Claremont Academy Session 5 – “It’s Not the Stars that Hold Our Destiny”

Down Below, earlier that morning

It was the Monday after the Friday before; a Friday that had been packed with unexpected encounters with Tattered Men, time-crossed twins and apparently mystical pendants. Ashen was now sat in the changing room ‘down below’ attaching a special lined cowl to his training uniform. He needed to have the option of operating in daytime and the school hoodie was obviously working for him during school hours, completely shielding his skin from the effects of UV rays, so why not use a similar protection on his costume?

He picked up a bag of plastic pods, placed two in the special compartment he’d added to his glove and the rest in a concealed compartment on his belt.

Ashen was hoping that using specialist ‘smoke’ grenades filled with reflective particulates would provide him with sufficient ‘shade’ to allow him to use his powers in daylight. He was however still struggling to overcome his personal fears about using powers whilst outside, under the Sun.

He marvelled that something that powerful could fit is such a relatively small capsule but the smoke was generated by an explosive charge and a small amount of a chemical reacting with the oxygen in the air so most of the space was given over to storing the highly compressed reflective particles that would (hopefully) shield him from ultraviolet emissions.

Ah well, time to try it out. The school had agreed to a private training session. So, toss one, drop the other, toss one and drop the other, he repeated to himself as he pulled his cowl over his head and headed into a training chamber under an artificial, blazing sun. If this worked, this would be a real surprise to show to his friend Chris…

The BASEment

“Damn Akira!” Mace thought as she activated her bike and flew out of the hangar at breakneck speed. It was bad enough he’d been such an idiot during the school assembly, but to steal one of the pendants..? Someone had to apologise for the damage the “voleur idot” was doing to the team’s reputation, she just wondered why she felt it had to be her?

Now

It was almost lunchtime when Chris and Gustav left the Big House. Gustav had decided to not tell his friend about his experiment just yet, he wanted it to be a surprise. Because of his last Special Curriculum session overrunning slightly and the rush to get to lunch, both had elected to leave their training uniforms on under their school clothes.

They were crossing the playing fields when they saw HER drop from the sky on her grav-bike. It landed; she stepped off, did something on a wrist computer and the bike instantly rose 30 metres into the sky and just hovered there. The all-black costume and her confident demeanour made her instantly recognisable as Mace, the newest member of The Balance.

They immediately approached her and she asked if there was anything they could help her with. She responded that she would be grateful if they could direct her to the Headmasters’ office, as she had arranged to have an informal chat with their headmaster, Mr Summers. Suddenly lunch wasn’t as important any more.

They did wonder what she was doing at the school, with Chris whispering to Gustav jokingly that she was probably there to apologise for Akira’s behaviour in school assembly the Friday before.

Gustav did build up enough courage to ask her if she knew what The Balance had been up to when they had gone to Carpathia, but that had been before her time, and she admitted she hadn’t actually read all of their case files yet.

As Mace, Chris and Gustav walked across the grounds they overheard a couple of other pupils walking beside them discussing what ‘Also’ Rhan had revealed in her class; that the Star Khan’s interstellar rebellion had resulted in the area of the Sphere (the name given to the sector of space that Terra was located in) being completely cut off from the loyalist areas of the Ziru Sirka Empire.

There were rumours that other, less friendly races were using the rebellion to strike far inside the Empire’s borders and beyond, whilst the rebel troops that used to defend the borders from such intrusions were now busy fighting the loyalist forces in the Core. Apparently there were also rumours of violent suppression of non-human races within the Freed Zone (as the Star Khan had elected to refer to his liberated territories).

Chis and Gustav knew that the Terra system was still classified by the Ziru Sirka as an Amber Zone – to be treated with caution – and was considered an independent state, due to being located beyond the conflict and Empire. The UN’s GREET (Galactic Reception Embassy for ExtraTerrestrials) apparently believed that as long as Earth’s governments doesn’t take sides in the ongoing interstellar conflict, it should be left alone by both sides, at least for now.

However, the fact that the planet was believed to have access to a major weapon (or whatever it was that had caused the millennia of misjumps within the Sphere – a section of space with the Earth at its direct epicentre) and given its inhabitants could apparently make Jump-capable ships capable of crossing 4 parsecs in a single jump – twice the distance of their own ships, as well as the rumours that some off-worlders believed that the planet had a secret fleet of battle cruisers capable of becoming sensor-invisible, it made Terra a potentially valuable resource for the Star Khan. Of course denying access to his enemies of these resources was equally imperative.

