"All right. I think that's the last of them," Raven grunts as she helps Darius toss one of the last unconscious Marauders into the brig. Like the outside of their craft, the walls, ceilings, and floors inside the room are jet black and non-reflective. Only thin lines of pulsing red help the three find their way through the enclosed compartment. Once the two teens are out, Raven presses a button outside of the brig, summoning a shimmering light-yellow energy barrier to cover the entrance. It's translucent enough to be seen through, making it easy to keep track of the prisoners.

"You're going to be safe here by yourself?" Nicholas asks as he moves to follow her back to the boarding tube. "You're sure they're not going to get out?"

"I think someone as strong as R'rith might be able to break the locks, but the force-field should keep him at bay. It's pure energy. The more he hits it, the more he'll just get hurt." Raven says as she climbs down a ladder leading to the jet bridge that connects the two ships. "Alright, well, if you guys don't have any more unnecessary questions, I guess this is where we part ways."

"Wait," says Nicholas, climbing down after her. "Why don't you come on board and say hello to the others? I'm sure they'll want to meet you."

Darius glances at him. "Are you sure about that?"

"I think she's earned our trust, no? I'm sure everyone will be thrilled to see another Human out here."

Clapping her hands together, Raven turns to walk across the boarding tube. "Fine, but you two really need to learn to whisper more quietly when you're talking about someone," she smirks, reaching hands out to ruffle the heads of both teenagers. "I could hear you two miles away." While Nicholas smirks and takes it, Darius swats lightly at her hand in annoyance.

Exiting the boarding tube a few minutes later, the group finally arrive at the caveship through one of the maintenance doors and make their way to a section of the ship with an archway that signals they've reached the cockpit area. The door to the bridge opens on their approach, and immediately, everyone inside turns their heads and their attention to the newcomers. Sarah and Sophia are first to approach, a mixture of awe and curiosity on their faces as they look at Raven and what she's wearing.

"Whoa," Sophia says, analyzing the body armor. "We saw what you did to R'rith on the monitors. That was pretty wild. I bet he's going to be really mad when he wakes up."

"Yeah, well, he had it coming. Imagine his frustration when he realizes he's going to be locked in solitary confinement for the rest of his days," Raven says, looking over the teenagers, examining them closely.

"Hello!" Tah-Kuell says as he wanders into the room from the hallway. "Always a pleasure to meet a new friend. I am Tah-Kuell. Welcome aboard." As he approaches the group and extends a hand toward her, Raven takes a step back, eyes narrowed, a spiteful look clear on her face as if his presence was offensive. "You didn't tell me you had a Grey on board."

"Tah-Kuell here helped us out," Sarah says, moving in closer to him as a defensive gesture.

"Is that a problem?" Nicholas says, bewildered.

There's a quiet, albeit tense, moment as Raven sizes up the alien in front of her, before she turns her attention to Nicholas and Darius, her facial features softening considerably. "As long as you keep that thing on a tight leash, no, there won't be a problem."

"Hey, he's our friend!" Sophia calls out, visibly upset at her treatment, stepping alongside Sarah to physically protect him. "What's your deal?"

Raven seems annoyed for a moment by Sophia's outburst but soon relaxes, closing her eyes. "I believe I was promised payment for my actions?" She opens her eyes and turns to Darius and Nicholas again. "If you don't mind giving me what you promised, I'll be out of your way as soon as that's done."

"You're right," Nicholas says. "I did promise you that. But we have sort of a problem."

"We've been trying to get them off for a while now," Darius says, lifting his arm and attempting to pull the omnitool from it. Any grip he gets on it is quickly lost, failure after failure eventually prompting Raven to release a sigh of defeat.

"Well then, I guess I'll just have to take your arm off," Raven says, taking a playful swipe at the boy, making him lean back and go tense. "Ha. Relax. I'm kidding. Look, if I can't get the omnitools, then at least give me something else. I'm not leaving emptyhanded." She looks back toward the others and, though she pays Tah-Kuell no mind, her vision lingers on the teenagers. "C'mon. I know you guys have something worth my time here. I'm getting paid, one way or another."

Sarah immediately digs into her pocket, removing her cellphone, handing it over to the mercenary. Raven takes it, looking it over. "What the hell is this?"

"It's a cellphone." Sarah explains, looking over at Nicholas and the others.

Nicholas, catching on quickly to what Sarah is doing, nods in agreement. "Yeah. A cellphone is a device with a key lock, sort of like a puzzle. You have to try to figure out how to make it unlock. Something valuable appears and gets opened if you can get through it. Like a treasure."

Raven immediately gives the two teenagers a skeptical look, before looking down at the cellphone. She gently presses at the buttons, eyebrow quirking when the screen lights up. "Is this part of the puzzle?" She turns the phone around so everyone can see. Sophia tries to contain herself from laughing as it's just the password screen, with a picture of Sarah hugging a kitten in the background.

