurred vision he watched Ivory squeeze through the space between his bars. Even in the dim light he could read the concern written all over her face.
She put her hand over his heart. "Your heart rate is irregular."
Scott grunted, unable to pull in enough breath for a rude reply. It was as if a weight sat squarely on his chest, and, try as he might, he couldn't move it. The darkness closed in, and soon the only thing he could see clearly was Ivory. He grabbed for her arm, and noticed it was missing.
"Oh, no you don't!" She pulled a pair of energy cables from the stump of her shoulder. "This is going to hurt."
Ivory pressed the cables to his chest, and a blinding flash chased away the shadows. His ears popped as Ivory was thrown into the security bars. His nostrils filled with the stink of burning fur. She was wrong. The surge of energy flowing through him seemed to awaken the R.Nano, and new life flowed through his body. It didn't hurt at all. In fact, he felt better than he had since their raid on the Pale Garden compound.
Scott crawled over to Ivory. She was moaning and trying to shake the fog from her head. He leaned forward to help her sit up, and smelled blood. He was careful as he put his hand under her head. It was wet. He carefully propped her against the bars and sat down beside her. The R.Nano was fixing what ailed him, but it was a slow process.
"That... that was stupid."
Scott grunted. The two sat in silence for a while, Scott letting the nano do its job while he watched the human beside him.
"I grew up in a nowhere colony kinda like this place," she mumbled. "My people were hardline colonials obsessed with going out into the stars and getting away from Earth and its bubbling melting pot." She raised her good arm into the light, showing off her pale skin. "They didn't want to lose this," she scoffed, "then the EC came and reclaimed the separatist. Back home there are still families who won't associate with Earthers. Can you believe it? I've been small my whole life, and men take it as an invitation. No Earther has ever tried to take advantage, but colonials..."
"You probably have a concussion."
"Yeah. Hit my head pretty hard." She closed her eyes. "How do you guys know who's warrior and who's laborer? No offense, but I can't figure it out."
"Fur color, stripes, spots." Scott thought about the descriptors he took for granted. "Labor caste have no spots, no stripes, no courage. Their fur grows in dull hues, browns and tans, sometimes black."
"Color." Ivory clicked her tongue. "Sounds just like human bullshit."
"No, it's more than just color. It's bravery, skill, talent." Scott resisted the urge to shake her as she started laughing. "Labor caste kept our livestock and crops while the warrior hunted game and protected them."
"From who?"
Scott hesitated.
"Other warrior caste, I assume." She opened her eyes, and turned to him. Her gaze steady. "The separatists left Earth because, despite science to the contrary, they believed skin color determined intellect and capacity for civility."
"You don't understand. It's not the same."
"Bullshit. It's all bullshit."
Scott growled. "I liked you better before the head injury."
Ivory erupted with laughter, and after a moment Scott joined her.
"You know that guy with the raisin arm wanted them to cut your head off? The old woman stopped him, the one with the fur the same color as the female guards."
"Raisin?" Scott raised an eyebrow. The word sounded familiar.
"Ugly, wrinkled fruit."
He chuckled.
"He's terrified of you. They all are."
"Good."
"If we were on the battlefield, I'd agree, but we're in an actual dungeon." She shook her head. "It's only a matter of time before he comes for you."
"Let him come." Scott hadn't come to Jagg-Ra C to disrupt its government, but every cell in his body ached to kill the runt and end the farce he embodied.
"I doubt he'll give you a fair fight, and their tasers pack a serious punch. Clearly high voltage and R.Nano don't mix." Ivory's voice was getting stronger. "If they didn't take my arm I could get you out of here."
"Now that you mention it, how'd you get out of your cell?"
"These bars aren't meant to cage small humans. I've been going back and forth for the last few hours. I found a window I think we can use to get outside, I just need to figure out what to do about you."
"Spider was right. You are pretty useful in the field."
Scott smiled, taking in all of the small thin woman. She was brave and tough, all the hallmarks of a strong mate. He'd even begun to enjoy her scent. Scott rested his hand on her shoulder, and she leaned into him with a sigh of relief. After a moment she looked up at him.
"Your heart is racing. Please don't tell me you need another boost."
"... my heart is fine. It's ju- Someone is coming!"