(See The Balance adventure – Diplomatic Neutrality for details)

Despite these ‘advancements’, Terra was still just a single, unaligned planet – and no real threat to the Star Khan. Though, apparently a representative of the Star Khan’s court was currently visiting the Earth to try and negotiate for access to advanced technology; such as the Jump ships invented by Daedalus and the Challenger-Wildeman family.

As they were about enter the main school building, they saw a compact, bald headed man with a military bearing march out of the Headmasters office and head towards a car outside. Going by its displacement, Chris was sure the vehicle had to be armoured. He then drove away at speed, out of the school gates.

They entered the school building and to Chris and Gustav’s surprise, Old Man Summers’ office door was wide open. Summers was sat behind his desk, a deep frown on his brow. His face immediately lifted however as soon as he saw who his guests were.

“Ah, Mace it’s great to see you. You couldn’t have decided on a more appropriate time to visit. The school could really do with your assistance. Ah boys, I would like you to join us, I think that you may also be able to help the school out of a dilemma we seem to have found ourselves in. Please come in and close the door.”

All thought of lunch vanished as their hunger was replaced by curiosity.

Mr Summers sat them down and quickly explained, “That was a Mr ‘Smith’ from G.R.E.E.T., the Galactic Reception Embassy for ExtraTerrestrials, CSB section whatever that means. We’re to have an unexpected visitor to the school and I would like your help.

Apparently the Star Khan believes we have a pupil from the Ziru Sirkan Empire attending the school and wants his ‘roaming ambassador’ to meet with him.

As a representative of the ‘Freed Zone’ he wishes to visit Claremont. This is not a request, GREET has demanded the school comply and refuses to accept that we do not have a Vilani pupil attending. I quote, ‘if that is the case, we should be happy for the Ambassador to visit and confirm for himself.’

We don’t know why they want to do this. There are maybe about a couple of hundred aliens on Earth at the moment. That includes several youngsters but the Ambassador apparently only wants to meet OUR particular Vilani youth.

Yes, I’m afraid I lied to GREET. We do have a pupil in the school but for reasons I can’t discuss, it’s imperative that they don’t see him, yet the Ambassador needs to meet someone who could pass for someone from Ziru Sirkan space. Ah, Mace your team was heavily involved in this, admittedly before your time. Have you read up on the team’s earlier case notes?”

Mace nodded, she understood that the team had secretly rescued the Shadow Emperor’s apparent nephew, ‘Prince’ Tamesha from the Star Khan’s troops a year before and organised it so it looked as though he had been killed by a deadly plague before arranging for him to become a student and hide here at Claremont. It would be bad if the Ambassador was to learn the truth, even worse if the Star Kahn was to learn his real identity, that he was in reality ‘Prince’ Ishugi Naasirkaa, the youngest Son of the Shadow Emperor.

Summers continued, “That leaves the school with a dilemma – we have no other Vilani pupil to meet the Ambassador and an intensive search of the school grounds by the Ambassador and his soldiers could result in our HCP facility being revealed. As a recent HCP graduate yourself, Mace, I’m sure you understand why that would potentially endanger our pupils.

Now, Rhan has identified a minor race that is sufficiently different that we believe with a little technological help could pass without causing too much suspicion. That race are albinos, Mr Jaeger, and they are extremely sensitive to sunlight – if you follow my drift. We’re reasonably sure that the Ambassador is unaware that Albinos also exist on Earth. If you are willing..?”

Gustav merely nodded, unsure how he would be able to pull off such a subterfuge.

“Mr Sett, I’m hoping you and Mace here might assist with our little ploy. Mace, I understand your team uses a concealed form of communication that also has integrated translation facilities? Does that include Vilani? Would you be willing to lend them to us?”

Now it was Mace’s turn to nod. She reached out to behind her ear and pulled free a skin-toned bud. It immediately changed colour to white.

She held it, “Yes, it has Vilani already programmed in. It works through sub vocalisation and transmits via bone conductivity straight into the inner ear, so should be undetectable. It does mean that you need to mutter what you want to say, very quietly, for it to then ‘feed’ you the translation in the different language, so there is a time delay. Will that be a problem?”

