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_ Chapter 1- Dragon's Rest _

<UEF Station 108523 'Dragon's Rest' > May 18, 2085

The station of Dragon's Rest hovered in Geosynchronous orbit overlooking a planet very earth-like in appearance in the Messier 102 Spindle Galaxy, part of the Draco Constellation. The planet's indigenous species was a cat like lizard that had been dubbed Felis-Draco. The station itself, however, was named more for the simple fact it was one of the few stations in the sector that could boast a dock large enough for the Dragoon-class 'Broadsword' Super-carriers- the largest of all the United Earth Federation's ships. This, and the fairly large Anthro Dragon population on board the Station itself.

Improvements to the Warp-tunnel tech had progressed in leaps and bounds as newer, more exotic materials became available as containment and fuel. It was now possible to travel several thousand times the speed of light through the 'tunnel, but without the adequate shielding now available it would tear the ship to atoms instantly. Waystations like this one, however, were still needed, as although the shielding could protect the ship, the engines needed time to cool off and that was best done while a crew had shore leave.

A young human male was seating in a couch-like seat curving with one of the large windows looking out over the emerald and sapphire planet below. It was not a public area, but a private room booked several days ago. The room, however, was dark. Only the light reflected off the planet revealed the young man shrouded in semi-shadow. From the poor light, one could see (if they could see into the opaque windows) that he was sitting lotus position with his back to the window, meditating. Of his journey to this point, and the task he still had in front of him.

---

His parents always had the best intentions for him. Good schools, better colleges, internships with large companies that treated him better than some of their employees. It was all partially due to the fact he tested out very early on as a genius, and anyone who saw his work agreed with that label. At 3 he was showing surprising aptitude with higher level technologies, at 8 he received a small computer, already fluent in not only basic functions but in 4 different programming languages. By 12 colleges were lining up with full scholarships for him to attend. By 16, Mega-corporations were in bidding wars for his name on a dotted line to work for them. He didn't sign a single one. Instead he took his knowledge he had gained, and started programming something new, something unique.

AI had picked up credibility early in 2020, but between limiters in what they could do and what technology itself was capable of, there wasn't much call for it. When space faring ships became so complicated that humans couldn't keep track of everything required, AI started seeing more use. Disembodied voices telling you the time these were not though- these were completely digital intelligence designed and programmed with specialized functions related to the systems they were tied to.

Gone were the primitive limiters of 2020, and the tech limits were gone as well. One tool at the disposal of programmers of AI now was the ability to dive into the world of data. Similar to virtual reality, this technology allowed minute tweaks to code, and took the idea of Object oriented programming to a whole new level. But it had risks. The human brain can only process so much data at a time, even with enhancements, so time in these dives were usually limited to thirty to forty-five minutes at a time. Any longer and the individual ran the risk of literally melting their brain from synapse overload.

What this young man did was create a buffer for that information overload. Part overlay, part proxy, and part still intermediary, the AI he made, then stripped of extra function and sold to the top bidder, was a personal AI code-named AURA- Augmented Universal Radiant Assistance. The non-stripped version he privately kept for himself, and never revealed to anyone the scope or depth of the functionality of the true AI he made, that though was also named Aura, was not the flimsy imitation he had sold. He finished this project by the time he was 21.

By 23, he personally realized that the religious zealotry and political climate that had infected Earth combined with his more personal tastes in partners made his particular outlook downright dangerous to have. If he was to be discovered as being even remotely sympathetic to Anthros all his assets could be frozen, and if he was not thrown in prison, he more likely would be outright executed. So secretly, he began to broaden his horizons. Shield systems, electronic warfare (instead of the much tamer cyber warfare that he had already studied), life support systems for deep sea and spare faring craft were all studied.

He even exerted a touch of influence too much and managed to get information on the Warp-tunnel tech, but shortly after his parents were tipped off that he might be trying to flee to space. When confronted, he tried to at first deflect, then explain his reasons. Unfortunately, this was to be the last he had contact with his parents, as they were appalled and horrified at his decisions. He had that episode as the only warning to go into hiding with as much cash as he could get a hold of before three days later all his assets were frozen, as he had feared. Using some of his darker contacts, he managed to get on a frigate going space side, and began putting distance between him and Earth.

