Prison systems were one of the few legacies left behind by the founders. Once intended as a means of keeping the peace during eras of true strife, most records of such time were locked away. Secrets stored deep in Union freeze cells, floating among sealed prisms of hard-coded information. Data Crystals that were synthetically grown, and were held at [Absolute Zero]

Of the information gleamed from them, as Union traditions allowed and specified every 50,000 cycles, the most notable records were of the exiled planets.

Entire worlds, dedicated to the task of punishment.

Even the most proud, advanced, and intelligent races acknowledge that without their technology, stripped naked, and abandoned in an unfamiliar environment: they have lost everything. Thus was the original purpose of the exiled planets. Selected truly at random, these worlds were molded and designed to act as retribution the most terrible of enemies. For crimes of war, for an enforcement of justice. As the ages came and went, morals among the Union slipped, while politics crept forward. Eventually, these worlds were simply a means of leaving behind those who were a threat.

During the times closer to the present age, they were even more simplistic: as an efficient method of execution.

Any standards of upkeep to the biomes beyond atmospheric composition were abandoned, and often failed experiments were dumped from low orbit. Bio-hazards, plagues, irregular mechanized units, political dissenters, prisoners of war... The dead lands became something else. Layers of unnatural garbage stacked upon the ancient surface, as surely as the poorly maintained terraforming units faltered, the few controlled zones became empty, and the planets themselves slipped back into equilibrium.

…

Array Class Monitoring System – Coverage zone IV // Group III //

Surviving Members [Multiple Casualties]: Convicted 578043 → 578060 // 2 Unknown/? Units

[ -- Class XII Prison World: Attica – ]

Sentence: [Death] / [Twenty Rotation Commitment]

[Rotation XII]

…

They were late again.

Together, their mad dash out of the ruins came just as the shadows began to creep, stretching forward with strange, contorted shapes. As if hands, or fingers, grasping at anything they could, and clinging to all that they touched. As the light was blocked, and the cold began to replace any trace of warmth in the soil, the strange fungus that inhabited it began to burst and bud, forming into ever growing tendrils of vines and pods.

Hungrily, it came for them.

What came out from within those dark stretching shadows was much worse than the cold. Those budding vines would pull one down, never to be seen again, and the only place that was safe from them was the desert.

But the desert had its own dangers.

Dunes of sand stretched on for miles on the planet's surface before the vehicle, as it bucked under the strain of a rocky landing, kicking up dirt, sand, and gravel under its wheels. Six of those spun in a synchronized torrent of propulsion, throwing the frame forward through the terrain ahead. The light of a red star slipped along the horizon, presenting a mirage of a bloody pupil, with a small black moon for its center. The illusion it presented was a fitting one.

Stretching on along the distance was an unnatural formation, which seemed to grow in size as the vehicle crested over the gradual slopes of elevation, averaging beneath them in the form of rough pitfalls and exposed boulders. The ruins of past civilization stared at them from the horizon.

Cresting over the highest point, to return to a downhill, the wheels occasionally lost traction, providing those within a sickening sensation of free-fall. With every rock and shake, several passengers gripped at the pale blue metal frame with white knuckles, claws, and tails, to hold themselves from going airborne as the the forces lifted beneath them. All while air began to whip past in gusts, then waves, then in a storm of particles as the weather patterns began to fall in with the approaching darkness. Dusk was not a calm time on the surface.

“This wasn't the plan Yitale.”

"I know, human."

Scarred arms held to the steer-staff on the the vehicles console, muscles tense under a thin layer of light blue fur, while solid blue eyes stared ahead into the oncoming storm. The voice that sang from her throat was calm, as her tail flicked off the floor to pull a manual release along side the midsection of the cabin's front end. The hairless mesh of scars wrapping around the lever and yanking it with adept precision.

Warnings flashed across the holo-screen projections that coated the perimeter of front windshield- a half dome that streamlined the craft as it cut through the fierce resistance. The vehicle's shield unit flashed up as the grains turned to coarse stones, which in turn shifted to projectiles. Their ricochets shooting off into the faltering visibility grew, as the craft plowed onward.

The storm was upon them now, and with it was a wrath that only nature could bring about. As the visibility dropped to zero, the wheeled desert strider came to a forced stop, and Yitale brought all power to the environment shields. She knew that they would have to wait it out, and hope for the best.

Turning in her seat, the shipmaster pushed away from the controls and faced the others who sat in uncomfortable silence behind them. Their faces gave away no expression, even with the residual knowledge of her biosync translator. It seemed they were wary to give any indication of emotion to someone they did not fully trust, or her strange guardian. She gave them all a “Smile” as the human called it, and watched as the passengers seemed to cringe. It was a desirable effect.

Especially considering how badly she needed cooperation.

