Kandi'kayn nudged Shandaar with his psychic powers as the psychic hologram shifted again. It showed four Young Ones trying to drive forward a clutch of combat slavespawn that were capable of rapid adaption to enemy actions as well as being psychically linked.

They were resisting being moved down the hallway to the point that the Young Ones were using their psychic powers to push them forward while the slavespawn's legs skittered on the flooring as they tried to push backwards.

**it appears the slavespawn are in no hurry to encounter the lemur** Kandi'kayn mused.

**how far have we fallen that our slavespawn show more pattern recognition and self-preservation than one such as the chief defense officer** Shandaar asked.

**they have fallen far convinced of their own superiority and perfection unaware that the universe ever moves on and the old falls away to the new** Kandi'kayn whispered back.

**what do you two plot** the Vessel Commander asked, rotating in place, held aloft by its psychic powers, phasic energy rippling below it.

**a plan** Shandaar admitted.

**of what sorts** the Vessel Commander asked, narrowing its eyes. It did not trust Shandaar at all, there was just something about the younger Atrekna that it did not trust.

**a plan to save ourselves from the mad lemur before it works itself into a high enough battle frenzy to rip through the bulkheads and kill us all** Shadaar said. She smiled to herself inside. **should the lemur become too frenzied it will not only seek to kill us all but it will seek out things to devour for nourishment as well as beings and objects to satisfy its sexual urgings which will only grow the longer it fights**

There was silence on the command deck for a long moment.

**what urges** the Vessel Commander asked.

**biological mammal sexual urges** Shandaar answered. **the Mad Lemurs of Terra are exceedingly violent in their sexual copulations violence is a part of their reproductive cycle and so violence excites them**

**sexually** Kandi'kayn added.

**how would you know this** the Vessel Commander scoffed.

**during the Siege of Nineteen Stars I observed lemurs overcome with violent sexual urges attack one another in a breeding frenzy** Shandaar half-lied. She held up a lemur holographic storage device that she had discovered in the pockets of a corpse shambling about the streets of the Tomb World. **you may observe if you wish**

The Vessel Commander used its phasic powers to bring crystal over to itself.

**be warned the images still contain a slight amount of lemur rage aggression lust sexual excitement and desires** Shandaar warned.

The side of the holographic storage cube read "B.A.S.S. RAIN FOREST CROSS SPECIES YIFF LUST XCIV" on the side in glimmering pink letters.

The Vessel Commander scoffed and set its hand on top of the floating cube, closing its eyes and 'reading' the contents of the cube with its phasic powers.

In less than two seconds the ship commander screamed and threw the cube away from it, backing away, its skin covered in oily perspiration and ripples of fear.

**they were eating each others faces and groins and mammaries while they grappled on the ground in the tropical rain forest** the Vessel Commander screamed. **some had fur and some had wings and some had tails and... and...** the Vessel Commander shuddered and turned away, fighting to regain its composure.

**should the lemur work itself into too much of a frenzy** Shandaar added to the communal mind with a shrug. **eventually it will even find us sexually appealing** She tossed another cube that showed brightly drawn cartoon characters with the label "Hentai Cthulhu Tentacle College BASS Rave CCXCVII" on the side. **observe**

The Vessel Commander and several others touched the cube.

In seconds they all pulled back with keening cries of alarm.

**the lemur will attempt to put our feeding tentacles into its solid waste disposal orifice** was the panicked cry by several of the Atrekna unlucky enough to view that section.

More than a few had fainted.

**as you can see it is imperative should we want our feeding tentacles and orifices to remain unsullied by primal brutish breeding frenzy that we either kill the lemur or** she let the silence hang in the air. **get it off the ship**

Horrified, all of the conscious Atrekna on the command deck all nodded together. So disturbing had the graphic imagery been that the conscious did not seek to drag away the unconscious and impregnate them. Just the idea of such made them shudder with disgust at the memories.

**how can we do that** the Vessel Commander asked. It waved a feeding tentacle at the Defense Officer, who was shrieking at a half dozen Young Ones that it knew they could hear it and they better go in that room and kill the lemur if they knew what was good for them. **the lemur does not seem to want to go along with our plans to kill it**

Pulling both cubes back to her own hand, Shandaar floated forward. **the lemur's brain allows it short circuit our predictive analysis brain structures which is why we keep losing fights**

The Vessel Commander started to scoff and stopped. It remembered that the Young One had faced off against the lemurs four separate times and survived.

Most didn't survive their first meeting.

**lemurs are driven by primal urges as you saw** Shandaar said, floating up slightly. **we will use those primal urges to make the lemur do what we want**

**how** the Assistant Security Officer asked, hoping that Shandaar could come up with a better plan than "run at the lemur with this gun" that his supervisor was trying to convince him of.

**first how far are we from a lemur or Inheritor of Madness system** Shandaar asked

The navigator looked up, his eyes black and full of whirling gold specks. **five hours**

Shandaar looked at the Vessel Commander. **make for that system while we begin this plan of operation**

**will it enable us to survive** the Vessel Commander asked. It was starting to feel something, something new, and it wasn't sure if it liked it or not. It wasn't sure what it was but just thinking about the Mad Lemur being aboard his ship made that feeling start in his stomach and behind his two chambered heart.

