Xant stood in the hallway of the cabin, hesitating on the task before him.

Jasmine and Siglinde had gone deep in the seafaring vessels kitchen, to prepare their first meal of the quarter and a ‘welcoming’ feast of sorts.

Xants task was to invite the new members to the event.

He had been half wondering how to describe their current predictament, while they were the same species as Jasmine there was no familiar bond between them beside their situation.

He’d hesitate to even call them companions at this point, since the only one he could properly converse with was as openly hostile as one could get while still being within civilised company.

Xant tucked the Data-slate under his arm and took a deep breath.

The human named ‘Ryo’ had an aura most uncomfortable, permeating the air with an oppressive sickness. Xant focused his thoughts to feel through the Frequency, trying to understand it so as to be better at withstanding it.

Stress was the overwhelming factor and completely understandible, disgust was a close second, although its source was a little harder to define. Cold, soft, clear sky…

If it was one thing Xant had learned about humans was that their Freq was obnoxiously powerful and deceptively subtle, without physically connecting and sharing memories he doubted he was going to get much more from observation alone.

Xant approached Ryo’s door, remembering to knock before speaking this time.

The sudden noise startled the human inside, changing the freq to a more aggressive mix, but Xant could steel himself from such attacks, Jasmine had given him plenty of unintended practice.

“...” Xant suddenly realise he forgot to ask Jasmine what was the human standard of greeting unfamiliar humans, their introductions were a little confusing, too many names. So he fell back on what was polite in Council society, “Your honour, may I relay a message from Namgeiver Jasmine?”

The cold and clear Freq turned sharp and prickly through the door, the alien inside had his focus on Xant now, it made his ears hurt.

“Yeah? What does she want?” came the acknowledgement, he had a deeper, harsher voice than the human Xant knew, a species quirk?

“Jasmine will be cooking some human cuisine for ‘breakfast’, she requests you and the other human join us for formal introductions and to update you of the current state of affairs,”

Polite and formal, treat with care, Ryo’s first impression of the council was no the most hospitable, his second impression had not been so great either. Xant could only show that he was not like the others.

“... I’ll let Beau know,”

“Excellent, breakfast will be up in the ‘Bar’, I look forward to a proper introduction between us,”

There was no reply, Xant didnt expect one, but his task complete he could make his way to the bar lounge and get the most comfortable chair for his tale.

Jasmine set down a huge plate of sizzling salmon slices on the table, using the pair of tongs to separate out the pieces and serve them on plates, making sure that Sieglinde got a very large bowl to herself.

The party of seven (three humans, one zenthi and three dogs) sat on the bar lounges,

‘Ryo’ Sugawara had abandoned the council provided skin suit in favour of human clothes Jasmine had grabbed from storage. He had plain black pants, a navy blue shirt with a threatening image on its front (a human skull in an unfascinded helmet) and an black coat with hood Ryo was using to hide his stubbly head and translator scars.

Beau, by contrast, wore fairly little clothing, navy blue jeans, no shirt or shoes but an obscenely colourful ‘Hawaiian shirt’ that could not be buttoned up so his chest was bare, showing off the contours of his anatomy.

The three dogs all got their own bowls while Jasmine offered tongs to everyone so they could serve themselves from the big share plate.

Jasmine pushed the small lock of brown hair behind her ear and out of her ocean blue eyes, she had decided to go for comfort, her favourite white top, yellow and blue summer shorts and light sneakers.

“So where did the salmon come from?” Beau asked as both he and Ryo looked at the plate with salivating mouths but skeptical eyes.

Jasmine served a plate and side greens to both herself and Xant before replying.

“Three fish were sent the same research facility as me, so they cloned the meat for us to eat,”

“Clone meat?” Ryo scoffed, Jasmine shrugged.

“I can make you more Waurdess if you like?” she offered, popping a slice of fish into her mouth.

Suddenly the salmon became way more appetising to the young man, but Beau had already taken the tongs and was piling his plate up high.