"Yep. You have to figure out the right combination," Nicholas nods. "It's not easy. I've been trying to solve it all my life. Every kid has one." He looks back at the others, everyone lifting theirs. Even he raises his broken one.

"Uh huh..." Raven takes a few attempts at unlocking the phone but finds no success. "Well, I guess this is suitable, but when I get past this, I'm coming back. You got that?" With a dismissive wave, Raven turns to leave the bridge again. "Anyway, good luck. Stay safe. It's rough out there." The door closes behind her with a soft swish as she exits.

With a relieved sigh, Nicholas looks over at Sarah, who chuckles. "Well, that worked. Let's hope she never figures the 'puzzle' out," she says.

"Yeah, she seems like the kind of person that would be able to find us if she were angry enough," Nicholas remarks.

"Good call. I honestly didn't think she'd fall for it."

"What was her issue, anyway?" Ava huffs, finally stepping forward to join the others. "She seemed pretty upset that Tah-Kuell was here."

Tah-Kuell clears his throat gently. "My species has a very sordid history of abducting and experimenting on many species. Our insatiable thirst for knowledge has led us to do some... reprehensible things. In fact..." He turns to face everyone. "I believe we have visited your world before, although we only started researching it as far back as... oh... a century or so. Anyway, many species harbor a grudge against us, because we often do whatever we please without the consideration for galactic law."

"Your people sound like assholes," Darius says as he peers out the door to make sure Raven is really gone. "No offense, T.K."

"It's a shame we couldn't convince her to stay with us," Sarah notes, looking between the others in their group. "She seemed to know a thing or two about taking care of herself."

On the monitors, the Marauder vessel uncouples from the ship, slowly drifting away. Once at a safe distance, the black vessel adjusts course, turning on its backward thrusters and quickly speeding out of sight. Nicholas stares at the screen and smirks. "Who knows? We might bump into her again..."

"I've calculated where we might be headed next." Tah-Kuell crosses over to his seat, settling on it and bringing up a star chart on the main console. "There's a heavily trafficked star system in our path. I believe this is where the ship intends to take us next. We've got a few hours before arrival."

"Well, I'm exhausted," Darius says, walking back into the room and heading for his rolled bed.

With this news digested, the group agrees to settle in for a nap. Sophia and Sarah remain with Tah-Kuell in the cockpit, quietly learning about the ship's functions. Ava settles into one of the chairs in the far corner and plays around with the screens, eventually dozing off. Nicholas and Darius both lay down on their respective bedrolls, falling asleep fairly quickly.

It's not until the ship begins to audibly slow down from its usual low hum, several hours later, does Tah-Kuell give the signal for the two girls to awaken everyone. Nicholas gives a low groan as he's awoken, standing slowly, and trying to rub the sleep from his eyes.

The spaceship approaches a light azure planet, the dark side of it showing off a twinkle of lights on the surface, indicating it is in fact populated and industrialized. Though perhaps most importantly, the teenagers can see through the viewfinder that the system's star is completely surrounded by a mega-structure. Two colossal spires which periodically farm plasma from the sun's north and south poles. They are attached to a massive sphere that seems to completely engulf the star, unleashing occasional bursts of brilliant red, intercepted by enormous space stations on every side, that seem to beam the energy back to several planets in the system.

"What in god's name is that?" Darius says, staring at the massive sphere through the screen.

"I believe your people call it a Dyson Sphere," Tah-Kuell responds, typing on the main console to make sure the teenagers get more detailed information about the structure on the monitors.

Soon, the ship's other displays are overcome with a heavy glow of reds and oranges as the ship descends into the blue planet's atmosphere. The cameras outside somehow managing to remain undamaged and still broadcast live images through the firy entry. The group brace themselves for the inevitable. Tah-Kuell, curious at everyone's panic, observes this strange behavior. "What's the matter? This ship can clearly handle atmospheric reentry, and its systems know how to approach the ground properly. There's nothing to worry about. No need to--"

"Just wait for it," Sarah chimes in. The teenagers close their eyes and prepare themselves.

Nicholas turns to Tah-Kuell and sighs. "Here we go again."

Almost as if on cue, a brilliant surge of blue energy overcomes everyone on the bridge and moments later, they're sent outside the ship, deposited onto the cold surface of a landing platform. With this accomplished, the ship hovers for a few minutes before it begins to ascend again, maneuvering thrusters now visible beneath it as it speeds away out of sight in seconds.

While the others had braced for it and came out of it standing tall, Tah-Kuell, who'd been sitting moments before, finds himself on his back after a slight fall. "It would seem that our host does not care for a traditional way of physically entering and exiting the vessel. Duly noted."

Slowly, Tah-Kuell stands back up, dusting himself off. He frowns and looks at the surrounding area. "Fortunate that we were dropped off on a habitable planet," he says, looking about slowly. "The odds of that are highly improbable."

