Kaleidoscope II

Phantoms and Their Ghosts

---

The Barrens, Neo Egypt

Yangu-Grurra System, Planet Vasily (YG-4)

13:49, 35/2/1, 15 XP

---

“Ottah…” Robyn slowly phased her paw through her wife’s rudder tail, defeat sagging over her muzzle. “What the bloody hell should we do? We can’t mope about like this forever.”

“I don’t plan on it.” Carbon stared Sydney in the eyes with a certain determination smoldering in her own set. “I’m not leaving my family alone, not after all we’ve fought over together.”

“I refuse to leave them a second time. Gods, no.” Robby sighed and stood straight. “We can figure this out. I just can’t focus on where to start.”

“I’m not an expert on this science stuff, but I do have one question.” Nadiya held Qesis closely as they spied Ilaria and Iolvin through shared eyes. “Why did only some of us get this way and not others?”

“And not just people.” Carbon pointed to three unoccupied exosuits and the confused pilots walking around them. “Whatever happened, it wasn’t random. This is selective.”

“I don’t think we’ll snag a grasp of the criteria until we figure what caused this.” Robyn turned back to the present group freshly lit with a cause. “Whatever or whomever did this should be our priority, folks.”

“Yeah, we--” Qesis followed a hint of motion in her periphery and found Artemis, Cherenkov, and Vydr arriving. Bafflingly Void was carried in Cheren’s arms until they were spotted, the otter flopping painfully onto the ground in surprise. “Uh… Void? I take it you can see us?”

“Ugh… Yeah, I can.” Void took a quick survey of the situation from the dirt of the road. “Appears you’re in the same boat. Arty’s unable to see us too.”

Nadi quirked her head as she gained Void’s senses. “You okay? That wounded painful. Feels like it stings too.”

“Nah, I’m fine. I just wasn’t watching where I was walking because of you guys.”

Qes also quirked her head to the side. “Really? It looked like Cheren was--”

“I said I tripped. No biggie.” Deferring his embarrassment, Void gathered which of the large group could and couldn’t see each other. “We have larger fish to fry. Are they all able to see each other? It’s just the two groups of us?”

“Good point. Whatever happened, it was apparently a binary split. So...” Robyn perked up at the new possibilities rushing through her head, then turned to look back at the test site. “Wait, what happened to the black hole? You don’t think that buggered us up, yeah?”

“We’re not firing that cannon again, mum.”

“Well if it pulled us into this mess, it--”

Void hopped over to his stepmother and latched into a hug. “Sorry. I meant that Mime isn’t here with us. Without him it’s simply too dangerous to fire that thing.”

“I’d appreciate not destroying my people’s countryside as well.” Layla sat on the ground and played with a few tufts of grass. “I don’t think I’ll be any help, but if I might be so selfish I’d appreciate leaving that weapon alone.”

“We’re peaceful people. Destruction is a bit new to us.” Qes nuzzled her wife a moment, then parted to sit with her priestess instead. “It’s easier to break things than fix them, so we’re taught to avoid violence.”

“That’s not a bad way to raise your generation.” Carbon hopped out of Ex and joined the two, her extended vision showing her the subtle changes and shifts of the grass as it was disturbed. “Interesting. We seem to be able to make changes to our version of the world but not theirs.”

Void commented, “I noticed that too. It’s like we make a ghost copy of whatever we touch.”

“Is that so?” Carbon kicked the dirt and watched a faint duplicate fly away while the ground somehow also remained intact. “It’s like we’re phased out of reality, or into another one perhaps.”

“So we shifted timelines? Ottah said you guys visited other universes.” Robyn groaned as she watched her twins fret over her disappearance. “Apparently my lovelies were responsible. How’d those two geniuses come about that plan?”

“They invented the dive FTL system, then promptly broke it. I’m not sure myself, but they make it sound like they used gravity to open holes into subspace or something.”

“Actually, they open wormholes into multiple universes at once.” Vydr uncommonly spoke in scientific tongues. “The limitations upon mass in ratio to the speed of light don’t apply if you dither the load across universes. To simplify things, assume that if you move a kilometer in one universe but dive through ten, you come out the other side ten kilometers away.” Void looked at the gawking expressions pointed his way and rolled his eyes. “If there’s one set of classes I payed attention to in the academy, it was the flight training course. I’m probably an imbecile, but one that can legally fly anything up to a carrier.”

“Huh. Right.” Carbon moved closer to the otter and offered a shoulder to lean against. “So if you span a bunch of universes, what happens if the wormhole closes while you’re between them?”

“Well that’s how my sisters put all of you into other universes. Close the path at some place mid-dive and you come out at that location. The hard part is finding the remnants of the wormhole to get back home, apparently.” Void politely declined the offered aid as he grasped the scruff on his chin. “I see where you’re going, though. Supposing we were in a wormhole and the power to sustain it cut off at the right moment… I posit we might be able to reside in a place between universes.”

