Page 146 - The Chronicles Ser2 (6-10)

Buraxin, who soon established trading outposts in and around Keterian space and the Gateway.
Locals eventually settled on a nickname for the Gateway – The Hole (in The Wall) – from a Flutvarn
phrase meaning the same, but that proved practically impossible for most other races to pronounce.
Besides; it said what the thing looked like and was, spacers are practical, no nonsense fellows after
all.

Lorna stayed on the Hellion as the ships Chief Xeno-Archaeologist for its mission, so a new
Xeno-Specialist was sought from one of the other colonies. Lyris and Misha; who had opted to stay
in Keterian Space, headed up the return mission to Shust and Atlantis, along with Gio as pilot, Darius
in charge of medical matters. Lennie and Trok had traded places and Lennie then headed up the
Engineering and Technical arm of the expedition. Along with a dozen or so other crew and a new
Buraxin vessel; this formed the Keterian arm of the twin expeditions. Their journey was shortest of
the two; and the least fraught with problems. A Flutvarn Xeno-Biologist from Venosia Prime was the
last to join their merry band; she brought with her some newly developed Bio-Neuro-Net tech based
upon the Networked mycelium that linked the “Brain” trees and plants on Venosia Prime. They were
basically data storage that grew to accommodate increasing amounts of data. Lennie referred to
them crudely as “Gel-Pack Technology”. This then was the Shust expedition team.

The “Broken” Moon expedition team would consist of Krysta; who stayed when Gio left,
Trok in charge of Engineering, Hasbid had recommended Trok also be in charge of coms, and a
couple of other Mechanoids. Various other crew members came from requisite disciplines that were
required. That left the Xeno-Specialist; and Lorna had recommended a friend she had made during
her early expeditions. He was called Hubris; a Vahamat, and, by his races standards, relatively young.
He had been one of the team of Xeno-Biologists during the early years of the Unat exploration of
Human territory. He had been a junior technician when the first Humans had been augmented,
Cain’s People. Humans were not the first species that The Unat and Osir “augmented” and it had
been Hubris’s job to categorise life forms capable of augmentation. This assembly had been given a
new class of vessel; equipped with the latest ultra-fast Hyper Warp drives of Untharan design. It had
been named Sun God Strider; or in Untharan, Veklaar T’un Hur, but for expediency sake that was
shortened to Veklaar (Great Stride). She was sleek for such a large vessel; in its holds were all the
equipment that could possibly be needed. The Veklaar was not designed to land on the “Broken”
moon, there were landing craft for that purpose, but it was equipped with extreme range coms,
heavy defence shielding and some armament if the situation called for such a response. Hubris met
the ship’s captain at the observation booth of the hangar bay. He had heard all about Krysta from a
friend in the diplomatic service.

“Good day Captain; is everything ready?” Hubris asked

“Oh; just one or two minor adjustments to make in
Engineering. I see you have your clansmen’s Crest, Jovhar, if I
am not mistaken. A Noble line indeed” and Krysta did a slow
head nod in respect.

“Please; let’s keep things simple, I am not one for formalities.
Did the specialist equipment I ordered arrive from Velgas 3?”
He responded

“Yes and it has already been stowed; an Ensign will take your hand luggage to your quarters, I have
someone on the bridge who wants to meet with you. She will be joining us for our journey.” Krysta
said and directed Hubris to the elevator to the command deck.

“Elevators? A little antiquated for such a new ship” Hubris said puzzled