****
This is a story I wrote last year for a Fiction Writing course at my University, thus I must apologize for what may seem as a condescending tone in some areas as this was written for a audience with no technological background or understanding of what the Arigas setting is to me. Be warned there is some innuendo. Still, gave it an R to be safe.
****


A blue scaled phyrrian rumbled pleasantly, his reptilian muzzle resting on the heaving chest of his mate. His name was Zhukar Renneth, and his mate was Asiko CarRak, a Wepernian. The cori-derivative looked to a human like a bipedal canine, reminiscent of the Corgi breed of dog. The white fur of her bare chest rose and fell, panting in the afterglow of their lovemaking.


“mrawr,” Zhukar rumbled “You are always amazing my love.”


The canid scratched him behind the ears gently, a gesture of affection. “That, hfeh” she panted “I am.” Asiko got up, gently sliding her sweat slickened form from Zhukar to go take a shower. The blue scaled reptilian was left with his thoughts. Only a few months ago he had been alone, depressed and confused. Now each day got better. Standing, the phyrrian slid his uniform back on. He was an employee of TITAN Security, a Private Military Company. Rumor had it they had a new operation lined up, and they were to report for briefing in a short while.


Shortly later Asiko emerged from the shower, freshly clothed in a uniform. “Arr, we gotta be at the briefing in 5 minutes.” Asiko glanced at Zhukar, and the door, then back at Zhukar. “Race ya!” she exclaimed as she tore out the door.


Zhukar stood in shock for a second before he realized Asiko was gone, tearing down the hall out of her. This was what he liked about her. She was impulsive and fun loving and he loved how it rubbed off on him. Zhukar pumped his legs, powerful stride keeping pace with the sable furred cori as they tore down the hall, leaving personnel they passed standing blinking nonplussed and confused.


Unfortunately, Asiko had seen their Commanding Officer ahead, and was skidding to a halt. Zhukar’s claws screeched against the floor as he struggled to skid to a halt. Unfortunately he was going too fast and slammed into the back of Asiko, the two toppling over. Zhukar looked up, smiling weakly. Their CO was known only to them as the Ell Tee, but despite his enigmatic nature was a good person, cared for all of his troops deeply. He offered a hand to Zhukar and Asiko, helping them up.


“Well I’m glad yall could make it,” he said, smiling knowingly at the two. “Come, we’re just about ready to start.”


As the three entered the room, they saw the large room was filled with mercenaries, three tiers of seating wrapped around a central holographic projector. In the center stood the commander attached by TITAN to the operation, and a Phyrrian Lieutenant. Zhukar recognized the uniform, the black double breasted style of the Special Operations Command. Most likely he served with Naval Intelligence.


“Thank you for coming.” The human commander said with his deep, somber voice. Zhukar had only ever seen him a few times, but he always seemed to be serious. “Now, as I’m sure you are all aware, we’ve been tapped for an operation by the Phyrrian Royal Navy. They have something big going on and they need us to take care of some of the small things. I’ll let Lieutenant Vaishan here fill you in on the rest.”


Vaishan nodded an affirmation at the Commander. “Your Commander is correct.” The black uniformed, red scaled phyrrian said. The Holographic projector switched to displaying a three dimensional view of phyrrian space, before zooming in on the Arigas Sector. A line of red highlighted several frontier systems, ominously hanging over them. “Recent reconnaissance patrols by the 4th fleet have uncovered this enemy presence. The Grand Admiral has approved an operation, Operation Chevalier and we are going in to clear them out. This is where you come in.” As he gestured, the projector zoomed in on a small gray moon, dotted with a few bases. “We lack the troop strength to assault all of these bases at the same time, so we will be employing your services. If you have any other questions, I will be sending a dossier on the Ashiran Empire.” The projector switched one last time to displaying a six legged worker drone, fierce mandibles clicking. “Good luck.”

