Tyler: Human
Tyler was filled in on the plan. Even if the Circuit Queen was innocent, they had too many unanswered questions. They were going to go back to the Circuit Mothership and confront her.
The team was scattered around various sections of the ship as they awaited their arrival. Tyler was tinkering with the little black box they had used to find Short, Byralnus was reading something from a screen in his chair, Bai was in her room fetching something, and Heva was taking a short nap.
They were enjoying the short period of free time as they waited, all except for Jirabi, who was sitting at the cockpit keeping an eye on the ship diagnostics.
It was then that Jirabi got the message.
"Captain?" Called out Jirabi from the control room. "Captain, come and look at this. You're not going to believe it."
Byralnus got up from his chair and swiftly glided over to the screen that Jirabi was standing over.
Byralnus quickly read the message on the screen. "Hi guys this is Short..." Byralnus read aloud. "I'm back on Gnumus—but I don't want you to come find me so I'm not going to say where." He glanced at Jirabi in astonishment.
"Short is still alive?" He said surprisedly.
"Yes and back on Gnumus!" Replied Jirabi, rubbing his chin. "I wonder how he pulled that off?"
Byralnus scanned the long message, reading quickly. "Malba." He said, stopping before getting to the end. "This is something the whole team needs to hear."
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"You are all probably wondering" read Byralnus, his crystalline voice resonating clearly through the ship's lounge. They were all gathered and sitting comfortably there as he continued to read the message from Short. "...How I ended up back on Gnumus. It's not important. But because I know you are all dying with curiosity, I will simply say that the Pardos had better things to do and didn't want to waste his time with me."
They all looked at each other in confusion.
"The Pardos had better things to do?" Murmured Bai. "He is literally a hit-man!"
Byralnus paused and glanced up at her from the screen. "Let's save our questions for the end, EkirBai."
"I was thinking the same thing" whispered Tyler to the Quibeek.
Byralnus continued with the message. "The thing that you all really need to hear is my side of this story, from the beginning. Believe it or not, I am actually a high ranking admiral. I was out on a hella boring diplomatic convocation in the Retriplis universe when my fleet was attacked by... HER. It was, yes, the Circuit Queen! Ooooooooo how could you not see that coming, jokes, I already told you it was that uhhh..."
Byralnus' voice faded as he reached a swear word in the message. "B-word." He finally said, flinching.
It was interesting hearing Bryalnus read through the script without the dramatic voice it obviously called for.
"She destroyed my fleet, killed my army, and made an attempt to disconnect my memory core, which would have completed her plan of changing me into the mass murderer 'lunatic' that would be perfect to frame.
"Unfortunately for her, because she and I are of the same ranking under the sacred Motherboard, praise the Mother, she had no authority to mess with my memory core.
"Her attempts at messing with my innards didn't go the way she had planned, but they did change me, somehow bestowing upon me more charisma and ba-dazzle than any normal mortal Circuit can handle. And that explains how 'boring ol' circuit bob' became yours truly—witty, devilishly handsome, me.
"'How did I first get stranded on Gnumus?' I hear you asking through this message. Even if you aren't asking I'm just going to assume you care and tell you the story anyway. She put me here. She staged a crash of my favorite cruiser (I named the ship Frida by the way) and wrecked her on this..."
Byralnus hesitated again. "This uh... S-word hole dump."
Tyler couldn't help but smile.
Byralnus continued reading the long message. "Several days later I woke up in the center of the wreck inside this strange suit. I know little about it, save for the fact that it is Rhaa tech and it almost got me killed by a hitman for some reason just a little while ago. I assume the Queen got it for me, which was incredibly sweet of her, remembering my birthday like that.
"So now we talk about what it was like living stranded on Gnumus. Nothing really happened between the time I was wrecked here and when you all came to visit me, which was so lovely by the way. My ship was full of half dead Circuits that creeped me the h-word out for the first few days, but I got accustomed to them eventually.
"Despite that it wasn't long before I was exploring the ugly place, hiking around the dust, seeing the sites. There were so many identical dunes to see and so little time.
"It was during one of these little nature walks that I discovered the spirits! Did you know that there were invisible little monsters living on Gnumus?"
Heva gasped, breaking through the monotony of Byralnus' voice.
Tyler was glad that she did, the little Terilli was keeping them from noticing Tyler as she also perked up. She knew that Short was talking about the Bovase.
She had yet to tell the group about Ishnook.
The group all turned to look at the little blue being. Even Byralnus paused to look at her.
"What is it, Belnag?" Asked Byralnus.