“So,” Beau started with a big mouth full of fried fish, “How about you start at the beginning, and we can work from there,”

“Right, the beginning…” Jasmine looked to Xant for reassurance, as she chewed on her first bite, “Right, I suppose the beginning is when we all got abducted,” she swallowed her bite and began to recall the events as she remembered them.

“We were all abducted some time in January, I was out camping with friends, we were abducted by the Rajava, who are basically organic computers hell bent on genociding the known galaxy. At some point in their travels from Earth across the stars they were experimenting on us,”

Jasmine inwardly winced at the memory, the terrifying sight of her body flayed open would not be leaving her any time soon,

“after that, the ship was allegedly attacked by pirates, gutting it and taking everything inside and then, Lieutenant Nako caught them mid-looting, he claimed the ship as his own and then he sent seven black stasis pods to Uleesia station, Esaander corp, where Xant,” Jasmine made a gesture with her fork, “Was head of research, they opened up the pods at Nako’s behest and I was in one of them, and because I didn’t have a Freq pulse, they thought I was either an animal, or a Rajavan creation called an amalgamation. I started scribbling math into the sand and Xant was smart enough to recognise it, then they put a translator in me so we could talk.”

She tapped her head, Ryo glared at Xant from the corner of his eye, Beau was not so subtle in his stare either.

“That’s when I learned about Freq, Frequency’s and that humans have a lot of it but no natural way to express it. I also learned about the DNA degradation and the ‘Painful Dynasty’, and I offered to help where I could. I also learned that the Rajavan’s probably destroyed everyone I loved and probably the even Earth too, but Xant, Rynard and the dogs 3 kept me from doing something really stupid.”

She shook her head, summarizing the last four months didn't do the ordeal justice in the slightest, everything she had learned and the friends she had made seemed like a footnote in the adventure.

“After that, Lieutenant Nako came to the station, I got to understand the difference between citizens and Military units, a little bit about life in Council Space and that humans cant, or, shouldn’t be able to travel in space awake if they have a translator in. Nako brought us here to identify any of the Earth tech the pirates didn’t take and the Rajava thought might be useful. Somewhere along the line, you guys were sold to a Progenitor corporation, experimented on, destroyed the facility and killed its crew after your own involuntary translator fitting, Nako was sent to deal with you and managed to negotiate and brought you here… and now we’ve got three weeks to figure out what are our demands and how to make first contact with Council member coming to see us.”

Jasmine sighed, stirring the food on her plate with her fork, “any questions?”

“Several,” Beau stated, “But I’ll let Ryo go first,” he shoved another piece of fried fish in his mouth.

Ryo ate another piece of fish and chewed slowly, he didn’t even look up to ask his question.

“You mentioned pirates, the Rajava and the council, how many factions(enemies) are we dealing with?” Ryo’s thoughts projected loud and clear to anyone with a translator, a quirk humans gained with the translator, telepathic abilities.

“The only other faction is The Arvas imperium, but I don’t know a lot about them,” Jasmine answered honestly.

“They are the second power in this arm of the galaxy,” Xant explained, trying to build a helpful rapport with the new members, “they are allies to the galactic council but prefer to hold their own government and military over planets in their territory,”

“Right, thank you Xant,” Jasmine smiled.

“Where’s the Rajavan ship we came from?” Ryo was skeptical of the Rajavan angle, as neither he nor Beau had any memory of the abduction.

“The Engine Lord has the ship somewhere on the other side of the hangar, I haven’t seen it other than a hologram, but it’s big enough that it could carry this entire yacht and all the cars outside,”

“A transport ship specifically,” Xant elaborated, “Engine Lord Vitoiic is still investigating the ship but I suspect they will find the shipbrain soon enough,” He kept the human style anomalies to himself for the moment, information to share with Jasmine in a more secure manner.

The word shipbrain caught Ryos attention, and his aura simmered under his blank expression.

“The lieutenant bug made insinuations of us getting a ship,” Ryo continued “what are the chances of that happening?”

Jasmine blinked.