***


The dropship touched down with a puff of dust, the ticking sound of cooling alloy audible over the distant booms of defensive fire. Their assignment had changed on the way down. Instead of partaking in the main attack, Zhukar’s group was now tasked with eliminating an anti-air emplacement on a hill, to weaken the insect’s defensive perimeter and allow their air support to assist them. According to Vaishan, the Commonwealth Navy would have just nuked this rock from orbit, but they couldn’t. Apparently the bugs were using some of their own people as shields. Could be a trap, but they couldn’t take that chance.


Zhukar grabbed his bag, slinging it over his shoulders. He was a medic, and the bag contained all of the medical tools and supplies he couldn’t cram into compartments on his armor. He trotted up to his commanding officer, Asiko trailing behind him. She was playing with the lower receiver on her massive field rifle, apparently finding an offensive speck of dirt.


Zhukar admired the Ell Tee’s armor. His armor was far blockier then either Zhukar or Asiko’s, but it had even greater capabilities then both of theirs combined, and was damn near a walking tank. His helmeted form nodded at the two as they walked up.


“So Ell Tee, whats this about a mission change?”


The human stiffened, clearly uncomfortable about what was being asked of his squad. “Well, us and Beta, Gamma, and Theta squads will be assaulting up this hill. We don’t take out that AA emplacement and this offensive is going nowhere.”


“Ahrr, what sort of defenses we looking at here?” Zhukar enquired.


The El Tee shrugged, which was actually an impressive gesture in his thick armor. “Standard bug fare. Heavy linear accelerator weaponry, a few tachyon beam emplacements. Expect them to use a lot of good old fashioned HE rockets. Don’t worry though, we’ll plow right through em and be back on ship in time for dinner. Asiko, you have point.”


The corgi nodded, and they set off to the crater wall, their destination just over its rim. Their squad had been one short since that shipping accident near Voltaire. Fortunately, they had all of their specialists with them. The human that served as their designated marksman hailed from the Confederation of Solar Republics (CSR) planet of Rousseau. From what they gathered, his name was Daniel, but he rarely spoke. Allegedly he came from a privileged existence but something happened in his childhood that he had to turn to a rougher living.


They also still had their heavy weapons specialist, Alexei Zey Vyacheslav. The wepernian was a thick furred sayd derivative, and he had a love for firearms that bordered on the disturbing. He even named his KSI-17 Heavy Machine Gun Irina, and took meticulous care of it. He spoke with a thick accent (Asiko had called it Second Rosette). “Tyme to keel some covards, dar?”


“Pretty much Alexei. Try and at least hit the enemy once this time though, hrr?” As Asiko said this, her armored tail wagged, showing she wasn’t serious. Still, Alexei fell silent, fuming at the cori.


As they hiked up the crater wall, Asiko poked her armored head over the rim. She could see their objective, but it wasn’t nearly as heavily defended as they were lead to believe. She sent the video feed to her squadmates. “Well Ell Tee, it’s your call, what’d ya think?”
“We ain’t got no choice, we push on.” Asiko nodded, as much to herself as anyone else, before throwing herself up over the crater rim. Flipping through the air, she landed with a plume of dust and dashed forward, ducking down behind a large boulder. The rest of her squad scrambled up and followed her. In the distance she could see the brilliant flashes of tachyon beams raking the other formations of mercs assaulting up the hill. Dirty orange fireballs peppered the troop formations as HE rockets flew towards them, mixed with the crack of linear accelerators. The atmosphere was too thin to breathe (at least for them), but it was thick enough to convey sound.


Fortunately, none of the defenders had seemed to notice them. She hoped that stayed the same as she crept forward, slinking into small craters and behind rocks, waving forward their formation. As she moved to advance again, a projectile ripped into the ground before her and she ducked backwards. “Daniel, enemy sniper. I’d guess about 3 klicks out, dead ahead.”