“Which means we just need to find the original wormhole and reopen it.” Carbon gave an apologetic glance to Layla. “Sorry, hon. We might have to use that cannon again to make another gravity well.”

The human shook her head. “Don’t get me wrong here. If that’s our only option I’m not against it. I’d just prefer something less violent.”

Qes flared open her eyes at the sight of Rose dragging something humanoid through the tree line. “Speaking of violence…”

“I didn’t do this, oddly enough. I found her this way while scouting.” Rose groaned as she hurried the body into the open, tossing a large lump of blueish alien ahead of her. “Anyone seen someone like this before? Have we met this race yet?”

“If only we could talk to Yoyo.” Carbon leaned over the creature and examined her closer. “Is she covered in feathers? I can’t see clear enough.”

“Something like that, sure.”

Robyn knelt down to check for a pulse, finding the ‘feathers’ far fluffier than expected. “The lass has something between fur and feathers. It’s crazy soft and fluffy. Aha, and a pulse. Jolly good.”

The alien slowly rolled herself over, her dry mouth gasping as she weakly reached for Robyn.

“Woah!”

Everyone jumped back to a safe distance save for Vixelynn. The normally meek, cautious vixen found a sense of purpose, risking her safety to place a half-consumed bottle of water near the creature’s head. “Slowly. Don’t choke on it.”

“Vix--”

“She’s dehydrated! How would you feel in her position!?” Vix found her serious voice and announced her intent viciously. “Alien or not, I’m not letting her die like that. That’s a horrible way to go.”

Shaking as she moved, the avianesque being reached a wing to the bottle and pulled it to her mammalian mouth with strange, thick bundles of feathers instead of fingers. She desperately wrenched the cap open and started glugging down the vital contents.

“Slowly, I said. Careful now.”

The being amazingly seemed to understand Vix’s words, slowing her rate of consumption to generous sips. She cried from her large, telescopic eyes at the humble care package. Upon finishing her drink she then huffed and nodded to her savior whilst offering back the nearly-empty container.

“Is that better?” Vix took back her bottle and noted the lack of contents. “How long have you been out here? That’s half a liter you just finished.”

Again to everyone’s amazement, the creature both understood the vixen and even wrote a response in the dirt. She crafted several figures resembling boxes with crosses through them, adorned with one to four circles filling the quadrants.

“I don’t understand. Are those numbers?”

The bird-like woman raised her head, apparently her form of positive acknowledgement. She took the time to sculpt another set of the numerals, pausing at each of eight stages of progress. Upon finishing she held up eight bundles of feathers and coiled them in a reverse countdown.

“I get it now. That’s octal… eh, octet? There’s a few names for it.” Robyn eased closer to the numbers and sketched their equivalents in decimal numerals. “They loop back every eight numbers instead of ten. That means… twenty-one. She’s written twenty-one as an answer.”

The alien again shot her head upward to that assessment.

“Twenty-one? Of what? Hours?” Carbon tried to discern the unit of time by context but came up blank. “What’s this measured against?”

The alien coiled a ‘finger’ and drew a circle. She dotted two points to the side, then slowly drew another circle starting from the dots.

“Days? Wait, but Vasily days.” Carbon shut her eyes as she remembered the length of a local day and translated it into space time. “Damn, that’s still fourteen space days give or take. Fourteen days without water? We can’t survive longer than three or four.”

Cheren walked over and nudged a water pouch with her hindpaw. “She had a decent supply from the start, it seems.”

“But there’s water all over. Why not just drink from the river nearby?” Void fumbled with some of the dirt carvings and sighed at a realization. “Because it isn’t fully tangible. That means we have a limited shelf life in here, what ‘till we starve or the like.”

“Then we need to figure out a solution sooner than later.” Carbon hopped up to her hindpaws and reoriented herself. “The cannon’s over that way. Let’s get moving.”

“And leave her here? Carbon…” Vix very uncharacteristically drew a line in the sand, sidling against the weakened alien. “I’m not leaving her. Nobody deserves to die helpless and alone like that.”

“I never suggested that. A few of us should retrieve the weapon while the rest keep an eye on the others.” Carbon nudged her snout to her increasingly impatient family beyond their dimensional veil. “We don’t know if another black hole could harm them, so we need to keep track of them and make sure wherever we fire is safe.”

“Well that might prove problematic, mate.” Robyn pointed to her wife as she started walking toward the test site herself. “We can’t tell them to stop. What’s the deal now?”

“Crap. Well if they’re only headed the same way it should be alright.” Carbon spoke too soon, finding to her surprise that Ilaria both continued down the path and paused at Iolvin’s request. “Okay, that’s strange. Ari just split into two. Is that still a thing with our theory?”

“No. That’s not… possible…” Void stood tall on his one leg and scrutinized everyone not in his current space, especially Arty. “They all have slight ghosting. They weren’t like that earlier.”