Summers smiled, “Thankfully for Mr Jaeger, Standard Vilani isn’t the first language of the race he will be imitating. Any errors in pronunciation or delays in responding can be excused due to his ‘backwater’ upbringing and nervousness at meeting an imperial noble.”

He elected to ignore Mace’s sneer and comments about all nobles being worthless parasites anyway. She was French after all.

She placed the commdot on the table and to her surprise it was Chris who picked it up and seemed focused on it before handing it over to Gustav.

What she didn’t realise was that Chris was trying to use his abilities to uncover its secrets; unfortunately it was solid state, built using a sliver of some form of highly condensed crystalline material as a circuit board, so advanced it was as though he was a caveman trying to examine a positronic brain. He gave up in frustration and handed it over reluctantly to Gustav. Mace saw the flicker of frustration and found herself saying to him, “Behave yourself.” Though she wasn’t totally sure why.

Seconds later, Gustav was being instructed on where to place it behind his ear for the best reception and transmission and they watched as its chameleon circuit altered its colour to match his skin tone, effectively disguising its presence. Using it would take a little practice, though.

Meanwhile, Summers had continued talking, “Ah Mace, your presence during the interview if you would be willing, would also prove extremely beneficial. I’m reluctant to let the Star Khan’s people know that we have meta’s on the staff here, so having a publicly known non-Meta present during the ‘visit’ as chaperone would be a real boon. Could we persuade you to stay for the afternoon and act as protection to my two pupils here?

Also, I understood from Akira that you could possibly construct some form of radio wave dampener to block radio transmissions so the Vilani are unable to take pictures or transmit them back to anyone without interfering with the commdot’s functionality?”

Mace smiled, technically she wasn’t due to design that device for several more years yet – just one of the many joys of time travel, she thought. She nodded her agreement, wondering what effect if any, inventing the comms-scrambler now would have on the future? She smiled, she hadn’t cared for that particular future anyway, so any change had to be for the better, surely?

(See The Balance adventure – A Terminus Future for details)

Summers responded to her nod by continuing, “Mace, I should point out that both Mr Jaeger and Mr Sett here are enrolled in our Special Curriculum programme. Mr Sett, is there any way you could use your ‘unique’ abilities to subtly disrupt the electricity within the house so that it blocks a certain range of electrical frequency? Say the 30 – 90 hertz range?”

Chris thought for a moment. His Firewall defence might work, but that would be visible and might cause the Ambassador to react adversely… He looked around the room for inspiration and then suddenly grinned. If he were to try and focus his Taser blast at low level into the electrical circuitry say of a room’s electrical wiring he might be able to create a type of tuneable Faraday cage. “Ah, can I ask why you want to block that particular frequency range, sir?”

“I understand that is the gamma frequency of the brain and the frequency of psychic ability. Whilst having a device that blocks radio transmissions is explainable in a school, a device blocking telepathy isn’t. Hence, this needs to be physically undetectable; an unexplained anomaly. We do need to make sure that no-one with the Ambassador is able to read Mr Jaeger’s’ mind, or anyone else’s for that matter, in order to try and confirm his identity.”

It was now Chris turn to nod, “I’ll need some time to practice and some means of measuring the frequency output so I can get a feel for this…”

Old Man Summers nodded and told him that they planned to use the main room in the mansion for the meeting, so he’d ask the physics department to rig up some means of measuring electrical frequency before warning them that they had a couple of hours at most to prepare.

“Meanwhile, Mr Jaeger, I would recommend keeping your hood up as much as possible to avoid being too easily recognised afterwards.

Now for your cover story, your name will be Gis Kagaar and your father is here as part of the Ziru Sirkan Embassy researching ceramic applications. He really exists but doesn’t have a son in reality, though Archduke Viisarikaa will confirm that he has if they check…

He is from a race, Vilani-descended, who have similar looks to yours – from the planet of Khunsgulur,” (It took his newly fitted commdot a few seconds to find an English equivalent and whisper in his inner ear a possible translation; Morlock.)

 “Given the rarity of your ‘condition’, would you be willing to pretend to be a Vilani Khunsgulur for the day? There are a number of things he may want to ask you about; how you cope with your species being photophobic and agoraphobic, and how you cope with the need for certain unique enzymes found only in that planet’s particular food-chain to survive.”