He helped Ivory get to her feet, and watched as she worked her way between his bars and across the hall to her own cell. He laughed at himself. Ivory was human, no clan, no marks of valor save for a mutilated arm. She was the opposite of a proper khalyn, yet there was something there. The contradiction was alluring.
He took a deep breath, unhindered by the phantom weight on his chest, and caught the scent of two Felarnian women. The gloom retreated from the approaching footsteps. He was greeted in the form of a deep growl. He returned the hostile rumbling reflexively. Nearby a noisy portal opened, then his visitors came into view.
The captain of the guard stopped in front of his cell. It was her growls he'd heard rolling down the halls. The band on her wrist emitted a soft light which was painful after the relative darkness. She bared her fangs when Scott met her eyes.
Behind her was Councilor Tiagra. The venerable woman still wore her council robes, but seated on her shoulders was the cowl of a clan Scott was unfamiliar with. He quieted, and rose up to his full height. He ignored the scraping of the cell's stone ceiling as it scratched the top of his head. She nodded to him, and Scott bowed. She, at least, looked the part of a proper councilor.
"I'm not familiar with your clan markings, but I can tell you are a Rex."
"My clan is no more. There is no place for a clanless Rex." Her response was matter of fact. No self-pity, no shame.
Scott looked to the warrior beside her, clan in blood if not clan in title. He swallowed his reply, and asked, "Why are you here? Did he send you to kill me? Is he not even brave enough to do the deed himself?"
"Kyaaron lobbies for your head even now."
Scott growled, the captain growled in response and stepped more squarely between him and Tiagra. Clearly she had once been part of the Rex's honor guard. The older woman eased her aside.
"He'd once tried the same with Tyvaila, but the council would not have it. He won't have such trouble gathering support for your life."
"I'm flattered."
"Than you're a bigger fool than I thought." She shook her head. "This isn't a normal colony. You won't get your chance to fight justice for a final judgement. Your executioner will come through that gate," she pointed back the way she'd come, "and shoot you dead."
"How can you standby and watch this travesty?"
"I've lived long enough to see things which challenge The Way of the Khalyn, and hear things which contradict the teachings of the Hssai. What we have built here might not be perfect, but neither is the system that has divided our people for millennia."
"If you still believe in Kyaaron's vision, then what do you want?"
"It isn't his vision alone. We wish to nurture something different here."
Scott scoffed and leaned against the wall, his face the image of disbelief.
"You are an outsider, you don't need to understand or approve." Tiagra pulled a familiar hilt from the folds of her robes, causing Scott to stiffen. "I'd once fought beside this blade, and twice I've fought against it. It was your father who the rexes sent to break my clan. Clan Feylorn survived his betrayal, and you were spared the culling of your people. It's a thing that sticks with you, a thing that changes you."
Scott watched the bitterness play across the faces of both women. He remembered the days following his father's disgrace. To save themselves many allies abandoned the Felinus family. He remembered smelling his uncles fear at night as they awaited the arrival of a clan breaker to slay as many as he could and scatter the rest to the winds. For months he was tormented, every night surviving culling after culling as his dreams attacked where he was most vulnerable. Eventually Tyvaila sent he and Patricia away. Scott closed his eyes, and he could almost see the phantom clan breaker who never came.
"I'm not here to convince you. I'm here to give you a fighting chance."
Scott's eyes snapped open at the sound of his cell unlocking. He stepped forward and assumed the fei-jutsu second form. The close quarters would work against his two opponents. He and the captain's growls intertwined to fill the small space. Tiagra's roar silenced them.
"I'm releasing you and your companion," she explained. "I leave it to you to get off this planet. Councilor Kyaaron will look for you, if he finds you, have no doubt there will be an execution."
"Yes, his."
It was Tiagra's turn to growl.
"My people will not stop you from leaving, but if you move against any of the council members you will face my justice." She brushed her rob back, fastened to her hip was a plasmatic edge as old as his father's own.
The security force captain opened Ivory's cell, and gestured towards Scott.
"You should head towards the town south of here. I would not linger, Kyaaron will search there first."
"Then why would I take that route?"
"Tyvaila is also to the south."