“Copy that,” the human said coldly as he un-limbered his xaser (X-ray spectrum laser). To Asiko, the weapon was ugly, and ineffective, but he swore by it. Using targeting data transmitted by Asiko, the human paused for a moment, before popping up above the boulder long enough to fire a return shot. The loud, whining pulse of the invisible energy weapon drowned out all sound for a moment, and Asiko popped up in time to see a large hole bored in the distant sniper’s chest before it fell over. Waving the formation onward, Asiko leapt from cover, dashing up to the base of the hill.


The defenders finally seemed to be taking note of them, and one of the massive tachyon beams raked towards them. The group dived for cover, a small depression where once eons ago water may have flowed, now saving them from the deadly rain of high energy particles. Asiko pined for her K-racks, their high punch would have been very useful here, but the Ell Tee had said no, too close to friendly targets, could cause casualties. She voiced her disdain over the squad channel.


“Ell Tee, sure would be nice to have some ROCKETS right ‘bout now hrr?”


“Can it Asiko! Alexei, suppressive fire!” The massive sayd derivative hiked up the large machine gun, spraying at the hilltop, raking it with a steady thud of large caliber rounds. Taking advantage of the lull in return fire, Asiko ripped a subcritical fusion grenade off her belt, setting it for a contact detonation and hurling it at the hilltop only about fifty meters away. It landed square on the barrel of the Tachyon beam gun, consuming it and everything two meters around it in a ball of fire.


The Ell Tee saw this opening and decided to take advantage of it. “Go go go!” he ordered, charging up the hill in the lead. Fire from the bugs pelted them, but they returned, cleanly and effectively. He staggered as a large caliber round thunked into his chest, and back-tracked it in time to see a hole blasted into the offending insect. The rapid fire crack crack crack of the anti-air weapon on the hilltop tore through the air as it tracked a distant target. His eyes swept back down to the base of the hill, where bug reinforcements had emerged from a camouflaged entrance. If they didn’t get their air support down soon they would be surrounded and massacred. Pushing up, he finally crowned the hill, only to be knocked back down by the force of incoming fire, dents painfully reverberating through his armor.


Asiko saw the Ell Tee go down and leapt over him, charging at the insects. There were six of them, all worker drones, arrayed for one last desperate stand before the anti-air gun. Guns swung up, tracking her, but she was on a collision course, and nothing would deny her prize. Colliding into them, she wrestled with one of them, pinning it to the ground and ripping its head off with the strength amplified arms of her armor. The rest of the team crested the slope, and quickly put the rest out of action. She turned around in time to see Zhukar help the Ell Tee back up, apparently unharmed but shaken by the ordeal.


“Take out that gun, Asiko. The rest of you, fan out and spray the slopes.” The team of armored mercs dispersed, and Asiko turned to the large anti-air emplacement. The bugs had left it on automatic, and the loud crack of its high velocity rounds breaking the sound barrier was still quite audible. She pondered it for a moment, before taking her type-3 multitool from her belt. Beating on an access panel, she pried off the offending alloy, before whacking what seemed to be control circuitry. It shorted out with a shower of sparks, and the light from a nearby control panel died, apparently inert. However, she wasn’t satisfied. Leaping up the long gun barrel and shimmying to the top, she braced against the muzzle, panting for a moment before the metal yielded, the rails splitting apart to the sound of rending metal.


From the ground Zhukar chuckled. “You’re so sexy when you’re dressed up in armor that could squash me and destroy a tank.”


Asiko made a triumphant gesture. “That’s not the only thing I can do with a Type-3 Multitool. I-“pausing, she looked back down the slope. The insects had turned around entirely, and were funneling back into the tunnels from whence they came.


“Strange.” The El Tee noted. Not that it had any bearing on their mission. “Black Rock, this is Alpha 1. Hill 20 has been neutralized; you may start your drops. Also, be advised it seems the bugs have started to retreat underground. What are your orders?”


There was a pause on the other line, before the authoritative voice spoke. “Sweep what you can top-side Alpha-one, then link up with our forces heading underground.”