“What could cause that? Is it because we changed the world in some--”

“Hush. She’s trying to answer.” Vix watched as the birdy scribbled in the dirt again, vaguely creating a bunch of lines radiating from a central circle much like a child’s depiction of a sun. “I don’t understand. Is it because there’s two stars in this system?”

The creature lowered her head into her shoulders, an apparent negative. She revised her drawing, acting it out by first tapping the inside of the circle and then drawing secondary lines attached to the primary ones.

“That might make sense…” Void took a deep breath as he did some rough math in his head. “It’s a bit unlikely, but it could happen. What if we didn’t fall between two universes? What if, somehow, we landed on… a nexus of sorts.”

Robyn shook her head. “I’m not following, son. Isn’t that what you already said?”

“Not like this. See, the presumption we have is that other realities are simply clones of ours, but where certain choices or random chances have formed different outcomes.” Void traced the drawing, making new branches upon branches of lines. “See, every time we make a choice another universe exists where the opposite choice was made. As you go along, the possible choice outcomes multiply exponentially and thus there are an infinite number of universes. But…”

Carbon nodded in sudden agreement. “Right. Where we landed is a nexus where lots of outcomes start, before things get too complex. As time goes by the universes start to differ more and more from our currently stable state.” The hybrid kicked the dirt again and used the duplicate effect as an example. “Right now, in some universes the dirt moved and in others it didn’t.”

“Exactly. And as a result--”

Cheren mumbled the remainder of that thought for Void, uneasiness underlying her tone. “We’re not in any universe, but can see and affect multiple. Our choices both happen and don’t at once.”

“You know something about this stuff, Blue?”

“Somehow, I think I do.” Cheren shook all over as she tried to clear her head. “I think we’re in a space-time bubble, not a wormhole. Something in my gut is pointing me that way.”

Void stood tall again and fought for some logic to back that idea. “Then creating a wormhole isn’t the answer? Well how did we get here then?”

“You.” Cheren pointed back to the clearing she and Void recently left. “Something must have happened when you teleported us. That assumes you bend space-time to move like that, of course.”

“That last blink did seem to jimmy the works a tad. Hm…” Void closed his eyes and tried to blink a few strides ahead but something wasn’t allowing him to follow through. “Okay, maybe you’re on the right path there. I’m being anchored down somehow.”

“Well whatever you just did made parts of me feel numb.” Cheren held out an arm and gained a concerned expression at the additional transparency of the limb. “Maybe you shouldn’t do that again near me, Void.”

“No, he shouldn’t.” Robyn’s eyes twitched and then changed color, her internal lenses flipping through filters until finding one that worked. “There’s some kind of energetic discharge directly between the both of you. I think… perhaps the both of you caused this by proximity?”

“How far does the energy radiate? Can you see it, mum?”

“No, not quite. I might have fun with my modifications, but I can’t change the fundamental behavior of my eyes.”

“No, but mine work differently. I’m seeing something hazy around you two as well.” Carbon scritched beneath a strap of her breathing mask as she observed her surroundings. “I think I’m seeing this go on weaker and weaker for a while… but it doesn’t go on forever. It’s like we’re in a sphere of--”

“A bubble. Divine Spirits, she might be right.” Rose nodded as she moved closer to the ship captain. “Void, you know the most about this. What happens if you move outside of a dive window?”

“Aside from some turbulence, you just surface back into your normal--” Void very emphatically nodded in agreement at the proposition. “I like it. If we walk far enough, we can just leave the bubble.”

“Aye. Good observation.” Robyn looked back to her children and stood tall. “Hip-hup. Time for a trot, mates. I’m not leaving my little ones worrying one second longer than needed.”

“But what about her?” Vix helped the friendly alien to her knees, allowing her to regain her balance for a moment. “I’m not leaving her. Won’t she go back to her universe if she leaves the bubble too?”

“I would assume so. I wonder why she hasn’t tried that so far into this mess though.” Rose moved over and aided the two with her superhuman strength. “Maybe she got turned around in the woods? I could see someone getting lost out here.”

The bird-creature retracted her head back, again signalling disagreement. She weakly tugged on a ‘feather’ and pulled it free. A quick nibble on the tip opened up the hollow base of the odd hair. Then she dipped the tip into a small pouch at her side, holding the hair like a writing quill. Quite out of any expectations, she then started writing mid-air to draw a hazy white, three-dimensional representation of a sphere. Within this she then placed several dots. When she finished her sketch she waved her feather hand and the odd ink turned obsidian black.

“What’s this? The bubble?” Rose inspected the diagram, finding the ink was rock hard once set. “Neat.”

“It’s more than that. Look.” Vix tapped a set of blobs in the same effective grouping as they were positioned. “This must be us. It’s a map. You know exactly where you are in this place. But why wouldn’t you leave?”