Seeing as humanity in general had turned their collective backs on him, he took himself and a small crystalline box installed in shielded container that he disguised as a leather briefcase that contained Aura, fully functional from withing the crystal lattice he has specially designed for this possible eventuality, and began station hopping. He tried as much as he dared to not flaunt any wealth, letting his clothes growing a touch ragged, and picking up odd jobs here and there, working his way deeper into space. He wasn't adrift though- he was always searching.

Having access to specific station systems and due to close proximity of ships, Aura could hop from system to system completely undetected, gaining valuable experience and knowledge along the way. What the man was looking for was more puzzle than fact, but he was determined, so therefor was Aura. Ship logs compared to station docking logs, audio recordings, fuel figures, rations, everything was copied, categorized, stored in databases to be cross-referenced with the next bit of information. It took almost a year of station hopping to get close enough to put enough clues together, but he felt he had done what no human ever thought to do- track down a rumored Ark ship.

The secret was that they were not labeled as such- they were actually exploratory vessels, and with an all Anthro crew that for the most part didn't disembark often. Only a handful did, and they were rather close muzzled. They were also, strangely enough, fairly gender neutral. This piece of information at first had puzzled him, until he did a bit of digging and realized that each species of Anthro that had disembarked were of a variety that could hide their genitals in a slit. Further snippets of voice logs and manifests showed that there was quite the variety of species on board compared to what had been seen, as most all seen were carnivorous, but there was a lot of greens and hydroponic parts ordered, as well as aquatic tank parts that some of the less adapted ocean types preferred for relaxation.

When he had all his facts as ordered as possible, complete with the ship name and class, he started plotting an intercept course and a scheme to gain access. He wanted on, to be able to forget his human roots, as he figured if they turned their backs on him, he would return the favor. And the Genesis-class 'Seeker' Cruiser- Tiamat was his ticket to do so. Specially designed for an Anthro crew, it was used by the Anthro fleets as a recon and exploration vessel. It met all his requirements, and once he was within tight beam subspace communication range, he had instructed Aura to hijack the comm relay.

It took a fraction of a second to fire off a data package to ping between ships until it hit the Tiamat, sending a packet with a few documents including his actual resume, attached with the skill set he had picked up right before and following his escape from Earth, and a software suite designed for personal AI's to boost their functionality based on what they were mainly used for. It was a peace offering of sorts, to put the captain he had pinged in a good mood. That was a week ago. For he planned to supplant whoever was their systems admin, and he was going to try with demonstration of his skills as a programmer and hacker in one.

---

A very quiet ping interrupted the man's meditation. The portable data pad he had on a table beside him was where the ping had come from, but it was on silent. He grinned, showing a bit of teeth at that event. There was only one reason why it would have done that. A glowing circle of light appeared on the pad, rising into the air, creating a cylinder of faintly glowing blue light. Inside, a figure began to take form.

The figure at first was indistinct, as if seen through a thick fog. Slowly, the shape began to gain contrast. It was a feral looking animal, with further details resolving into a wolf with a coat that, would the pad have been able to accurately produce a hologram, would have shown to be multiple shades of black, white, gray, and brown- just like the coat of the now extinct timber wolf. One thing that did stand out, however, was the eyes- they were not normal eyes, but luminous pools of light that was constantly shifting hues. Once it was fully resolved, it padded in a circle inside the pillar of light before sitting down. A melodic female voice echoed from the earpiece he always wore now, breaking the silence once again.

"As expected, it took a few days for the captain to triangulate a proper course correction for your message to arrive direct. I am of the personal opinion they did not have sufficient capabilities or knowledge on how to manufacture a long range ping of the caliber that we used." The wolf grinned a bit a this, letting their spectral tongue hang out of their mouth a bit.

"Anyways, the response is within predicted parameters, if a bit short. It simply said En route, begin when ready."

The event the message referred to was a challenge that most would find laughably easy - if they were in person. He was to hack into the ship's mainframe, without being detected, and initiate a system scan. At this point he could be detected, as it would light up his presence like a flare. However, he had to complete the scan of the major systems without being locked out, and leave the results with the captain's AI. To make matters more transparent, part of the upgrade package he gave the captain would allow their personal AI to easily track the test, as long as it happened within the next 2 weeks. Afterwords the crypto-key used would change and it would no longer be synced to his access code.

"I'm guessing they are within range then, as we just received the message?" He spoke, quietly, so as to not alarm anyone or anything while talking to thin air- a habit he had developed after getting strange looks when talking to Aura, as no one knew he had it.

"They are. Shall I begin?" Aura instantly responded, Eyes beginning to swirl faster, anticipating the hunt.