Gustav looked blank, “photophobic and agoraphobic sir?” Summers smiled, “that means being unable to cope with bright lights and having a fear of open spaces.”

It took a plate of sandwiches sent over and a couple of hours of practice and hard work designing the scrambler and perfecting Chris ability to tune in on the Gamma Frequency, but they were now ready.

As they set up for the Ambassadors inspection, Chris had a thought as to whom he thought the Vilani student might be. The older boy sitting at the back of ‘Also’ Rhan’s class, always surrounded by the over-protective Amazons, seemed the most likely candidate, all of whom seemed to be missing from school today? What was his name? Ishugi Na-something or other?

Before he could think on it any further, the main door opened and the Roaming Ambassador, ‘Duke’ Sebastibol from the court of the Star Khan entered with his entourage which consisted of several armoured soldiers with Pulse lances and two human “Vadaka” (Hounds) who immediately tried to read their minds.

Chris standing by a nearby wall socket instantly unleashed a sustained Taser blast into it. They’d probably need to rewire the room after this, and began to focus on maintaining the frequency. The two psychics let out a grunt of pain and seemed surprised to discover that something in the room countered their abilities.

Summers had always had the ability to fill his conscious mind with trivia whilst disguising his deeper thoughts – thoughts currently hidden behind a catalogue of show tunes – but to see the psychics’ frustration deepen as Chris covertly blocked their abilities was just wonderful, and he had to force himself not to smirk.

Sebastibol approached a hooded Gustav. He stood seven feet tall; slim in his black and blood red military uniform with an ornamental neck brace that also covered his lower jaw. His eyes were with completely black, without any visible sclera showing, and his skin was a pale grey. He smiled, as he asked him in Vilani his name and told him to lower his hood.

Hesitantly, Gus lowered his hood for a few seconds then raised it again, almost defiantly. The Ambassador smiled, he’d seen enough and assumed his staff had photographed the boy for confirmation later. He never noticed the look of disbelief and panic on his adjunct’s face when his recording equipment failed to work or send.

In Vilani he began to question Gustav, <<”Your name boy?”>> After a few seconds of hesitation and in a very shaky voice the white haired, red eyed boy replied in nearly unintelligible Vilani <<“I am known as Gis Kagaar, sir.”>>

The Ambassador questioned him about his father, how he coped with being in a school with so much outdoors <<”I keep my hood up, my eyes down and I run. It’s not as bad as when I first got here and they give me another pupil to help me sir.”>> and how he coped with the food and the lack of suitable enzymes in the food <<”My father brought supplies with him sir, from home. Added to the Terran food, it keeps me alive, it’s not very tasty and I don’t like it, though.”>>

The meeting with the Ambassador seemed to go well, even if the Ambassador talked down to ‘Gis’ (in Vilani) once he learned he wasn’t the son of a noble or anyone of ‘real value’.

Interview completed, the Ambassador nodded at one of his staff, who pressed some sort of communicator on his wrist. This was some sort of tight beam transmission that Mace’s device couldn’t block – but Chris browser ability could overhear, even if it was obviously in a language he didn’t understand, <<“Menerii kha rii du arluuuulushkubg li imsha amku giaadbilaaud pa lunliishgir Tamesha Naasirkaa…”>>

Chris tried his best to memorise the sounds in the hope of repeating it back to Gustav later. The signal was sent twice more, each identical to each other, before the Ambassador elected to leave with his staff without even a thank you towards ‘Gis’.

As soon as they had left, Chris tried to repeat what he’d ‘overheard’ to the translator-equipped Gustav, who tried to translate it. It took several attempts, but in the end they thought the message had been, “The marauders are somewhere nearby. If (the boy?) is worthy, the trap is set. (They believe?) Prince Tamesha Naasirkaa is alive and (at the) School.”

They spent a couple of minutes trying to figure out who were the Marauders (them? The Ambassadors’ soldiers?) and who were the ‘they’ that believed?