The alien tapped the quill to another set of dots near the perimeter and they turned bright yellow. She then created similar yellow curves behind the dots, hinting that they had moved along a closely knit path.

“She’s being hunted.” Carbon stepped up to the diagram and traced the paths. “These are high coverage, single-overlap combing patterns. That’s the work of a trapper team.”

Vix groaned for the alien. “You’re being hunted? By whom?”

The bird distinctly looked over to Evelyn and Flynt, then decided to pull her head back in negative reply. Hoping her recent improvisations were a sign of understanding, she then began writing labels for the various dots. Her language was quite fluid, flowing vertically with signage sprouting from the left and right of a center post and with flourishes everywhere.

Vix touched the text in admiration of its form, then quietly sighed when she realized that was all she could discern. “That’s… really pretty. I don’t understand it though.”

“Without Eve I can’t make heads or tails of it either,” mentioned Carbon.

“Even with my veile I’m drawing a blank.” Rose shook her head and tried to guess meanings based on the likeness of the labels. “So these are bad, I’m guessing. We’re good guys. What’s this pink one over here?”

The alien touched the dot in question, then brought a wing to her chest. She followed this by adding a path winding behind the dot, then another leading to the current group’s location.

“That’s you. Okay.” Rose and Carbon checked the path and noticed it remained within the bubble, yet specifically avoided the enemy paths. “I see. You shook your hunters and started moving the other direction they did. Then… Oh, that must be where I found you passed out. I see.”

“So as someone in the professional habit of avoiding search parties, I’m in favor of getting the bloody hell out of Dodge before we’re found.” Void hopped over to the close group and offered his only paw to the newcomer. “Void. Nice to meet you, hon. Thanks for the early warnings.”

The alien offered her less substantial wing for a ginger shake. Then she pulled up her makeshift pen and wrote Void’s nickname in her language, followed by her own closer to her.

“Not a clue what that means. Sorry, hon. You do need a name though…” Void flicked his fingers over the loose feather with a smirk. “I’ll just call you Quill for now. Is that agreeable?”

The bird held her wing close to her chest, shut her eyes, and extended her head forward gracefully. Quill took her new nickname as a badge of friendship, writing it beside her true name with a smile.

“Quill, yeah?” Robyn shook her head as she helped her stepson amble off in a southward direction. “You remind me of your father far too much, lad. Come. Let’s get the bloomin’ hell outta here.”

“Agreed.” Carbon jogged over to Ex and hopped inside, shutting the cockpit so she could breathe freely. “I’ll carry Quill if she’s still too fatigued. Let’s get going, gang.”

Northern District, Luxor, Neo Egypt

YG, Vasily (YG-4)

14:43, 35/2/1, 15 XP

---

“What if t’ey don’ come t’is way, darlin’?” Patrick cuddled Catherine close beneath a blanket as the two sat on his utility truck’s hood. “I rather like t’e sentiment an’ all, but t’ey might be a while longer. Aye?”

“I don’t care. I want to see my kids the moment they return.” Cat drooped her head into the crook of Pat’s shoulder, listening to him breathe. “I made the mistake of staying to put out that argument back home. I don’t want to miss them again, not after they’ve been away so long.”

“Oh, I get t’at. You made the right call aidin’ your people, t’ough.” Pat gave his love’s head a few kisses and pets as he tightened down the seams in the blanket. “We might not ‘ave t’e heat from t’e engine much longer, t’ough.”

“You? Complaining about the cold? Ha.” Cat turned her chin upward and gave her love a quick kiss on the jaw. “I understand though. We rarely get to enjoy the warmer days, do we? Your work goes faster without ice and my people are getting… well, horny. One of these days we’ll be able to retire together though. That’ll be a good day.”

“T’at sounds like a proposal. Should I be sweatin’?” Pat scooted around slightly so the two could watch the first sun setting. “Or should we just enjoy our view, Cat?”

“And that accent you usually hide?” Cat giggled as she settled back into the warmth of her love. “All of the above.”

“Aye, ye got me in a bind.” Patrick pulled Catherine into a deeper kiss, the squirrel sneaking a small pouch into the otter’s paw. “Why not say which one ye prefer most, love.”

Confused, Cathy discovered the gift in her paw and frowned as she tried to decipher its meaning. Then she opened the pouch and saw gleaming gold, her jaw dropping as she pulled out a simple bracelet. “Y-You…?” She gave the item a closer inspection, noticing that every few links were made of a different, silver metal. “Pat, you really…?”

“Of course, me love. Here…” Patty slipped the bracelet over Cathy’s wrist, fastening it tight by way of a magnetic clasp that snagged the silver links. “I had some spare gold and platinum in me parts bin and so I figured... Tis a tad large, I know. I didn’t know how big t’ make it and a ring didn’t seem proper for you…”

“Patrick, it’s perfect.” Cathy adjusted the bracelet, then immediately pulled her love into a long, slow kiss. “Took you long enough, silly. Of course I’ll be your mate. I love you, Pat.”