"Yes, begin. I'll be diving in to assist where need be."

Following actions to words, he reached for the briefcase, and pressing a spot on the side, a panel separated slightly and rotated out, revealing a headset that he picked up and placed around his head, covering his eyes and resting behind his ears, but wrapping all the way around his head. A button on the side snapped it to his head, not digging in but securing it snugly. Laying down on the couch, he concentrated on the mental artifact he had created and programmed as the key to the system, a circular panel with 4 holes- 3 on top, with the middle slightly higher than the outside two, and one on bottom. Reaching a mental hand out, he placed his fingertips into these holes, turning first to the left slightly, then 90 degrees to the right.

The second he completed this, the room faded away to nothingness. He floated in space, not even aware of his own body. Summoning a mental image of swirling eyes, Aura appeared in the blackness. As they appeared, lines of shimmering light began to appear all around him. Now synced to Aura's crystal lattice network, he gave a nod to the timber wolf AI as they went to work.

"Securing channel @ Local Comms Relay"

_"_I'll take care of the security protocols. Maybe I should leave them an anonymous tip to strengthen their network"

"Negative opinion- Increased security level would adversely effect data transfer of all major systems. Best approach is not to offer negative gain improvements, but to keep private security holes and breeches."

The banter went back and forth between them, their response times in fractions of a second instead of the normal seconds it would take in non augmented virtual reality. Finally, all personal security was set up and station systems were bypassed. A total of 2 min had elapsed since he had lain down.

"I'm done double checking he protocols. You have the ship vector locked?"

"Direct line not available for Real-Time scan, therefore a 3 point echo off 2 stations on the way and one patrol ship should allow for the timely relay and code injection, proceed?"

"It should work, but just in case have 2 alternate paths lined up in case multiple attack vectors are called for. Authorization 5H4D0VV for ghost protocol. Begin covert scan of ship designation : Tiamat. All mission critical systems, databases, and subsystems. Primary goal is evasion of all AI and ship personnel, with the exclusion of captain and augmented AI attached to said individual. Final result- file copy for personal study, send main to captain, along with a statement if successful evasion occurs: "Scan completed successfully without detection of ship board AI by personal AI designation: AURA actual." With a secondary message to acting SYS ADMIN as follows: "You might want to talk to your captain, you just were scanned by a advanced personal AI without ever detecting it."

"Beginning code injection . . .Success" A moment's pause "Beginning system wide scan" At this point Aura lays down, both eyes luminous red-glowing whirlpools, with multiple ribbons of light flowing back and forth between it and the young man.

Nothing overt happens for a few minutes, other than the young man pulling up various screens in mid air, only to dismiss them as fast. He did this not so much to scan data, but to check the physical screens on board the ship to ensure everything was running like normal, and making notes to himself on things that could be improved or changed for the better. The whole operation took about five minutes, after which all the red ribbons turned blue, then green, before fading away.

Aura sat back up, shaking out invisible dust from their coat. "Covert scan completed successfully, with no detection. Messages sent as instructed, although the response that the second message provoked has been saved for review- life support detected a large thermal spike at that console when the message was reviewed, although nothing seems to have been damaged by excessive heat." That WAS interesting. Perhaps some form of heat manipulation, even pyrokinesis_?_ There had been studies back on Earth to try to cultivate various Psi abilities, but nothing major came of them. Had they managed to actually manifest them, and if so - to what extent.

"Make a secondary note and reminder to trigger if physically on Tiamat and private to research more closely Earth PSI injection programs for Anthros."

"Affirmative. Also, one other anomaly arose while preforming the scan- there is an entire deck of the ship isolated and shielded from the rest of the systems that there is no reference to, except one crew's voice log complaining about having to "go to E Deck" for some "Pod time." No other record of an "E Deck" is recorded in any of the systems, and nothing on the purpose of these "pods"."

"Hmm, mysterious and more mysterious. I think we might be right after all, but we will have to see. Outstanding job, Aura. "

_"Mid-range message ping just arrived along secure channel from infiltration. Contents as followed: <Quite impressive, ETA is Approx. 1 Earth Hour, attached is a video recording of the "confrontation" your parting diplomatic barb sparked between me and my "former" admin systems tech. For Your Eyes Only, please delete afterwords. ~CPTN Kai, UEF-A Tiamat> End of message, shall I pull up the video?"_Aura queried, tilting their head a bit.