They didn’t have long to wait. A few minutes later, a group of creatures entered the Mansion by the back doors. A woman in armour, carrying a massive hand-gun and what looked like some sort of sword handle but bladeless, appeared first, the only one of the group that began to appear who looked normal, even if she spoke Vilani. On the main staircase stood a monkey-like creature, about 30 cm in size, with four eyes, big ears and a long prehensile tail that was apparently being used to balance a rifle three times bigger than itself. Behind the woman was another humanoid female but with pale blue skin with a gag over her mouth. Next to her was a tall crystalline creature, a slimy, 2 metre long caterpillar-like creature with no obvious visible ‘face’ and a bug-like creature standing upright on its rear legs, at just short of 3 metres tall its antennae were brushing the ceiling.

Had Rhan been present she would have commented on the uniqueness of a Vilani, a Hamaran, a Zultasian Vadaka, a Crystalloid Quarii, an Inchok and an insectoid pet Rasz being gathered together.

Instead it was left to the ‘monkey-like’ Hamaran on the staircase to translate their ‘request’ using broken English, “I Sydna-Sha-Ruddi demand he-boy comes with us. No troubles want or we’s WILL BE BACK!!”

The Vilani female glowered at him and he responded by waving his gun around and saying something to her in Vilani which only Gustav understood, <<“What Captain? It’s a big threat in Terran, Syd heard it used on an old Terran entertainment…”>>

Chris immediately restored his psi-incapacitating Faraday cage by re-firing his Taser into the electrical socket, and was rewarded with a look of pain from the blue-skinned female.

Then war broke out when the giant caterpillar-like creature unleashed a mental attack at Chris. Thankfully, it failed as the energy was dissipated by the makeshift Psi-shielding around him. As this was occurring the Vilani female that the miniscule gun bunny had called ‘Captain’ rushed forward and made a grab for Gustav, only to fail as a stronger than expected ‘youth’ pulled free causing her to stumble.

The Hamaran on the stairs with the excessively big gun fired it at Mace and Chris, only for the massive gun to buck in his paws and hit the couch, disintegrating it and filling the room with tiny fragments of foam.

Gustav used the confusion to dodge round the Captain and rushed at the blue-skinned female who was standing back and unleashed his voice of allure on her, stating that they’d found him but he was scared and they needed to stop this now. She didn’t speak; for some reason he got the feeling, especially with the mask over her mouth, that she couldn’t speak but he did get two distinct impressions from her – that his abilities wouldn’t work on her and that they didn’t actually want to do him any harm, in fact they were there to ‘help’ him whether he wanted it or not.

Mace meanwhile, was responding to the attack with a series of baton round bolts through the curtain of falling foam. The first bolt at the captain missed but did cause her to be off-balance, the second hit the Syd creature and incapacitated it with a bolt to the throat, again the next bolt hit but the Crystal-like creature appeared unaffected by the attack and the next two missed though how the shot at the tall insect-like creature had failed to hit was completely mystifying. The creature had sort of shuddered and the bolt shot past and hit the wall behind it instead.

The Captain suddenly knelt before Gustav and in formal Vilani said, <<“Prince Tamesha of the household of Naasirkaa. We, your humble servants are here to return you to your Uncle the Ishimkarun (the Shadow Emperor) –– in return for a full pardon and a small monetary reward of course… I am Captain Gyu Maran of the freeship Marauder and my crew and I are here to bring the Emperor’s nephew Prince Tamesha home, across hostile space and against incredible odds I might add, to Capital.”>>

She looked up and on seeing his red eyes and white hair beneath his hood, quickly added, <<”Wonderful ‘disguise’ by the way but we insist that we leave now as we have very little time if we are to escape orbit before the Zultasian ship in orbit finds us…”>>

Gustav responded also in Vilani, <<”You need to go before you are captured by the Star Khan’s troops, I can’t go with you, I’m here for my own safety… And I’m not who you think I am.”>>

Before Gustav could translate any of the conversation for Chris and Mace, the back windows of the mansion blew in and a red-skinned, humanoid creature in armour walked in followed by half a dozen large robots. The appearance of the robots shuddered and for a second Mace swore they almost morphed into a humanoid shape. Some form of disguise, possibly? Then all hell broke out as the robots and mercenary warrior with them began firing at everyone in the room. Seemed everyone was a target. One of the robots immediately fired off some form of bright flare with the intention of temporarily blinding everyone. Mace managed to close her eyes in time and turn away, as did Chris.