“Aye, I love you too.” Pat gave his new fiancée a final kiss, then smiled as they parted lips. “Oy, looks like you get to flaunt t’at bracelet sooner t’an la’er.”

“Hm?” Cat turned around and found Nadiya walking back into town, immediately starting a squeal of delight. “Nadiya! My baby girl!”

“I swear t’ God, how does her own mother not remember she’s deaf?” Pat chuckled and waved for the others as they came, but slowed his wave upon realizing they were appearing out of thin air rather than from the road out of town. “What t’ bloody ‘ell…?”

“Pat, something’s wrong. I can feel it.” Cathy slipped off the hood of the truck and mounted onto the side rails of the passenger side. “Take the wheel. My babies need us.”

“Aye, love.” Pat tossed the blanket into the back of his truck and hurried in starting the engine. “One moment an’ we’re t’ere. You e’er see anyt’ing like t’at happen before? Ye kids actin’ like wisps?”

“Not like that before now. What did you say they were doing out there, exactly?”

Pat spurred up the throttle and began closing the gap. “Some sort o’ experiment. It sounded like a t’eoretical physics type job.”

“Oh gods. That never ends well.” Even before the truck came to a stop the Raft Mother hopped onto the dirt and threw her arms around Nadiya and Qesis. “Are you two alright? What’s gone wrong this time?”

“Hopefully nothing as of now.” Qes gave her mother in-law a quick kiss, then pointed toward the remainder of the phased group as they emerged from an ætherial curtain. “We had a little issue with this crazy weapon we tested. We found a simple way to fix it though.”

“Oh, thank the gods. I was worried for you guys.” Cat watched as Vydr exited the Nexus with a strange alien. “You said everything was fine. Where are the others? And who--or what--is that?”

“That’s Quill. She was stranded where we ended up and Vix chose a better fate for her.” Qes helped her confused wife stay standing as she lost and gained several points of view so suddenly. “The rest of the family is where we left them, probably looking for us. Mind if we borrow the truck to inform them?”

“I’ll do one better. One minute.” Void blinked out of existence now that he was able, returning with Mikhaila in his arms. “There. Problem solved. You’ll get the others to head back, right sis?”

<Of course. They’ll be thrilled to see the good news.>

Void nodded to the sign language, comprehending only the basic essentials. “Jolly good. Now if you’ll pardon me, I have half a body to recover.”

Mik slowly formed her end of a portal, which soon connected as her sister had a similar inclination. <Good luck, brother.>

“Daddy!” Robyn lunged for her father and nearly snapped his neck with a hug, having forgotten she weighs substantially more than before as a cyborg. “You’re finally back, daddy? Oy, you… still carry snacks in the lorrie?”

“Ah, I see yer angle now, Nugget.” The older squirrel reached into his truck and retrieved a honey-pecan protein bar. “I done went the healthy route, but it still does the trick.”

“Oh, it’s not for me. Thank you kindly though, daddy.” Robyn snagged the treat and offered it to Quill, which only incurred odd looks until she opened the wrapper. “It ain’t much, but I’m sure it’s a slice o’ fried gold in your sorry state. Take a nibble, yeah?”

Quill gave the block of compressed nuts and granola a sniff, then politely accepted the gift with an extended head and a fluff of her neck feathers. She took a small bite, then to everyone’s surprise managed to slowly chew rather than let her rabid hunger take control. She closed her eyes and furled her cheeks even more, enjoying the sustenance thoroughly.

“I think she likes it. Thank you, Robyn.” Vix sat with her new friend and held her nearly-depleted water bottle at the ready. “Just make sure you keep up that pace. You can get really sick if you eat too much on an empty stomach.”

“Had a personal experience, I take it?” Cathy kneeled near the vixen and observed the alien’s subtleties, making note that something she just said managed to visibly frazzle Vix. “Hm. She’s right, though. Don’t eat too much if you’ve been starving.” She looked to Nadiya and queried, “I take it she can understand us through you? Ceylon’s been helpful in that regard as well.”

The vixen in the spotlight shook her head as she connected to her mother’s mind. “It’s not me. She just seem to know English but can’t speak it back.”

“She can understand us? How?”

“That’s a solid question, mom.” Ilaria passed through a new portal with her brother, both setting ponderous eyes on the alien being. “We weren’t sure about them, but we had hints that remaining unknown party of ships from the Battle of Xor were bird-like.”

“We’ve come across a few ruins and remains. Apparently either the Sect of Xor or the Oobleck were attacking them.” Iolvin crouched near Quill, examining a living example of his past research. “What we’ve found shows they have a level of tech warranting defensive systems, so we think they may be pacifists of some variety. Is this person acting friendly?”

“She sure is.” Void blinked back into the area with Mime back at his side. “Don’t poke and prod Quill, dad. She’s been through an ordeal.”