Keeping this many alive was nothing short of a miracle... by all rights they should have died their first day. There were thirteen of those down now, and they still had seven to go. Yitale still found it difficult to believe how many things had gone wrong to land them here in the first place.

Leaning back, she closed her eyes, letting her body tune itself into a light slumber. Her mind fell backwards, and the familiar feeling of reflection took over in the rhythm of her slowly cycling heartbeats. A slow pulse, a tiny drum that set forth their many songs. Not all species had hearts, but Yitale firmly believed that those that did shared a kinship of sorts. For a beating heart was a constant reminder of how fragile their lives were, and it was constantly striking out against the echoes of the void. A tiny voice of resistance that kept them alive.

Even from here, in her sleeping trance, Yitale could make out the crashing bass of the human's heart.

Some voices of resistance were stronger than others.

Passing into deeper layers of the trance, the surroundings began to fade away, and Yitale's waking mind began to fade into a general focus. The subconscious period of reflection began to shift over in tiny drops, like stones skipping across the surface of her thoughts. She needed to plan ahead, but that wasn't where the focus landed as it sunk into her mind, down beneath the surface. Instead she drifted, and thoughts of the past became her reality

…

The emergency crash near the 33rd had been what started the snowball effect, and Yitale hadn't even been conscious for most of it. When she finally came back to lucidity, all hell had apparently broken loose, but in a quiet way. A deceitful trickery, that lulled her into an absurd state of mind, and had her believing that, for once, everything was working out.

When the military finally responded to the distress signals, and sent a rescue squad down from orbit, to the planet surface, things had seemed almost normal. Legalities of crashing her ship into a military base aside, it appeared that by doing so, many lives had been saved. It also helped that they had a full cargo-bay of military gear, which had arrived on schedule despite the chaos going on above along the 33rd lines.

Yitale had managed to stagger to her feet, and doing her best to ignore the gaping hole in her ship's ceiling in the passageway outside of the bridge (which appeared to have no obvious relation to their crash landing) walked with her human escort to greet the Union rescue vessel's lieutenant. There, she recieved formal greetings, recognition for valor in the face of danger, and approval of delivery. All while the individuals that had unintentionally been rescued by the crash landing were all put into stasis pods before Yitale had even thought to take a look at them. Apparently they were in rough shape, if the body parts that were scattered all over the ground among the debris were any indication.

She had been glad to learn her ship hadn't run over any intelligent life, and thankful that her record would avoid unintentional manslaughter charges. Avoiding entire systems due to warrants for arrest would have been extremely stressful.

Then, the second ship that came down, and the curtains seemed to pull away.

Concern was present with the lieutenant, and even more so with his crew behind him as the vessel landed in an aggressive manner, setting itself dangerously close to the gathering in the open courtyard. The soldiers behind their commanding officer quickly began communicating through their combat suit comm systems for information, as their lieutenant in turn raised a scaled limb to indicate that everyone remain calm. When armed squads came out of the second ship, weapons drawn, the confusion turned into tension, and when they opened fire, the raised limbs weren't enough to prevent the favor from being returned.

The following shootout introduced Yitale and her ship-beast to the civil war.

Popping cracks and hisses of shields ripped the air as impacts rained down around her in screeching bursts of energy. Her skin burned, as bolts of plasma went sizzling through the air, synchronized with the pulsing fire of returning fire. As a shock grenade burst at their feet, Yitale had been thrown from a lucidly surreal state of confusion, to hard earned- half conscious struggle to keep her thoughts in a straight fashion.

Soldiers began to die in a tremendous affair, as plasma bolts boiled and burst their flesh apart, while those lucky enough to have had time to react, brought retribution back upon their aggressors, letting loose with volleys of organized attacks. A huge variety of weapons were unslung, and unloaded, and bursts of pressure differences began to throw any being present from their feet.

In the pandemonium, Yitale found herself dragged by the scruff of her mane like a young spawnling, and tossed behind cover by the ridiculous strength of her guardian, shortly followed by the human himself rolling in directly behind her with a rough grunt.

Cover, which then lurched to throw them yet again, as it took off from the planet's surface on the screaming signals issued by the lieutenant an instant before Yitale watched his head torn off by what appeared to be a metal death-machine. Gore flew through the air in slow motion as the monstrosity turned to face them with a flat face of cold black sensors, and jagged grafted shards.

Then, the scene fell away beneath them. The ramp into the ship lifted to seal in those that had made it inside, and Yitale had just enough of a view to watch the unexpected, robotic, third party turned and lunged for the original assailants before she was slumped over from the sheer force of their accelerated ascension skyward.

Heavy metal clicked shut, and a shield fusing appeared along the seams, suggesting they were heading for a trip out of the current atmosphere.

Then, all was quiet.

As the events caught up to them, it was suddenly apparent that Yitale abruptly found herself alone, with the human, and a large number of individuals she was not familiar with, in a military ship- which had just lost a commanding officer- and was now heading towards a known combat zone for refuge.