“Probably very likely, in my talks with Nako and Laandi, she was the executive director of Xants old Station, she said that if we were accepted into the Galactic council, our credit scores would likely be enough to get us an entire planet,” She let the information hang in the air a little bit, she could barely believe it herself, “But, it would mean allowing our DNA to be catalogued-” she cut herself off, finding the words to explain it favourably, “We’d have to negotiate the terms of course, I wasnt stupid enough to promise them anything wholesale, But its something we’re all going to discuss and have to agree on.”

“A whole planet huh?” Beau repeated, having finished his second plate, “that’s a mighty big promise, but I'm glad you didnt take their word for it and laid some foundations for negotiations good job,”

Jasmine felt her ears turn red, recognition for her hard work was validating.

“Makes sense now why they were so eager to keep us alive,” Beau mused, “our DNA in exchange for a planet, they'd want to keep that underwraps at any cost,”

“Any source of DNA is precious since the Rajavan degri-” Xant started but Beau, unable to understand the doctor, continued on his trail of thought.

“So what’s stopping them from just taking what they want? Why not just keep us unconscious and take as many samples as they want?”

Jasmine placed a hand on Xants shoulder.

“I’ll translate for you,” she offered and relayed Xants words to Beau.

“Because a violation of a sentients will is what the Rajava would do. The Galactic Council was founded on the ideal that sentient life deserves to exist. Humans are a Creator Intelligence race and should be treated with respect, to deny you that means the Painful Dynasty was fought for nothing.”

Beau leaned back and let out a bemused sigh.

“Alright, so what is the painful dynasty?”

Those words threw her back as many months, when she too, asked the question.

“The fall of civilisation,” she replied, condensing the horrors into a digestible laymen's explanation, “the known galaxy was prosperous, then with the creation of the Universal Translator the people found out that those in power weren’t people any more, they were genetically altered computers and when the people tried to change it, those in power, the Rajava, turned genocidal. Melting down restless citizens into unthinking drones, recycling their DNA and destroying anything else that didn’t fit their design, hence why our own DNA is so valuable,”

“But you just said we were abducted by the Rajava,” Ryo chimed in, “so why haven’t we been recycled?”

“That has been a unanswered worry for everyone involved,” Xant answered, “There are many, disturbing questions we have uncovered in our short time together, we haven't had the resources to answer them.”

“They having psychic conversations with each other?” Beau asked, “I noticed the aliens ears twitch when he does,”

Jasmine was beginning to get a headache being caught in the middle,

“Yeah, Ryo asked out why we having been melted down, and the honest answer is we don't know, we may never know, The Rajava aren't up for having friendly discussions”

Beau rested a hand atop Spades head, deep in thought.

“The Rajava are the enemy, the Galactic Council is sheltering us, and our DNA is valuable, not that I don't believe you, or your friend, but are there any sources I can look over to confirm them?”

Ryo let out an audible scoff,

“Like he’s going to find an unbiased source-”

“I’m sure we can find some historical documents, right Xant?” Jasmine talked over the negative nancy.

Xants ears flattened.

“We do have historical audfiles, but without a translator he won't be able to understand them,”

“We can figure that out when we get there,” Jasmine replied and relayed the info to Beau, who sighed through his nose.

“I can go through the files,*” Ryo proposed, much to Xant and Jasmines surprise “*Beau is basically useless without you telling him what's going on,”

“If you’re going through the audfiles then Beau can help me go through the human stuff, see if we can find anything useful.”

“Jasmine? What about preparing for the Council members' arrival?” Xant asked gently.

Jasmine mulled it over in her head.

“Well, we can wait until after the audfiles, for now we can just think of a list of demands, a list of rights and such, do you still have the contracts i made with Laandi?”

“I shall source them for you, Infact, shall I get a hold of Laandi for us? She said she had coached First contact negotiations before.”

Xants ears stood up and he bobbed his head happily

“An excellent plan Xant, that’s why youre my number 2,” Jasmine was happy with their plan of attack for now, she needed to get as much information as possible or everything was going to be so much harder.