“Son. Thank gods.” Yoyo immediately stood and squeezed the life out of his youngest. “I thought I lost you, boy.”

“It’s… okay, dad. We’re fine. Actually, I might have been responsible for all that happened.” Void rolled his eyes as Ari joined the hug. “Sorry for worrying you two. I had to save Art though, so it was worth it.”

“Oh yeah. He found us back there.” Ari freed her son and tapped her twin until he relented as well. “What exactly happened, anyway?”

“It’s a long story. I’m hungry enough to chew through my remaining arm, so can we discuss it over supper by chance?” Void waited for his father to release him, then focused on his next blink location. “I’ll see you guys back at the palace. I need to see Ria’s face right about now.”

“Go, son. Make me proud.”

“Still not rutting, dad. Have a little respect for the lady?”

Ari grinned as her son warped away. “At least he’s being honorable. Must be from my side of the gene pool.”

“You realize we have the same genes, right?” Yoyo grinned as he led his new anthropological subject to a bench. “So your name is Quill? That sounds distinctly English.”

“Void came up with it. You should be proud, brother.” Nadi wobbled a bit as more and more of the previous group came through portals and added to her pool of meat cameras. “You should see this nifty thing she does with her feathers. She draws in the air, like physical holograms.”

“It’s really cool.” Qes sat on the bench to one side of Quill as Vix took the other. “She actually guided us out of the bubble with her drawings. Thanks for that, Quill.”

“Interesting. I’d love to learn all I can about you and your people, Quill.” Yoyo rested a paw on his sister in-law’s shoulder. “Diya looks like she’s having issues. Mind watching her, Sissy?”

“‘Sissy’? Ugh.” Qesis shook her head in disbelief as she rose to steady her mate. “You and your nicknames. Don’t worry about Nadi, Vinny.”

Ilaria broke out into laughter at that statement. “Holy shit. How’s it feel to be on the receiving end, lil’ bro?”

“Strange. Huh.” Yoyo noticed the growing crowd of not only family members but Neo Egyptian citizens as well. “I’ll tell you how I feel about it later. Maybe we should scurry Quill inside though, to avoid things getting out of paw? Xenophobia can be a mixed bag.”

“Sure thing. You take care of Quill and I’ll handle getting the vehicles back to--”

“Oh gods! Cat!”

Ilaria immediately rushed over, fearing for the elder otter’s health out of instinct. “What’s wrong!? Mom!?”

Robyn held out Cathy’s wrist, tears forming in the corners of her eyes as she showcased the new adornment. “Ottah, look! Isn’t it grand?”

“Mom…?” Ari went a bit weak in the knees at the sight, eventually crumpling into a squealing hug with her mother. “Congratulations, mom. You too, Pat. I knew you two had something special.”

“Thank you, sweetie.” Cathy noticed her son looking over in confusion and dangled her shiny trinket for him. “I didn’t want to distract from more important things. Sorry, my whelps.”

“No, no… Holy crap, though. Good for you, mom.” Yoyo temporarily abandoned Quill to give his mother a hug, but only after paw-bumping his soon-to-be stepfather. “Nice. I knew you’d finally claim her. I’m happy for you.”

“Yeah, yeah. She is somet’ing special, though. Changed me life, she did.” Patrick quickly added to the group hug, then went to help Quill to her talons. “Let’s celebrate somewhere a bit more private, yeah?”

“Definitely.” Iolvin found Adrian as he finally passed through the portal and met him with a kiss. “Let’s go. Zoë must have her hands full with the grandkids, and I’m looking forward to relaxing with them.”

“I think I could use a break too. That was a bit more stress than I signed up for.” Dee shut his eyes and leaned against his husband while they walked. “Grandkids first, hot bath after. Maybe we can invite that nice girl from earlier too, to help us unwind?”

“Heeee…” Yoyo picked Dee up into his arms and increased his tempo. “Good thinking, Adri.”

Grand Palace, Luxor, Neo Egypt

YG, Vasily (YG-4)

18:22, 35/2/1, 15 XP

---

“Ugh… Remind me not to get excited for future family gatherings, Cher.” Artemis tossed his shirt into a bag, then fumbled with his belt to remove his pants next. “Looks like we’re not going to be alone in there. You sure you’re okay with that?”

“Absolutely. I follow my Master.” Cherenkov scanned various bags and cubby holes, finding several outfits she recognized. “I may blush a bit, admittedly.”

“Just keep your eyes down if it’s too much. Or you can hide in your lamp if you want; I won’t hold that against you.” Arty wrapped his loins in a towel and nudged a heavy curtain aside, revealing a much more massive open bathing area than he imagined could exist on an alpine world. “Well this isn’t something you see every day. I guess they do have geothermal plants though. What’s… the protocol for this sort of thing?”