***


Silenced consumed the team of mercenaries as they made their way through the dark cavern complex. Asiko CarRak climbed over another rock, scraping her helmeted head on the ceiling as she pushed through. She grunted with annoyance as the rest of the team climbed through. The tension in the air was thick enough to cut with a molecular knife, and the team pushed on in silence. She swept her visor across the larger cavern before her, before continuing their slow sweep. The team had caught a few stragglers topside but they simply killed them. Orders were for this op that there would be no prisoners, and since the Arigas Treaty Association (ATA) had rescinded governmental status from the Ashiran Empire remnant the mercs had no choice but to obey their employer’s orders. Not that Asiko really cared. The insects were the vilest of any of the Arigas Sector races and certainly rated high on her disturbing meter, but she couldn’t help but feel that the Phyrrians were doing this for vengeance. Even Zhukar himself had seemed to change once they landed. She lagged back to be closer to him even though it mattered little with their wireless link.


“What’s a matter hun? You seem a little distracted,” she asked over a private link.


“vsss” Zhukar hissed softly. “It’s nothing, this place; it just brings back bad memories for me.”


“Ah. I forget that you were in the war from time to time, you just don’t seem the soldierly type.”


“I wish I could too,” he said. Their screams tore through the air, above the sound of more projectiles hammering the ground. Fire lit the ground and washed over him, melting the outer layers of his armor as more Ashiran bombers raked their position.


“The bugs again?” Asiko asked, turning slightly out of reflex as if to look at him, even though it was a futile gesture in her armor. Instead, she looked down at the false color TV image displayed by her rear facing camera.


“Yeah. You know how I deserted the Phyrrians right?”


“mmhmm, you were in the Phyrrian Marines right?”


“I was a Guardian, and a field medic. My Talon came under heavy bombardment during the battles around Zelthia.” The massive missiles streaked through the air, the whole team seeing their doom approaching. “They hit us with good old fashioned high explosive and incendiaries. If it wasn’t for a SOC team in the area, I’d be dead too.” The power armored spec ops soldier hauled his mangled body over his shoulder, blood slicking his armor as he ran. “It was… terrible. I… I still remember the Captain; he got hit directly by one of the strikes. His body… I tried to patch together what I could but… well, that was when an incendiary bomb dropped on us. Roasted him alive.” The captains once proud green flesh sloughed off as he tried to repair it, charred black and dead. “I-I just couldn’t take it anymore at that point. I fled and promised I’d never go into battle again, but when I deserted that put a black mark on my reputation, my honor was tarnished.” The court martial’s uncaring audience watched as his rank insignia were stripped, his honors removed.


“Well,” Asiko said, unsure what to say. “At least you still have me! This does explain a lot of your reservations about fighting though, I understand.”


“Hir hir hir” Zhukar chuckled. In his mind he thought back to his first meeting with Asiko. Their first mission was a mess too, but at least they lived. “That is something, something I’m very grateful for every day.”


The team pushed through the rough hewn rock of the caverns, Asiko staring attentively ahead, her visuals set on thermal and displaying a high resolution black and white image. Nothing ahead, nothing behind, and they had seen nothing for miles. Asiko was about to voice her concerns to the El Tee when their combat controller in orbit came in over the general channel.


“Black Rock to all ground teams, status report.”


“Alpha Team, situation green, no hostiles,” The El Tee remarked.


“Beta Team, situation green, no hostiles,” The Beta team leader said.


“Gamma Team, ditto.”


“Delta Team. Bumped into some hostiles but they ran before we could do anything.”


“Zeta Team. No problems so far.”


There was a pause as the last team checked in. Their combat control spoke up again. “Epsilon team, are you there?” Only silenced answered the controller. “Epsilon, do you read me?” Asiko felt worry and concern settle in her gut. Epsilon’s silence was not a good sign. “Damnit! Black Rock to all ground teams. Epsilon’s tracking beacon is still transmitting, converge on their position and get me a status report!”