The young man chuckled evilly. "This should be rather entertaining. Pull it up. As per captain Kai's request, full system lock-down until video is deleted." Then to himself "Should be very interesting indeed . . ." His grin matched Aura's, as they watched the scene unfold.

---

<UEF-A Ship 'Tiamat' > May 18, 2085

The Captain's intercom beeped once, informing him that there was a call from someone on the ship. He smiled, as he knew not only who it was, but why. Opening a channel on his neural interface chip, he distinctly heard the voice of the admin tech coming through loud and clear, if only in his head. (Ah, the beauty of illegal tech, since I'm an anthro, they won't do shit about it, as my very existence is anathema to their doctrine these days) the Anthro Eastern Dragon thought to himself as he brushed a bit of his platinum colored main back behind his ivory horns with a gold scaled hand.

"Sir, we have a problem, I think anyways," The voice was pitched a bit high, mainly due to the speaker being a fox, some strange holdover from the feral strain causing their pitch to be much higher than a human male's voice. Strangely, the female variety was either normal sounding or almost identical to a male anthro fox.

Dagon, the Captain's personal AI, had already told him of the breach as seen through the rather remarkable upgrade that he had been supplied with. The workmanship of the code, as Dagon had expressed himself before integrating it, was a masterwork. It was on par with the highest level AI properties that his AI had chance brushed paths with. The subsequent message was also floating in his view, right next to a digital image of his AI- that of a winged demon, crouched and hunched over, but rather helpful instead of the embodiment of temptation.

(So what is the problem?) The captain directed this thought at the fox on the line, which the fox would hear on his speaker in the captain's normal voice. Of course, he wanted to see how honest the fox was going to be, whether or not he knew he was being let go or not.

"An AI just scanned us sir. But the strangest thing is it was OUTSIDE the ship, and with us in a warp-tunnel, I cannot fathom how they managed it. What's worse, I'm almost positive that every encrypted file and system was compromised, but for the life of me I cannot locate what they were after!" The fox's voice was rising in pitch with each admission, and quavered on the last part.

(Did you stop it?) He let the question hang in the air for a moment. (From the sounds of things, this sounds like the breach was past tense) Now to rig the trap. (I would imagine that you at least tried to stop it while it was in progress?)

The fox didn't respond for a moment, then audibly the captain heard him swallow. "Sir, if it wasn't for the message that was left specifically for me, and the subsequent sweep for traces that I only barely managed to find, I would not have even know it had happened. Whoever did this is using tech way beyond anything I have seen. Pretty sure UEF doesn't even have tech that can do this."

That last part really got the captain thinking. Either his fox was sorely lacking in the skill set he was hired for, or this mysterious human was every bit the savant that his records claimed him to be. Either way, win-win for the captain. The secrets on this ship couldn't get out. If that young man wanted on, he needed on now. Otherwise the theories the man had probably formulated about this ship would be spread and that's the last thing he needed.

(I need you to report to the bridge within the next 5 minutes please Shawn, that will be all.) He quickly switched to another channel.

(Snow_, you know I don't like asking this of you, but your the best at this. Can you report to the bridge in about 7 minutes. Also, be warned that it's Shawn that it getting "the treatment," so be ready to clamp down on him at the first sign of sparks or flames.)_

"Roger that captain," The Arctic Wolf morph responded almost instantly, if a little sad.

He switched channels one last time. (Sue, I know you are close to Shawn, but please help pack his things up. He's going to be out of it on his way back to his room, and needs to be ready to disembark within the hour.)

The response he got to that was rather heated, but it was somewhat expected from the fox's mate. To be on the safe side, he had Dagon lock the comm channels between the two foxes so no word could get back to the fox yet, and had the message pulled up in front of him on a pad for when the fox in question finally made an appearance, almost 5 minutes on the dot.

"Sir, You called for me?" Good, still in the dark. It was always rather messy if they caught wind that they were getting kicked off the ship before-hand.

"Have a look at this profile. Tell me what you think, honest opinion of course." Kai prided himself on honesty. That much could be said from the fact he had not lied to anyone about this, or just about anything except what the ship was actually capable of. Handing the pad over, he noticed Snow practically ghosting into room behind Shawn and palming the door to locked.

"I don't know where you found this guy sir, but this is over-qualification to an extreme. Why all the computer degrees, only to turn around and start on Astrophysics-based studies, life and ecosystem management, and even warp system analysis? That's roughly three lifetimes worth of study, and one person, a Pure Human at that, claims to have all this? Assuming it was possible, and they weren't locked up either being experimented on or working in a black site, this guy would possibly be able to pull off that trick, but I don't see how." The fox was scratching behind his ear as he read off the various qualifications.