Scott stepped into the hall, and stretched. His muscles thanked him. His chest pains were completely gone, and he felt ready for anything the false council could send his way. He cracked his neck and scratched his stomach, finally relieving a persistent itch. Ivory walked over, a dwarf beside the felarnians. She didn't seem phased.
"My arm?" she asked.
"Confiscated," replied the captain.
"Along with our supplies..."
"Here." The captain handed over their unicards, as well as a fistfull of felarns.
Ivory pocketed the paper money, and handed Scott his ID.
"What about my father's blade," he asked cautiously.
"No one dared challenge me when I claimed it as my own," Councillor Tiagra growled.
Scott glared at her, readying his mind for what he had to do.
"Be more careful where you leave it." She handed the hilt to him with reverence.
It was his father's, and his father's father's, and his father's father's father's. A priceless heirloom to the Felinus family.
"I want no trophy I did not bleed for," Tiagra said as she turned away.
She was doing his family a great service. The blade had been shipped off to Earth 2 with Scott and Patricia, thus avoiding the devastation which came later. The council of Felarnia was willing to spare the Feylorn clan, under one condition. The clan came for the Felinus family's blades and banners, the symbols of their existence. Most were killed fighting back their clan brethren. The survivors were allowed to scatter. All but one Felinus plasmatic edge was destroyed. The one in Scott's possession.
In the end they used the window Ivory had scouted to escape the grounds. The region was a thick bushland dotted with large outcroppings of rock, and squat trees with wide canopies. They moved quickly, Ivory setting the pace. They followed Tiagra's directions, moving west to the river which supplied drinking water to the council hall then following it south until it forked. Their destination was a collection of two dozen stone buildings surrounded by a short wall made of trees and stone.
Ivory grabbed rags from a refuse pile just outside of the main gates and wrapped herself in a makeshift robe.
"You smell like garbage and old sweat," Scott grumbled as they walked past a pair of security force officers.
"Yes, but I don't smell like a one armed human on the run."
"Try to walk with longer strides, it'll help with the disguise."
They made their way to the center of town dominated by a huge open market. Scott was surprised to find a diverse collection of merchants so deep into Felarnian space. His people weren't xenophobic, they merely didn't respect the weak. A pair of raiel merchants ran booths across the aisle from one another. One sold raiellian soundboxes, and the other the tools and power cells needed to work them. A fat human sold an ancient frozen delicacy made of cream. Another rented out constructs for hourly labor. In a rather opulent looking stall sat a hortisk selling spacemaps to unexplored planetoids. Anyone with half a brain knew the fiendish creature was likely to have family members waiting on those rocks to ambush anyone foolish enough to risk the adventure.
"I hate those creatures," he growled.
The woman in front of them turned with a snarl. She was a few inches taller than Scott, her hair tied back in a quartet of golden braids. Her eyes were violet, her muzzle broad. The smell of incense clung to her clothes.
"Were you talking about me?" she asked.
"No," Ivory said quickly.
The woman met his eyes and he reluctantly nodded an affirmative. Scott rankled. To back down from a canamarian seemed like cowardice even if he wasn't referring to her. Unfortunately a fight would summon the guards, and he needed to keep a low profile.
He wrinkled his nose and pointed towards the merchant. She followed his gesture.
"Disgusting beings." She spat into the dirt.
The hortisk glared at the trio while making an obscene hand motion. Scott and the woman growled in unison. The merchant quickly uncovered his CLOSED placard, and pretended to be invisible. After a pregnant moment Ivory chuckled, and the woman burst into a fit of laughter. Scott glanced at the woman, wanting to join her but hyper aware of the species divide.
"Let me buy you two some yonyon, not as an apology, merely a friendly gesture."
"I love yon-" Ivory started.
"No." Scott said flatly.
He'd hoped the woman would respond angrily even spew an insult, but she merely walked away with an apologetic shrug towards Ivory.
"Seriously, Raven?" Ivory punched him in the arm. "This Ancient Grudge nonsense is becoming a pain in my gut."
On cue her stomach growled.
"I couldn't..."
"Racism, I get it. My family left Earth to keep their skin as pale as possible. My dad named me Winter Whiteman for crying out loud. I understand, but it has to stop somewhere."
