The ship held in darkness. The shimmering of stars danced off its surface hiding the ship in the sea of stars.
The floating ship slowly turned, flittering, moving slowly though the endless void, it held all and yet vastly none, the ripples from stars moving planets, moving the fabric of this place.
Inside the ship veiled within the black waited Razaloth. He was tapping his leg against the ground, anxious of when his ship would return. He knew not what they would report but he held little hope they would return the ship. His ship was badly damaged, hobbled together from the scrap humans call ships, he knew not if the Rruin modification would hold out in the void of space.
The Hours trickled by slowly, until the stress of waiting finally exhausted Razaloth and a slumber befell him before the ship had returned.
He awoke from his slumber with the rocking of the ship, the scraping of metal and the hissing from the exhaust ports, the ship had returned.
Razaloth moved quickly, running to the port on the side of the ship, he needed to know what they would say, what they saw.
As he rounded the last corner on the corridor the light filtered through the red lights and he saw the captain's face. She looked worried.
'Yes.' Razaloth thought to himself. 'They saw it, they now know what I saw, what I was up against'.
The captain's face continued to fall and her shoulders slumped as she heard more of what her subordinate had to say.
The captain looked around her surroundings before thumping her clenched fist onto her horns, the ringing sound that they produced was low and dull like a fist hitting wood, slowly with each thump. Another thump accompanied it and the whole crew joined in, from even the lowest crew member everyone was hammering their own horns with their fists.
A loud crisp sound resounded above all the other thumps piercing the air around them. The crew looked in the direction the sound came from in. Still in the hall by himself was Razaloth who with two hands was thumping his own horns, the sound was clear a sign of his increased durability and his status as a Gunner. The sound was half a pitch away from an Elites.
The crew stared in shock. They knew he was a gunner but he was the last surviving gunner of the outpost who is close to an elite, everything he had said was true, the janitor started it he bowed to Razaloth who continued to beat his horns. Soon, the rest joined in including the captain. As tears rolled down the scales of his cheeks he turned to the member of the crew and used all his strength to strike his horns one last time. The sound was like a gong and resounded through the halls of the ship, slowly as the sound still lingered Razaloth bowed to the crew, he had been accepted.
The ship slowly turned back to normal and went towards the elders ship that would enable them to attach the humans again and take back what was theirs and avenge their fellows who had been slaughtered.
The dark ship slipped into the bright light sphere, the shapes and colours passed by their ship moving close but never touching the ship. The inside was completely normal, no walls warping or colours spilling in. The Druin ship sailed smoothly through this space without a problem, nothing changed and inside the ship the a clock was projected on the wall on the bridge counting down from five minutes. The red lights surrounding the strange numbers slowly disappeared with the time going down.
After the five minute countdown ended inside the colourful space a black sphere formed around the ship, the sight when they come through the hole was of numerous Druin ships flanking the elder ship. The elder ship was sleek, two long prongs came out of the front of the ship and merged into the body before extending out the back. The ships around the elder ships looked like shards of diamonds, sleek but able to move in any direction when needed.
Slowly, black sand like gravel floated into the air and a large face was formed inside the Druin bridge.
"Welcome, Captain. We were not expecting you to join with us until the next cycle" said the large male Druin now in the middle of the room.
"Sir, we have encountered humans now occupying the outpost we were heading to"
"Are they currently attacking the outpost?" asked the man with a face full of worry.
"No sir" the man interrupted the Captain's sentence before she had finished.
"Thank the elders, but they have invaded our space, correct?"
The captain gritted her teeth "Sir, they are not attacking the outpost as they have already taken it over" The Captain watched as the mans face fell from relief to pure anger and hatred.
"How many survivors?"
"One sir. A Druin gunner who fought to the end. After being knocked out a dune swallowed him and he was not found by the extermination effort of the humans" The Captain chose her words carefully, she was measured in her story, she knew that if word got back to the elder of a gunner surviving without citizens in tow without knowing the whole story it would be hell for Razaloth.
"hmmm" said the man as he scrutinized her face and body movements. He watched her ears carefully, if they twitched, her mouth if it quivered or if she lowered her horns, all signs she would be lying. After a long minute the man broke from the silence.
"Do you have previous contact with this gunner?"
"No sir, we just picked him up in a modified human ship. He was injured and showing signs of overload, he had clearly fought like hell to get off world" She made sure to emphasized how beat up and injured Razaloth was when he had arrived to show to her superiors that he was not a deserter and had killed many humans in revenge and was in fact still a true believer in the ancestors.
If this was enough for him to be believed and his story to be heard she was not entirely sure, but she had to do something, he had survived. He knew what the ground looked like, he would be valuable to the counter attack and he was one of them, a Druin who fought hard to save his people. She did not want him to be driven out because of this.