To Gustav’s surprise although he and the blue-skinned girl took the full brightness of the flare, his hood managed to protect his eyes through the female wasn’t so lucky. Temporarily blinded she stumbled and fell to the floor.

Time to show off his new toys and see how effective they were, even in a room filled with light. “Toss and drop” he muttered to himself as he tossed the smoke grenade from his glove straight at the red-skinned alien and, without waiting to see if it arrived, dropped the second at his own feet and was immediately rewarded with being enveloped in shiny, dark-blue smoke that quickly surrounded both him and the girl. He immediately used the ability he called his ‘shadows alley’ to jaunt from within the cover of the grenade at his feet across the room to behind the smoke-hidden red humanoid.

Meanwhile, the rest of the robots were unleashing laser fire at everyone else in the room, thankfully the reflective particles in Gustav’s grenade was acting as a means of dissipating the beams and disguising the fact that Gustav was no longer in that side of the room. Only one of the laser beams found its target; the captain took a shot through the shoulder, burning a hole the size of a penny and cauterising the wound as it did so. The others responded immediately. The caterpillar-like Inchok manifested a gap in one end of its body and swallowed one of the robots whole. The sound of it being crushed and shattering filled the room. Despite being shot, the Captain managed to get off a blast with her own weapon at another robot, but unfortunately missed. However, it gave Chris an opportunity, dropping his psi-shield he ran across the room and up the stairs where he began to administer first aid to the incapacitated Hamaran. As he did so, he was surprised to see it grab a strange-looking device and toss it over the banister where it magnetically attached itself to a passing robot’s leg and subsequently exploded, leaving the machine attempting to remain upright on a single functioning leg as it tried to advance by hopping.

Mace used the thinning smoke to unleash an EMP bolt into the middle of the room. The nearest robot immediately collapsed as the pulse took it offline. Two more found their servos went dead, causing them to be rendered stationary though still capable of firing their weapons, one of whom immediately fired at Mace in response – a blast that thankfully missed her but did decimate a picture hanging behind her.

Recovered from his jaunt from one smoke-induced shadow to the next, Gustav took the opportunity to grapple the alien warrior from behind as the smoke began to thin. He got him in a pressure hold only to find he was being targeted by one of the robots. A flash of their laser made him momentarily think his time was up but the smoke particulates weakened the beam and his training costume with its reflective inner coating beneath his school uniform absorbed the rest though the heat from the blast did burn him.

The Inchok having excreted the mass of components from its first robotic ‘meal’ immediately swallowed another. On the stairs the diminutive Syd unleashed a second magnetic mine, this time throwing it at the alien warrior and unfortunately Gustav. Gustav was still trying to hold him in an arm lock from behind when the mine attached itself to his chest plate and exploded. Gustav was blown clear. Thankfully, the warrior had acted as a barrier and absorbed most of the explosion. He was alive, but badly incapacitated. Gustav’s school uniform was now on fire, but he was otherwise unaffected.

Chris followed up the explosion with a laser beam from his hand straight at the alien’s now exposed chest. The blast was enough to knock him off his feet. Mace used the opportunity to unleash a barrage of baton rounds at the remaining robots – taking out another completely and staggering two others. None were now undamaged in some way or other. The alien, with great effort, raised its gun and unleashed a cascade of shots in Mace’s general direction, causing her to have to shelter behind the remains of the furniture.

Unfortunately at that moment a pupil, Charlie Simpson, a blonde, bubbly female student from the year above them, wandered through the front door into the chaos inside. Charlie was considered sweet, but not quite ‘all there’. She never seemed to understand the jokes or the cultural references others made. As she took in the attack, Chris and Gustav finally understood why. Her face remained unchanged from that of quiet bewilderment as her right arm changed into a mass of tentacles and swept out towards the last remaining upright robot to tear it apart.

The Captain shuddered at the sight and said one word, almost a curse, as she tried to aim her gun at Charlie, <<“Rha’Zhak!”>>

Gustav’s commdot translated that as ‘of the Unity’ and suddenly understood the fear. Rhan had discussed them in one of her classes. The Unity was a hive mind that had conquered hundreds of planetary systems, a protoplasmic lifeform that replaced all life with its own. They were supposedly contained far across the universe on the Trailing edge of the Ziru Sirka and were the reason that they allowed the use of psychics, in order to hunt them down and contain them. They could morph into any shape or disguise themselves as any species they wanted, but they couldn’t disguise their psychic makeup.