“It seems the baths are gender limited by schedule. From what little I’ve gathered, they filter the pools to keep them clean. I do believe they disallow soaps and harsh chemicals in most of them, however.” Cheren noticed a smaller pool to the side littered with buckets and benches and she pointed toward it. “See? That’s where you’d wash if you needed.”

“Well we already did that in our room. I just wanted to relax.” Arty scanned around the hot spring, finding many of his family here and there yet few private spaces. “Ouh, see that rock between the sections? We can probably hide from prying eyes there.”

“Or perhaps do a little more than just hide, if Master wishes…” The djinn grabbed her master’s arm and started kneading her way to the base of his shoulder as they walked. “One way or another, you’re too stiff. I’ll give you a massage if nothing else.”

“Maybe later, thanks. I just want some peace and quiet after that panic earlier.” Arty rounded the large rock formation and immediately groaned in defeat. “Seriously? I’m trying this later.”

“Art, son… Don’t be like that.” Iolvin shifted on his carved stone seat, Zoë smiling from his borrowed lap. “Join us, please. We never get to have time alone.”

“A man-to-man?” Arty tossed a paw to the others behind the rock, Adrian sitting beside his husband with the harem girl Nesuna rising and falling over his own lap. “Now? Fuck, dad...”

“What, this? Son, I’ll move if you want. I’d like to chat.” Yoyo slid a paw down Zoë’s arm and halted her hand, apparently receiving a bit of love himself below the water. “I need this. Your mom would want us to talk more. What’ll it be?”

“You realize it’s males only now, right? Shit… Well I don’t think the rest of the family needs to see your dick at its best. Just… don’t make me regret this.” Arty found the carved stone shelf on the edges of the pool and took a seat, waving Cheren away when she tried to emulate the other women and sit on his lap. “Damn, that feel nice. Now if only I was alone I could relax…”

“There’s plenty of girls around here, Art. They seem to really like their jobs.”

“You mean the harem? Nothing wrong with that I guess, but I think I’ll pass.” Arty glanced over to Dee as the smaller otter grunted softly, signalling he was unloading his stress inside the dazed human riding him. “You d-don’t have to hold back, dad. At least you’re having fun with your mate and not a stranger.”

“Oh, I fuck strangers all the time. It’s the secret perk in the ambassador job description.” Yoyo gave his wife a kiss on the neck and she resumed her stroking, the handjob causing Yoyo’s cock to grow higher than the waterline. “I figure Adri deserves his fair share when the opportunity presents itself. Nessy here actually volunteered, too.”

“To be impaled by this beast, actually.” Zoë sped up her motions, adding a second hand to better handle the girth of the false dragon cock bolted to her man. “Yet your father always finds a way to make me feel special.”

“Love you, kiddo.” Yoyo gave his mate a kiss, then guided one of her hands down to his knot. “About to pop, hon. Your choice how that goes down…”

Zoë smiled, angled her husband’s cock toward her, and clasped down on his knot. “Just like this, Iolvin. Mark me as yours.”

“Fuck, when you talk dirty like that…” Yoyo shut his eyes as he found his release, a fountain of magenta sprouting up to spash his wife in the face and chest. “Gods, you’re sexy. Zoë...”

“Wow.” Arty blinked and stared while his stepmother took every pint of heavy bombardment. “Okay, I’d normally complain but that was… impressive.”

“Ditto, son.” Yoyo panted as he came down from his high, his gaze settling on Arty’s sizable erections below the water. “Actually, you deserve to get off too, Zoë. I already gotten to taste a bit of Cherry here, so how about…”

“Really? Arty’s into that sort of thing?” Zoë licked her sloppy lips and rose up, only to sit square on Arty’s smaller cock. “Damn… See, this is the way to do it. Give a girl a choice sometimes, Iolvin.”

“W-Wait…” Arty groaned and winced at the sudden sensation, holding his stepmother down instinctively until he could think straight. “I don’t… I mean, I’m not against it but…”

“Not sure? Aw, honey…” Zoë lifted herself up, only to be pulled back down again. “Oh? Still want to try anyway?”

“...only because my dad’s inconsiderate. You can… use me to get yourself off…”

“Heeee.” Dee leaned behind his husband and rubbed Arty’s shoulder. “That’s the spirit. Try new things and--Holy shit. You’ve got two cocks.”

“Oh, yeah. I forgot to mention that?” Yoyo leaned back and kissed his husband, then shook as Nesuna hopped off Dee’s lap and glided onto his reinvigorating manhood. “Just because I can keep going doesn’t mean I need to, babe. I would have chosen you if I did, too.”

“Well I’m flattered, but also tired. Besides, it was her idea. She also wants to share the bed, so you know.” Dee kissed his mate again as Nesuna brought him back into gear for a quickie. “We’re on vacation. We should all just enjoy ourselves. You already work too hard.”