"Winter Whiteman?"
"Don't even," Ivory growled.
Scott smiled despite himself.
"The grudge is deeper than Felarnian versus Canamarian, no matter what Spider says." Scott lead them away from the Hortisk stall. "Did you notice the shield symbol branded on her neck?"
"Yeah."
"It means she was a Canamar Knight."
"A canamarian elite fighter, so? Don't tell me you were scared. Wait, I'm just kidding!" She ducked under his swipe. "You messed up my lunch, you can give me a freebie."
"The Knights are an order of warriors sworn to avenge the death of the Shkshk Hssai since the convergence." Scott read the expression on Ivory's face. "The Hssai are the gods of Felarnia and Canamar. The Shkshk were cruel and foul gods who tormented my people. We killed them, which infuriated the Hssai on Canamar."
"So you guys kill your gods when they displease you? If I wasn't into you before, I am now."
"What?"
"Continue, continue."
"The Knights were their chosen avengers, and when my homeworld and our moon converged they descended upon us. Many were killed, and a number of our Hssai were stolen and taken back to Canamar. That's why we fight. I don't care whether a man is human, xnea, or raiel."
"Yes, you do."
"Well not completely... look, as a member of the warrior caste, canamar knights are my sworn enemies."
"A rose by any other name..."
"I don't get the flower reference."
"It doesn't matter. She's gone, I'm hungry, and we need to find a way to this Tyvaila woman everyone is obsessed with."
Scott didn't bother to mention how the remaining knight orders, those that survived the devastation on Canamar, had vowed vengeance upon his family or how many had gone mad, throwing themselves into the midst of any conflict they could find. He knew she wouldn't understand, just as he couldn't understand what a knight would be doing on a backwards colony in felarnian space. In his heart he knew it had something to do with Tyvaila, everything seemed to revolve around her on Jagg-Ra C.
Scott and Ivory asked around, first about transportation throughout the colony, and then transportation off the colony. They sprinkled in disdainful comments about the council. Most ignored them, but eventually an elderly labor caste man took the bait. He was looking for passage to his daughter's village to the east, but the price of transportation had gone up. It was all thanks to the council's laxed regulations.
"Shame what's happening to this place," Scott said to Ivory as the two sat down next to the old man. "A proper Rex wouldn't al-"
"A proper Rex would have cut this council down years ago," the elder felarnian growled. "I don't care that we're all outcast and clanless here, a true council would treat us like scum, but a man would be able to go see his kin..."
Scott nodded, though he didn't quite agree with the man. Outcast were at the bottom of the social hierarchy, below labor caste and clanless. Life for an outcast on any felarnian colony was difficult and unfriendly. He looked around, taking note of the high number of outcast walking the market, and realized to some Jagg-Ra C might have been a much needed safe harbor. He kept this thought to himself.
"Does no one speak out against their lackluster rule?"
The old man sniffed the air, and looked from left to right. Once he was sure no one was eavesdropping he lowered his voice. "There's Tyvaila. She speaks out, and she writes. Most ignore her, but there are those that listen." He tapped his whiskers, an antiquated sign that he was listening.
"I would speak with her, old man."
"Good luck."
"Does no one know where to find her?" Scott had come to Jagg-Ra C thinking it would be a simple task to search a planetary directory, but his adventure had proven to be the opposite.
"Everyone knows where to find her," the old Felarnian scanned their surroundings once more, "but the council watches and arrests anyone that openly mentions her name. Those who repeat her words disappear, never to be seen again."
Scott watched fat drops of sweat roll down the man's cheek, and knew he witnessed Kyaaron's handywork. He took some of Ivory's felarns, and put them in the elder's hands.
"This should get you to your daughter. I must see Tyvaila."
The old man stared down at the felarns, his lips moved but no words came out. He swallowed back a lump in his throat. "Thank you. It would have taken months to pull that much money together." Again he watched for members of the security force. "You'll have to take a skiff to the outer boundaries, from there it's a hike ."
Scott snatched a piece of brown wrapping from the floor, and produced a pen he'd stolen from the hortisk's stall. "Show me."
"You must be careful. That area is crawling with bandits, mostly labor caste toughs but, some of those rogues are outcast warriors."