**more than sending another wave at it** Shandaar said. She closed her eyes for a long moment then opened them. **the lemur uses motion based predictive analysis based on observation data cause and effect chains which is why we cannot predict them using our own temporal mechanics and movement based predictive analysis powers**

The Vessel Commander nodded.

**close observation of the lemur has shown that the theory that they use phasic powers to predict opponents actions like any other advanced species is incorrect and faulty** Shandaar said.

Kandi'kayn nodded.

**what is the lemur doing now** the Vessel Commander asked the Defense Officer.

**I do not understand its actions nor can I describe them but observe** the Defense Officer stated, waving at the hologram.

Natraya watched the lemur walk on its hands, turned upside down, lurching around the room.

"Damn, I feel really good. I'm feeling better and better every minute," the lemur said, smiling. "Just something about this body. I mean, don't get me wrong, I miss my nanites and my wetware and cyberware and my harness, but this body is pretty nifty."

Natraya just nodded, using a chunk of robot armor to scrape along the edge of the bladearm and sharpen it. She spit on the chunk of armor and went back to scraping the serrated edge.

"Feels really good to fight, too," the lemur said. It shoved off with its arms and somersaulted in midair to land on its feet, crouched down. It passed its hands in front of it, fingers outstretched. "The body has nanites, but no control array, which sucks."

"My condolences," On'trak said softly.

The lemur stood up. "They'll take a while to come at us again."

On'trak nodded. The lemur had said that before. "Explain, again, please."

"OK, their B-Team, their second best, came in with that fancy armor and those weapons," the lemur said.

"How do you know they were not the, what do you call it, A-Team Number Uno Surprise?" On'trak asked.

"They didn't know how to use that stuff effectively and had no sense of close quarters tactics," the lemur said. "Now, unfortunately for them, that let me get a quick look at their stuff, which is why when the A-Team showed up, I had an idea of their capabilities and how they'd move, which is why we killed them too."

On'trak nodded.

"Because we're still in jumpspace, we haven't docked with another ship, which means that by now they have to be thinking about what percentage of their crew we've killed and what they have left. We don't know the crew or ship size but we know that the rest of the crew knows how fast and brutally we've killed those who were sent against us," the lemur said. It somersaulted and landed on one hand, held the position and then gracefully put one foot down and did a slow cartwheel onto both feet and began moving his hands around. "What crew they have is all they have. Shipboard security will make up a maximum of ten percent of the crew, unless this is a troop ship, which I doubt, since none of these guys could really fight. That means they either are out of security or the remainder of the security forces are really really wanting to stay hiding under their bunks."

On'trak thought about it. It made sense. He would rather hide beneath his bunk than face the lemur in combat.

"Which means they only have a few choices. Kill us, abandon ship and leave it all to us, blow the ship up, or go somewhere where they can get help to kill us," the lemur said. "Since we're still in jumpspace, I believe they either think they can kill us or are running for somewhere they think will help them with the problem."

The lemur frowned. "The only problem is, I keep getting this sense of something reaching for me just beyond my reach," the lemur slowly turned around, still waving its hands. "I don't know what it is, but part of me knows I want it, like a dingo staring at a baby."

"I don't understand that reference," On'trak said.

"It's OK," the lemur said. It walked around the room. "I thought this was warsteel, maybe Mark-Zero or perhaps even biologically extruded like the Mantid and few other do in limited amounts, but I think its something different. There's too much crystalline doping in the metal to be warsteel," the lemur ran one hand, surrounded by a bluish nimbus, across the glittering walls, leaving behind a slight blue glow on the glittering black metal.

"It's reactive to psychic abilities, to phasic energy, which means its some kind of psychically active alloy," the lemur mused. "Which makes sense, because these squid-faced guys seem to really depend on both bioconstructs and phasic power."

Natraya nodded. "Yes. How does this help us?"

The lemur lifted itself up on its toes then dropped down, then started repeating the action, bobbing up and down quickly. "I don't know."

"So what happens now?" On'trak asked.

The lemur grinned. "We wait till the next group, I let one live long enough to realize it can't beat me, then we see if it runs, curls into a ball, goes into a frenzy, or can't realize it can't beat me."

"What will that tell you?" Natraya asked. She'd slowly become fascinated with watching the lemur's brain work.

"If their morale is broken," the lemur said.

**when it is just down to you you will run following the open doorways** Shandaar ordered the Young One.

The Young One nodded, looking extremely nervous.

**go all the way through the cargo bay to the far side** Shandaar ordered. **at the far side there will be a phasic nullifier field run through it and out the door which will close behind you do you understand**

**I understand** the Young One said. It looked at its rifle. **and if I kill the lemur**

**then we will erect a phasonium statue to you** Shandaar said.

**I believe I will be running** the Young One stated.

Shandaar looked at the navigator.

**how long until we exit jumpspace**

Tightening her grip on her makeshift sword, Natraya stood up as stomach wrenching feeling of leaving jumpspace touched her. On'trak gave a slight groaning noise as the jumpspace drop reached him too.

The lemur looked around.

**we've dropped out of jumpspace** the navigator said. **Inheritor ships detected heading for us**

Shandaar reached out to the Young One through the communal mind, feeling how nervous the other Atrekna was.

**now**