“I hope I won’t intrude.” Nesuna adjusted her hair out of her eyes and smiled as she sank down. “For now, relax and let me do the work.”

“Speaking of work, I think I need to focus on that Quill girl at some point. The language barrier--ah--might make a game plan necessary though.” Yoyo threw an arm around Dee and held him close, the two enjoying Nesuna’s athletic body in their own ways. “Art, what’s the deal with Lix and our bird friend?”

“Don’t call her that, dad. That’s… If she hears that, I’m kicking your tail.”

“Sorry, son. She’s a bit wound up, huh?”

“Not like you’re thinking. She’s been through some stuff.” After a bit of passive bouncing, Arty finally decided to help Zoë and thrusted his hips whenever she fell. “She doesn’t like to talk about it. I think that’s why she’s always hiding behind me.”

“Yeah, she’s a strange woman--better than that last girlfriend of yours though.” Yoyo reached out and planted a webbed paw on Nesuna’s relatively flat chest, more to warn her of his impending orgasm than to get a pawful of softness. “She’s definitely a looker. Same odd eyes as Diya though.”

“The squinting, again? Everyone focuses on that… And wait; she’s not my girlfriend.” Arty huffed as his growing knot started sticking into Zoë’s silky folds, reaching out to flag his own climax. “Zoë, g-get off. I’m gonna--”

Out of the blue, Cheren hugged Zoë from behind and sank down on her master’s longer, unadorned spire. “You need the full treatment, Master.” She pulled the both of them down hard, tying that knot inside Zoë while punching out her own translucent belly. This was the straw that broke the otter’s back, his hefty loads of blue cum visibly filling Cheren like some sort of living condom. “There… Yes, Master…”

“Shit, Cher… She’s my mom…” Artemis rolled his head limply as he fell into bliss, noticing from the new angle that his father was filling Nesuna much the same, the three women shaking on their own in their own peaks. “Fuck… Good talk, dad.”

“Fucking good talk. We need to do this more often.”

Cheren lifted herself free and laid on her back beside the spring while her bloated belly emptied onto the stone ground. “I don’t know why you loathe family gatherings, Master. I sure do enjoy them.”

“Not you too.” Arty groaned as he tried futilely to remove his stepmother from his lap. “Just don’t think Vix is on the menu--”

“Yeah, yeah. You’ve said it before, son. Squinty is forbidden.” Yoyo eased Nesuna up and off his lap, the human not taking enough of his crafted cock to reach the knot. “If that’s the case, I’d watch Quill. She’s hovering around her constantly now.”

“Quill? Really?” Finally Art managed to pop free of his pussy prison and helped Zoë rest between him and his dad. “That’s not possible. She’s basically afraid of strangers. Why would she adopt an alien as a friend of all people?”

“If I didn’t know any better, I’d say it was more like you and her. She seems to be protecting the bird gal.” Dee reached a paw over Yoyo’s lap and clasped one of Zoë’s hands lovingly. “She even seems to understand her writing a bit. What did you call it again, honey?”

“I know you’re just making me say it again, Adri.” Yoyo gave both his mates kisses, then offered a downturned smooch to Nesuna as thanks. “He knows I’m proud I get to coin it. Quillic, I call it. It’s a simple name for a change.”

Dee guided Nesuna to his side but she chose instead to kneel behind Arty and massage his neck, the girl too exhausted to sexually tend the guest. “I’m actually just proud you didn’t name it something silly for a change. You’re handsome when you act professional.”

“Huh. Well I know she’s checking on Quill, but I didn’t question it before now.” Arty shut his eyes as he finally felt relaxed, drained, and satisfied. “Thanks for the warning, dad. I promised she’s be alright around me and I can’t let a lady down.”

“And I’m glad at least one thing I tried to teach you managed to stick. That’s my gentleman of a son.” Yoyo pulled both his mates close and rested in the hot water. “I’m proud, son. Don’t let me down. Although… maybe let those down first.”

“Huh?” Arty looked down at his erect cocks, then back to a few explicit photos he had pulled up on his Sense. “Hey, you’re the one that got me thinking about my ex.”

“And you’re the one with a genie that looks like her older sister.”

“Hey, I know what I like. I guess the similarity is a bit creepy though.”

“I understand, Master.” Cheren lost some of her opacity for a moment, then reformed to embody a lithe ocelot of roughly her master’s age. “Is this more to your liking?” She gauged the baffled reaction from the men and changed a bit more, her chest deflating, pussy tightening, and muscles expanding to match Nesuna’s features. “Perhaps a more innocent appearance like this?”

Artemis swallowed audibly, then rose to his hindpaws and straddled over the nubile ocelot. “I’ll relax later.” The longer of his cocks pressed into the djinn’s evidently virgin folds just enough that his second cock pressed against her rear. “You reap what you sow, kitten.”

Yoyo chuckled alongside his mates as even Nesuna stared in awe. “That’s my boy.”