They were the great terror of all Vilani/Ziru Sirka, their bogeyman and if her presence on Earth was revealed to the Ziru Sirka they would attack the planet to make sure it never became a Rha’Zhak staging post for further conquest.

As the sentients’ in the room focused on Charlie, Gustav used the opportunity to leap at the alien warrior and bite into his neck with his fangs and unleashed his ability to control him, rendering him unconscious. One consequence would be that the last half a day would be wiped completely from his memories.

Meanwhile, the Crystalline Quarii moved in front of Charlie and broadcast a mental statement that everyone in the room (except the now unconscious warrior) received in their own language, “Not enemy!” He was joined by Gustav. Instinctively, he knew that Charlie wasn’t a risk to them.

She moved behind Gustav and tried to explain that she understood their fear. She welcomed any of them to scan her mind as she was an independent, free thinking creature and not part of any hive intelligence, not part of this dimension’s (or any dimensions, for that matter) Unity.

Seeing the doubt on their minds, she approached the blue-skinned woman and asked her in Vilani to scan her mind; suddenly a second voice was in everyone’s head as she confirmed that Charlie was from a different parallel universe, brought to this universe by some students to the school. In her dimension, the Rha’Zhak were integrated into their Galactic community, a peaceful and trusted race.

If she hadn’t feared for the safety of the other students when she entered the mansion, she would not have acted or revealed herself.

Gustav approached the Captain and explained he wasn’t their Prince and this wasn’t a disguise. He really was just a pupil at the school. He would appreciate though if they would take the alien mercenary, as the Vilani they were seeking wasn’t here. This had all been a trap to try and capture them. Given what they had just learnt, it was to everyone’s benefit to not mention any of this to anyone.

It took a few minutes for the Marauders to gather their wounded and the semi-comatose alien and leave via the rear of the mansion heading towards their ship which was covertly ‘parked’ on Saxon Heights, leaving the four of them with a decimated ground floor of the mansion to have to explain away.

Gustav removed the Commdot and returned it to Mace.

Robot parts were scattered everywhere, and Chris tried to see what he could pocket – mostly small pieces of circuitry he hoped he could figure out in the privacy of his own room later on.

As he searched, he tried to persuade Mace that she was now their ally. She responded that they were too young to be anyone’s allies and, after all, she didn’t know if she could trust them yet. A comment that Chris immediately declared “ageist” and that what they had just gone through should be considered a shared, bonding moment and joked, “so you’re going to tell on Gus’ smoking causing all this?” just as Mr Summers walked in to the battlefield that had been the ground floor of the mansion. Gustav immediately cried out that they needed to explain and this was not their fault.

Before she left, Chris had to ask if she’d “had a good time at Claremont?” She smiled and murmured something about not what she expected when she set off that morning, and muttered something about hoping to find a clue to her mother. “We’re you looking for your mother, here at the school?” She again smiled but said nothing.

It was only after she got back she remembered she hadn’t given the school back the pendant. Oh well, there would be other opportunities to return she was sure. In the meantime she sent Mr Summers an email to say it was in The Balance’s possession and she’d make sure it was returned next time she visited.

It was a couple of days later that Chris and Gustav saw Ishugi and the Amazons. They had been asked to come to Mr Summers’ office with them, where he explained about the deception they had pulled and about the Marauders turning up and then leaving once the rebel’s trap had failed.

Ishugi asked if there was still contact with the Marauders as perhaps after all he should consider trying to get back to his father with them. The Amazons immediately tried to persuade him to stay on Earth as it was too great a risk that the Marauders will be captured themselves as they tried to get from the Sphere back into loyalist space, across the Freed Zone.

He seemed unconvinced until Old Man Summers reminded him that if they were captured and, given this had been a trap set for them, that was a strong possibility, that his capture would benefit no-one and might even put the whole of the earth at risk for apparently hiding him from the Star Khan’s forces previously. Reluctantly, he allowed himself to be persuaded.

Of course much of this went above Chris and Gustav’s head since they had never been told just who Ishugi was other than he was a Vilani and the school didn’t want the Star Khan’s forces to ever find him. Oh, well!