"Wait a sec, I think I recognize this name . . . Darion Sygon. If I recall, wasn't he the wonder-boy that invented the AURA AI system? This cannot be right- that guy, if I recall correctly, went and ran off a couple of years after selling that system. No one heard from him since. News died down around him a bit too quick." The fox looked up at the captain after this.

"I don't know who gave you these files, but if that individual claims that name, he's probably a poser. No way THAT guy is still alive." The captain simply reached over and swiped to the next page, which showed a detailed breakdown of Darion's path from Earth, with annotations at the various ships and stations what jobs and systems he worked on, complete with references. Lastly he swiped once more and the the 3 messages that the ship had received were there in order.

Shawn put the facts together rather quickly at that point. "Wait, you KNEW he was going to scan the ship, let him, and didn't inform me?! THEN you sit here and plan to offer a PURE HUMAN the chance to have access to one of the only full Anthro ships in space, all because he was able to one up me?" He was getting rather hysterical at this point, when the final piece of the puzzle clicked into place.

"OH, shit, your kicking me off. I get the boot due to a fucking pure human piece of trash . . ." At this point there was a flicker in Shawn's eyes, almost like a candle flame, when Snow frowned from behind him. A moment later, the temperature, which had slowly been rising, dropped rapidly, and what only could be described as a spectral force clamped down around Shawn, preventing whatever flare up was about to take place, at the same time, his eyes lost the flickering look, and his gaze became unfocused.

---

Snow stepped forward in time to catch the fox as he began to crumple. The data-pad he had been holding fell from his nerveless fingers, only to stop it's drop a foot off the floor and float up to eye level with Snow. "From what I can see and read, as well as what I picked up from our foxy friend here, his replacement is probably the real deal, and I have a theory- Why this ship. Why leave Earth at all? The answer was right in front of Shawn the whole time."

Snow shook his head. "There are only three things that will drive humans off Earth in this manner- Bigotry, Zealotry, and Fear. And not from them, but aimed at themselves. My theory is that he cross studied precisely because he realized this was going to happen, and wanted to be ready. He didn't have the groundwork fully laid out, and barely escaped the trap. As a result, he wants nothing to do with humans anymore, for a very similar reason several of the individuals on this ship found their way into out path, were recommended to us, or were chosen by us. The fact he has such a broad skill set doesn't surprise me nearly as much as the simple fact he found us. I think this individual shall prove interesting."

Snow placed the slightly shorter fox on his feet, using a touch of telekinesis to hold him upright as he placed a white furred paw on the fox's head. "Going with mental block only, or physical as well?"

"Mental," the dragon replied, plucking the pad out of the air. "Not enough time for physical as well, but then again, _ That _isn't as uncommon among anthros as some other things are, especially compared to humans." He flipped the pad back over to the main profile. "How long you think the access block to E should be for Darion?"

Snow chuckled as he finished up with Shawn, a bit of life returning to his eyes as he heads for the door to clean out his workspace. "I recommend give him a hard week, unless someone approaches you about it. But whatever the outcome, I have no doubt in that he will manifest at least 3 perks, and possibly L3S, but the last is gut feeling."

Kai raised a scaled eye-ridge at that. "L3S? You sure, or just hopeful? I think that was what, one in one hundred million chance wasn't it. And only stable if specific conditions were met- something like high intelligence, perception, spatial awareness, and compatible base genetic template? This is more your forte, not mine Mr. Genetic Master."

"You got it in one," Snow confirmed, shaking his head at the captains photographic memory augmented by the neural implant. "Though as to genetic master, you know that is more Sky's gig. I'm more fluid in nature." For a brief second the Arctic wolf shimmered, and in their place was a photo copy replica of Shawn, hands on his hips, then with another blur the wolf was back.

"Anyways, I need to finish up getting clearance for us to dock, so go ahead and lock down the E deck please and thank you Snow. And spread the message that the new guy is off limits unless or until he initiates or indicates he is down for . . . activities. And that includes exhibitionism. Heh, should be fun to see how the more amorous deal with that stipulation. The showers are going to get messier than usual."

"That they will" Snow shot back as he walked out the door and it clicked shut after him.

(Dagon, clip footage right after clamping down Shawn and send it to our friend Darion.)