The round blue ball sat for a moment, and then spoke up in her reserved voice. "Ancient Oidian lore talks about invisible beings that lived in the rocks."
"What do you know about them?" Questioned Byralnus.
Bai frowned. She raised one of her four arms, her mouth open in protest. Then she dropped it with a sigh, shaking her head.
Heva didn't seem to notice. "The records on them are very obscure. The invisible beings of Gnumus are only mentioned a couple of times. They aren't very well known, even with the most educated species experts."
Tyler felt shocked. Not only did she know more about the Bovase species than Heva the expert, but she had one living in here hair.
"There is more about these creatures. Let me continue." Said Byralnus after Heva was finished.
He continued. "It was after one of my excursions that I first became possessed by one of these spirits. I had decided to venture through a different part of the dunes and discovered a heard of large, flea-ridden, ugly beasts—the first biological life forms I had encountered on this planet.
"It wasn't long before I suddenly was incapable of all locomotion. I thought for certain that my circuitry had given out and that I would have to lay there in the dust until I completely rotted away.
"But then, to my complete surprise, not long before sundown of that same day, my body began to move again. But against my will! It was quite a sensation, let me tell you!
"I thought maybe I was somehow just unaware of my own conscious decision to move my body, but I knew that it was definitely not from me when I could struggle against the movement.
"Me and the thing (I didn't know what it was at the time) would struggle back and forth. Many times my own willpower was not strong enough and I would give out, allowing the other power to take me where it wished.
"This willpower 'tug-of-war' was incredibly exhausting, and there were several times where I needed to take a break. But I could tell that the power was taking me further and further away from my wrecked ship, so I fought hard and eventually learned to take back control and move myself.
"It took me two whole days to move a quarter of a span closer to my ship. That was a lot of hard work, let me tell you. I thought I was just going to rust out there.
"But on the third night, I was saved!"
"In the pitch blackness, when both I and the demon were too exhausted to do anything, up bounded this huge, slimy, reptilian like creature."
Suddenly the gasp of Ishnook's voice sounded in Tyler's mind. Gigi-var muttered the Bovase. The darkness dwelling monster, killer of Bovase. A creature that lives off of eating Bovase, mistress.
Tyler nodded slowly, wondering what Ishnook was talking about.
I will tell you about it later, my lady.
Byralnus continued. "I was unnecessarily scared for my life when the big guy sucked me up, but then promptly spat me back out. It didn't take long for me to realize that I had freedom over my body again.
"Like a preacher in church, the big guy had exorcised the spirits right out of me! Hallelujah.
"Anyway, I could go on but I won't use up your ship's infinity core with my beautiful writings. The point is, a lot more things happened between that and when you guys found me in my lovely ship. I promise I'll write it all down for you guy's later.
"All you need to know is when you found me, I was once again possessed by another little sucker. That's why the only thing I could do was clamp my little claw and sputter static at your face. Then when the big green guy kicked me out of his ship, he was kind enough to drop me off by my friend 'the exorcist's' house. And now my soul is clean and I am chilling on a nice pile of dust, watching a sunset.
"Jokes, the sun doesn't actually set on this bloody planet."
"Anyway, I don't want to have anything to do with the Queen and her psychotic issues, but let me know when you guys are all done up there so we can hang out. I've got a nice pile of dust over here that is just so comfortable to sit on, and I'm in need of some guests who don't feel the need to possess my body.
"Good luck to you all! Love, Short."
Bryalnus looked up from the screen that was pulled up on a small table next to his chair.
"Woah." Muttered Bai.
"Do you have any questions now, EkirBai?" Asked Bryalnus, turning to her.
Bai opened her mouth with an inhale, preparing to say something.
"Alright." Continued Byralnus, turning away from her. "Conveniently, we are already on our way back to the Circuit mothership. I think our best course of action is to confront the Queen with PPF reinforcements. Keep in mind that we don't know that the Queen is guilty, but we definitely have enough evidence to be suspicious. Especially with what Malba discovered about the Rhaa tech Short is encased in."
"This whole thing is starting to feel like a wild goose chase." Muttered Tyler.
The rest of the team turned with blank stares to look at her.
"Oh." She said, suddenly feeling embarrassed. "A goose is a... uh... a wild goose chase is what you call... Hmm... Something that you want but can't ever get. I think."
"I got it." Called out Heva in her quiet voice.
"So." Said Byralnus, calling the group back to his attention. "Are we in agreement with the plan?"
"Well..." Spoke up Bai from her large chair. "Wasn't that the plan from the beginning?"
Byralnus thought for a moment then nodded. "Malba, please inform the PPF that we need some more reinforcements."