“What the frack just happened?” A loud voice rang out from the far side of the hangar.

“I'm not sure, friendly fire, and that was an SAI unit towards the end. Perhaps an illegal model.” The response was a much meeker presence, faintly coming from the back left corner.

“My broodmate is out there! Turn this Voidburnt ship back towards that battle, we can still save them! If the lieutenant is dead- I'm in charge of this operation!”

“Sir, death orders, not to be overruled, procedure and code are to be followed!”

“Fracking Damn it all to the void- this is your fault!” The accusatory voice directed towards her direction now.

Yitale was slipping slowly down against the wall, as heads and appendages turned her way.

She hurt too badly. Her sides seemed to burn, her head almost seemed to crunch in on her mind as though her skull was under extreme pressure. It wasn't a good time to be defenseless, but she knew in this situation her own capacity was almost entirely irrelevant. Her so-called ship beast, with its gleaming collar, stepped in front of her immediately, drawing a sword.

The weapon was easily three units long, and it held an off-kilter color, a strange bluish tinge that held even in the dim light of the hold.

"They would still be alive if we hadn't had to come down to this forsaken rock." The soldier's voice seemed to tremble with rage as it spoke in a low fierce tone. "That mechanized unit was forbidden military tech, only the lines are allowed to use those things."

"Well how the frack did it end up on the planet then? Those are meant for deep space."

"I don't know, it happened too quickly. I didn't even recognize what it was at first, heavy customization. Those units usually don't even have a weapon function, but that one had blades welded all over the place! Where did it even come from? And why did the others shoot at us?"

The voices grew silent for a moment, and Yitale felt her mane begin to prickle as it rose along her scalp, and down her spine. The simplest explanation was generally the most likely, and in this case, the simplest explanation was not a good one.

"Stand up, and put your limbs where we can see them." The voice was supported by the shuffling of boots and claws scraping the metal dockwork as soldiers began to fan out. Lights flashed on in a bright shock, as the ceiling glowed to full volume, revealing the bay beneath it.

The feeling in her gut was equivalent to the song of discomfort murmuring from her throat as she tried to stand up, pushing her hands against the metal framework to push into position. All around her were angry soldiers, and in their hands, or claws, were weapons; laser sights glowing trajectory paths of beam weapons that would reach her before she could blink, flee, or beg.

The only thing between them and her was the human. The ship beast by contract, that she wasn't even sure trustworthy...

"Call the creature off Shipmaster Yitale. We don't want to hurt it, but we're going to take you into custody until this gets sorted out."

The massive sword slowly dragged the blade's tip along the heavy tiles before it, leaving a thin gash along the dockwork floor, before the human raised it up into a defensive stance and backed away from the aggressors. Yitale's slender frame was completely hidden behind the dense form as her guardian nudged her back into the corner of the bay, and out of the targeting sights.

Murmurs of confusion slipped out as hushed voices communicated over the comm systems, and flashes of data searches ran on their HUD screens. “Thing has a collar, but scans don't recognize it. Anyone know what that thing is? It has a mechblade-”

“Just use caution, it probably just doesn't know any better. Siren probably has the thing bonded.” The volume increase as the leader shouted, “Last chance shipmaster. We will not hesitate to put that beast down!"

Yitale leaned against the cold smooth plating of the wall, slumping against the second with her shoulder as her scarred tail curled around her. Exhaustion was present, seeping, everywhere in her mind. Everywhere, but a tiny spark of... something else. A feeling of invisible presence, in the front and center of her brain. As much as he had remained distant, it seemed she hadn't completely failed to get through to him after all.

Slowly, she leaned herself toward that, in a concentrated effort to grab onto it, as if it were a physical thing, something that was palpable. If she could touch it, she might be able to manipulate-

The volley of thoughts that hit her were something of insanity itself: An insane stream of ridiculous assessments, of dark and covered motivations, of desperate emotions, of pure caged anger, terror, and guilt.

“I'm the last one.” Images of a burning planet, of crusiers in the dark. “I have to make it back to h-”

The images pummeled Yitale in a volley, her intentions fell aside and dissipated like wisps of smoke as she simply felt it pull her in, accelerating her towards its center like a black-hole, before spitting her out in stunning force that rattled her.

All that, from what barely classified as a bond. Just a peephole's equivalent, a sliver of comparison to what a life-bond should be. And as soon as she touched it, she knew that it had done the same. The foreign flush of currents rained in on her mind with riptides and flurries. It saw everything- all of who she was in an instant, an impression, of a snapshot, of a memory.

Then, as quickly as it had appeared, it was simply gone. Back to the tiny spark in the front of her mind, but slightly larger than before. Warm, like a small flame.

So transfixed by the feeling it gave, Yitale almost missed the whisper that rustled through it, and into her own mind.

“You should probably warn them.”