The slate grey metal platform stretches on for many miles. Nearby are some landing pads, each one ascending and descending into the ground below as smaller vessels land or take off. The pilots of these craft seem to pay no attention to the group being there. Tall, mollusk-shaped buildings stretch off in the horizon in every direction almost the size of skyscrapers. Each building attempts to defy physics in some way, or simply look unique: one has floors that rearrange themselves to create strange alien symbols every few seconds. Yet another seems to completely lack any solid walls, a slowly wavering, translucent barrier showing off the insides of the building which in this case is filled completely with water.

Movement catches the attention of Darius, who nudges Nicholas and the others, and as a result they all turn to face what appear to be a small group of alien security guards approaching.

One, a tall, bird-like alien, seems unarmed, but is also flanked by two taller, serpentine looking beings, each wielding a weapon. The make and model is visibly similar to the kind Raven had, but instead of black, it's grey, and seems much less sophisticated in comparison. The two serpentine aliens wear a navy blue uniform, not traditional in the sense of military, but clearly a uniform for a type of security forces.

The bird-like alien wears a blue and black uniform with several golden medals on his chest and carries with him an air of smug importance as he walks forward. He is a good two feet shorter than either of the serpents on either side of him, bringing him to just above Darius in height. He has a brilliant, bright green plumage over most of his feathers, though around his eyes, a ruby red paint swirls decoratively, connecting to each other over his forehead in an elaborate harmony that implies quite a bit of time is spent on these paints daily. The uniform he wears lack sleeves, showing off even more feathers. Finally, a bright yellow beak sticks out from his face, though not made of hard keratin. It seems to move flexibly as he speaks to his cohorts, and at first sight, seems a bit unnatural.

As for the serpent-like aliens, they are every bit as intimidating as they look, standing an easy two feet taller than even Darius, with long, thick, snake-like bodies trailing behind them as they slither forward toward the group. Their humanoid upper bodies sport powerful arms that perfectly fit their muscular frames, each of them sporting flared hoods that start from their hips and stretch all the way up to their heads, where they meld perfectly into their skulls. Both of their snouts stretch out past their face, somewhat hiding a vicious set of razor sharp teeth, easily noticeable any time one of them dares to turn their head in any direction.

"Oh, that must be the spaceport's security," Tah-Kuell muses, watching as they approach without much care, almost as if he'd seen this type of thing before. "But I don't recognize the uniform."

Stopping before the group of six, the bird-like alien seems amused, almost glad. But the serpent aliens seem disinterested now that they see any potential threat has disappeared. They lower their weapons in a neutral stance.

"Ah, new visitors!" the bird creature speaks excitedly, offering a low bow. "I dreamt the previous night of the great spirits depositing six lost souls at this very landing pad. And what do you know? Here we are." He chuckles almost excessively and stands tall again. "I am Nal'rook, chief executive officer on this planet and representative of Wortani Enterprises. Do not be intimidated by my associates, they're merely a formality, in case you did not come with the best of intentions. Welcome to Torith, sixth planet in the Kantir system, and one of the galaxy's largest commercial hubs." He extends his arms as if showcasing the planet. "Wortani Enterprises would like to reach out and make you a most welcoming invitation, we would like to make you our most esteemed guests this evening." Nal'rook smiles, turning to face them again as a small craft arrives behind him. "You have been selected to be the lucky few to meet the Grand President himself. Come, let's not occupy this platform too long and overstay our welcome." He motions toward the vehicle, much smaller than the spacecraft the teenagers are used to. The craft looks more like a private shuttle than a starship, and gently hovers in place and awaits to be boarded.

The inside of the vehicle is surprisingly posh, with seats upholstered in leather in the same blacks and blues as the bird's uniform. At the front of the vehicle is a single pilot, ready to take them wherever they need to go, separated from the body of the vehicle by a translucent partition. Entering first, Nal'rook quietly sits and looks expectantly toward the group of six, who are still outside.

Nicholas looks among the others, and ultimately to Tah-Kuell, who shrugs a little.

"I don't see any other way down. Maybe this could be our ticket home," Darius chimes in, pushing past the others and climbing onto the craft. Sophia is next to follow along, hopping into one of the seats.

"Yes, I think a private ship back to your home planet can be arranged," Nal'rook speaks, smiling pleasantly.

Ava immediately follows Sophia and Darius, a grin on her face. "It's nice to see someone out here with some class."

Only Nicholas, Sarah, and Tah-Kuell lag further. Nicholas and Sarah glance at each other, only for a moment, both mutually suspicious of the new aliens. Still, with half the group already present inside, Nicholas gives up his hesitation and decides to climb up to the ship, with Sarah and Tah-Kuell following right behind him. Once everyone's settled in, the doors swish close behind them and the vessel begins lifting from the landing platform. Before they get too far, another ship moves in for a landing right where they'd been standing moments before, allowing the two serpent aliens from earlier to board and follow them.

"So where are we going exactly?" Nicholas asks as he settles into his seat inside, still unsure of their decision to get on board. "Is this place close?"

"A facility on the Northern hemisphere. One of Wortani's command centers," Nal'rook replies. "It's where you will be staying. The President has been notified and he is waiting for you."