There was a chorus of assent, and the El Tee turned to his team. “Let’s get going then, move us out Asiko.”


Advancing through the caverns once more, the team moved with haste, running and jumping over rocks strewn on the ground. Attempting to break the silence that had fallen over the team, Asiko spoke over the team chat. “This reminds me of this one time me and Zhukar were stuck in a cave fu-ARK!” Asiko growled as someone rapped her on the back of her helmet, smiling as she realized it was her phyrrian companion.


Asiko skidded to a halt in the rock strewn cavern. The cave seemed to split into two before her, but she could just make out father branching of paths in the distance. “Well Ell Tee, it’s your call. What do you want to do?”


“Hmm.” The Ell Tee paced back and forth, uncertain of what to do. If he split his team to cover as much ground as possible it they would run the risk of the smaller groups being overwhelmed. If they stayed together and ran into trouble or a dead end, it might take too long to reach Epsilon, and if they were in trouble, that could be the end of Epsilon. He would simply have to choose the former and hope it didn’t blow up in his face.


“Ok yall, here’s what we’re gonna do. Asiko, you take Alexei and Zhukar and sweep to the left. Everyone else, you’re with me.”


“Vill ve ghet paid bonus for zhis?” The heavy weapons specialist inquired. “Zhis vas not in my contract.”


“Oh, I’m sure we will. TITAN’s pretty good about this sort of thing.” Zhukar chirped.


Asiko sprinted down the cavern, Zhukar and Alexei close on her tail. At this point Asiko could have cared less about her pay, her training had taken over and her adopted teammates were in trouble. And besides, she knew at least a couple of her kin from the 252nd were in Epsilon team, so she would be serving her nation in an indirect way.


The angry sounds of a pitched battle reached Asiko’s boosted audio pickups, and she announced it over the general channel. “I’ve got contacts, something going on about a half click dead ahead.”


“Copy that” the El Tee said, sounds of gunfire carrying across his radio link. “Ran into-“white noise washed out his voice “say again, ran into trouble, will rendezvous asap.”


Resuming their sprint, the trio soon emerged into a larger cavern.


And straight into an ambush. Fire poured onto the team from all sides, and they dived behind the large rock on the floor. Alexei propped his heavy machine gun up on it, the rapid thump it delivered as it sprayed suppressive destruction at the enemy almost as loud as the hellfire raining down upon them. As the fire waned, Asiko pointed her arm mounted camera up over the ledge. Zooming in, she could see a few wepernians and humans spraying fire all around them as hundreds of worker drones swarmed in around them. She didn’t need the thermals to see this, the muzzle flashes of her comrades was enough to indicate their presence. She ripped another explosive from her belt. “Grenade out!” she bellowed, tossing the spherical device. The sub-critical warhead detonated in a blast of flame, and she motioned her group forward, spraying fire at a pair of injured insects with her dual sub-machine guns. The insect’s carapaces shredded under the projectiles, their green, thick blood pouring out.


Zhukar dashed across the divide, crawling forward to the remains of epsilon, even as everyone else continued to fire at the enemy, pausing only to change magazines. He tapped in to Epsilon’s squad network, downloading their vitals. Everyone was under high stress, and several of them were critically injured. If they didn’t get out soon, they were toast. A vicious growl sounded as Alexei took a round his shoulder, ducking down and spraying his machine gun in the direction of the insect that fired it. Score after score of enemies fell under the heavy barrage, and he laughed a blood crazed laugh. “Har har har, keeling you is so easy to me, is funny!”


The phyrrian turned to the human lying before him. He was in the worst condition by far. Putting the emergency code into his armor, he popped off the chest plate. A linear accelerator round had torn right through him and he was losing blood fast. Reaching into a compartment on his own armor and removing a tube, he sprayed a general purpose medical sealant into the cavity and slapped bio-bandages on both sides. It wasn’t much, but it was the best he could do for him. A sudden noise behind him startled him, and he spun around to see what it was in time to see one of the insects crumple a few feet from him, riddled with bullets and xaser marks.


Asiko opened the com channel. “I’ve got a status on Epsilon. We are under heavy engagement, I repeat heavy enemy presence. We need backup!”


Another attacked Zhukar as he was patching up another fallen member of epsilon, and he sidestepped the creature’s crude melee weapon, gasping as it clanged against the rock. Snarling, the phyrrian leapt up, bringing his talons down on the insect’s legs. Green blood sprayed everywhere as his armored digits tore through the creature’s carapace. Grappling an appendage in his claw, he pulled hard, chopping downward with his other arm. There was a sickening crunch as the arm shattered, and he spun with the motion, slamming his spiked tail into what passed for a neck. As it fell, he jumped on it, ripping into the creature with his claws and not stopping until he felt someone pull him off the corpse. It was Asiko. “Pull yourself together!” she yelled, handing him his spine-throwing carbine.


The insects had managed to push in a lot closer in the short time that he was distracted, climbing over hills of their compatriots. They seemed to have given up altogether on their ranged weapons, rushing them with heavy spears.


“Awr, dis is bad!” Alexei cried out as he continued to fire. His gun clattered empty and he slung the machinegun, having expended over 400,000 rhi worth of ammunition. In its place he drew a brace of sub machine guns.


Just as they were almost in stabbing range, several massive explosions sounded behind them, chitanous body parts flying through the ground. The Ell Tee had caught up at last. The heavy boom of his smooth bore FSDS (Fin Stabilized, Discarding Sabot) “shotgun” rising above all noise in the cavern as his fire team waded through the enemy. “Glad I caught up with yall. Head topside, the Commonwealth is landing in force.”


As Zhukar stood to move, one of the massive spears sailed straight through the air on a ballistic trajectory to him. He turned just in time to see the blur of it as it plowed into his chest, punching through his armor. The blue-scaled phyrrian fell to the ground with a cry of agony.


Asiko saw it all happen in slow motion. The spear punched through his armor as though it wasn’t there continuing on to punch into his body. Crimson blood sprayed from the wound, smearing his tan armor. Her sub machine guns were empty, and she tossed them at a nearby enemy with enough force to embed one in one of the enemy creature’s heads. Drawing her emergency clawgun, she fired a single shot at the enemy that had thrown the spear, taking it out, before rushing to Zhukar’s side.


“Don’t-“ Zhukar coughed raggedly “think I’ll be making it to retirement after all.”


“Don’t do this to me you crazy vatch!” Asiko shouted, struggling to hold back her tears.


“I had always wanted to see the galaxy too, it’s a shame. I never even got to see your Rosette.”


Asiko scooped up her mate. Even if he didn’t live, she refused to leave his body behind to be eaten by those things. “Hang my talons on Zelthia, the one battle I never left…” he coughed again, breath coming in ragged gasps.


The loud boom of the Ell Tee’s shotgun interrupted the moment. “GO!” he ordered. “Get Zhukar to help, it’s not too late for him! All of you!” As his shotgun ran out of ammo he picked up two of the bugs own accelerator weapons, ripping through them in scores. Shoulder mounted weapons popped up, spraying the enemy with hypersonic darts. “Come get some you filthy vermin! I’ll take you all to hell with me!” Spears clattered off of his armor, accelerator rounds pinging as well. He kneeled down for a moment but stood back up even under the deluge of fire he was falling under.


With a strangled cry, Asiko sprinted back out the cavern, Zhukar’s unconscious form in her arms and all the other mercs of their team and the remains of Epsilon hot on her tail. She shot one last look at the Ell Tee, seeing him batting aside the creatures with his armored fists. As she rounded a corner in her sprint to the surface, she switched to his helmet cam. Bugs swarmed all around him, but they did nothing to stop him. His massive arms crushed them underneath him, fists punching through them. He had picked up one of their melee weapons, swinging it about as naturally as if it were his own. The last thing she saw was a bug attacking his helmet. Tears streaked down her face as she fled, their once talkative squad now completely silent. They had seen it too, the death of their leader, a man who was as good as a father to them.

***
Zhukar Renneth felt a sudden searing heat and woke up with a shuddering gasp. He cried out in agony and fear, clawing the covers and his spines standing on end as his fight or flight instinct kicked into overdrive. The last thing he remembered was that massive spear plowing right through his armor. He had been so certain that it would take him into the abyss, but he seemed to be in a hospital somewhere. He looked over to Asiko, and cocked his head sideways.


“Ahrri, is this that ‘afterlife’ I heard so much about?”


Asiko looked up from her book and smiled close-lipped at Renneth, her tail wagging. "No," the sable-furred cori answered, standing up from her seated position on the floor. "You're still alive, amazingly. Didn't think ya'd make it, hurr."


Zhukar sighed, running a claw through his sceathers. “I can’t believe it. I thought for sure we were all dead. What happened to everyone else?”


"The Ell-Tee bought it," said Asiko matter-of-factly, tossing her book on the floor casually. "I thought we were pretty much hrRarRked" -- she recalled Alexei's impassioned cry of 'Awr, dis is bad!' -- until some phyrrians dropped in. An' only a few of THEM survived." The bitch shrugged, folding her arms across her chest. "Short si'rep," she continued, "lots of casualties."


“So many casualties.” Zhukar felt a pang of sadness for their loss. The Ell Tee in particular was a good man in an era and occupation where there were few. This was the very reason why he deserted in the first place.


Asiko licked her nose. "Yep. So ya said somethin' about goin' to the Rosette," she started, checking some piece of equipment with casual interest, "when ya were on the ground bleeding all over my armor." The cori picked up a plastic bag object and tilted her head at it. "I can probably arrange somethin' to that effect. Just have to stay at the right places."


The blue scaled phyrrian perked with interest. “We can? Oh that would be amazing! And who knows, maybe I’ll retire after this, take a couple decades off.” Zhukar’s wrapped his tail around himself, and he flashed a happy smile at Asiko, beckoning to her with open arms.


"Uhm, yeah," Asiko said quietly, padding over to Renneth. "We should talk about it later. Right now, you're in th' process of recoverin'."


Zhukar wrapped his arms around the cori, squeezing her tightly and burying his face in her chest as he nuzzled against her. “mrawr. Well doc, what’s my diagnosis?”


Asiko pant-laughed. "I'm a field engineer," she reminded Renneth, "not a medic. But you're supposed to be discharged in a few days. No major strenuous activity for a week after."


“What? Who said that! I feel fit as a felixan! Wait, we’re on a Royal Navy ship aren’t we?”


"Yerr," Asiko answered, her short tail turning neat circles.


“Well, that explains it. Damn navy doctors don’t know a carotid artery from a malpighian tubule sometimes. Bet they put some upstart hatchling in charge of this medbay too…” Zhukar seethed.


Asiko stepped back a bit, leaning on the bulkhead to the right of Renneth's bed. "So," she said at length, examining the nails of one paw lazily, "do ya want anything? Rations 'r somethin'?"


Zhukar looked her over greedily. “Well, I think I’d like to have you my love!” grabbing her by the waist, the phyrrian pulled her onto him, licking at her muzzle as he laid back on the bed. “I think we should be celebrating my return to the living, hrr?”


Asiko pant-laughed. "I'm a field engineer," she reminded Renneth, "not a medic. But you're supposed to be discharged in a few days. No major strenuous activity for a week after."


“psss” Zhukar hissed. “I am in a comfortably reclined position with my mate laying on top of me, whats strenuous about that? Fine, have it your way.”


"Don't you ever scare me like that again, do'," Asiko whispered, resting against his chest.


Zhukar hummed pleasantly, leaning forward to kiss her. “I’ll try love, I’ll try.”