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Chapter 14

"We should be getting to our suite so slowly. It must have been hours," Camilla whispered.

"It's been exactly 2 hours and 23 minutes," the Anubis Seth Taur whispered back.

"It's about time for us. We should mingle with the people again sometime."

"Then let's do that."

They both pulled on their sauna robes and left the spa area, strolling purposefully down the hallways, they were only casually noticed.

"Notice anything?" the Taur asked, addressing Camilla.

"What?"

"Ever since I started looking purely biological and moving accordingly, no one has looked at us with curiosity or even weirdness."

"You're right. Now that you mention it, it strikes me."

"Let's take a shower and then get something to eat."

"Absolutely. The sauna was pretty draining," Camilla confirmed.

"Literally," the Taur added, grinning broadly.

"Oh, great. Now you're coming up with flat jokes, too. I'm really not spared anything, though."

"You wanted both of us so badly. Now live with it."

"I really need to watch what I say."

" 'Don't get your knickers in a twist' is as good a template as, 'if you can't remember it, tie a knot'."

"Yes, I was afraid of something like that," sighed the fox-wolf.

After an extensive water and shower gel fight in their suite, they were both refreshed, dressed and entered the dining room.

To their surprise, the captain's table actually included the captain, Isis, Stephen, Frank and also the rat named Greta.

The group seemed to be engaged in an intense conversation, but broke it up when the captain saw who was entering.

"They were talking about us," Camilla noted bitterly.

"They're up to something, and I don't like it," the Taur stated.

"The question is whether they're out to get us by the skin of our teeth or it's more of a clandestine support."

"You mean Isis and the captain have been conferring about how to get support to Sirius B and D?"

"That would be one option."

"And the other?"

"You don't want to hear that one."

"Yes, I do."

"How to dispose of both of us in the quickest and most innocuous way."

"I should have said no."

"I warned you."

"And now?"

"To the buffet, and to sit guilelessly with you at the table," Camilla ordered.

"Very well, Miss Queen," the Taur purred, chuckling.

"Now that's not very funny. Hurry up and let's hear what they have. I'm just wondering why I trust you more than my closest relatives."

"We share a bed, a shower, food, our thoughts, and ultimately our bodies."

"You mean more like sharing my body. After all, you're putting some of yourself into me, not the other way around."

"I agree."

Once at the table, everyone was still present and smiling at the two.

Stephen was the first to break the silence, "Dear Scholli! You laid it on mighty thick there," he turned to the Anubis Seth Taur.

"It was not my intention to deceive or confuse anyone," the Taur apologized.

"But if you are also Seth, then you are living up to your mythological role," Stephen probed.

"It is the role that has been assigned to me, and it is not correct in that way. It is rather due to external circumstances that events overlapped which I had not triggered, but which made themselves clear with my appearance and influence, although noticeable before. In short, one looked for an idiot to whom one could tie it and found him in me. For one thing or another I might be the trigger, but later they just held me responsible for every shit," explained the Anubis Seth Taur.

"Once a scapegoat, always a scapegoat," Butler Frank Simson stated.

"How can we help now?" interjected Captain Degreen.

"You guys have been discussing this for a long time and only interrupted when we arrived," Camilla stated, looking around the room.

"I refuse to support you for now," the rat girl declared solemnly.

"What do you mean?" echoed Camilla.

"You understand me very well. I offered my help if you couldn't manage to deal with a jackal male. With a stallion, I'll strike out and be out."

"Oh that. Oh no. I thought you meant that as a joke."

"What, I don't joke with that kind of thing. I would have been very ready."

"I would have shredded you with my thing," the taur pointed out.

"Even we anthro rats are flexible and stretchy. With the right technique, a lot of things work, but with a horse, I'm not going along with it anymore, no technique will help, and even more so, nothing can be done with caution."

"Too bad," the Taur feigned dismay at the rejection.

"Let's change the subject to where we left off," Isis began. "Where do we end up on Sirius B?"

"Don't you think the subject is getting a little past Captain Degreen?" cautioned Camilla.

"He surprisingly knows his way around Sirius B, even rudimentarily knows the terrain," Isis explained.

"Well. We were young then," the stallion hesitated.

"Okay, from one stallion to the other," the Taur added. "We're talking captain stallion to Seth stallion now. Where is the best landing spot out of range of my troops?"

"That's called conspecific to conspecific. Doesn't do much good, though, since I'd like to know where the access points are and what the guard rotation is like and the strength of the backup troops."

"Shit!" escaped the Anubis seth taur. "He's right. We need to get to the bridge and we need a log," he added.

"Be my guest," the captain acknowledged, pointing toward the hall exit.

"Nope, later. Right now, I'm going to get something to eat."

"Right," Camilla added, biting into an apple.

Isis grinned inscrutably to herself, Captain Degreen looked pensively at the Anubis-Seth Taur, butler Frank Simson looked sheepishly at the table, Stephen played the good stepbrother and scratched behind his right ear, while Camilla ate her apple and her Taur munched on a sandwich.

"There, now we can," the Taur solemnly started after half an hour, picked up his dishes and stood up.

"Let's do it, then," Degreen confirmed, showing enthusiasm. "Miss Queen, may I invite them to join me on my bridge?"

"As long as they don't want to show me around, I'm happy to."

"I guess that's stuck with me forever now," the stallion groaned.

"Captain. You keep challenging it, don't you?"

Without another word, the captain pointed briefly at the Taur, then toward the exit. The Anubis Seth Taur understood and followed him. A short time later, Camilla ran out of the dining room and followed the duo.

"Well, and we're going to focus on landing on Sirius A soon," Isis announced, smiling.

"I hope we don't get lost at our destination," Stephen grumbled.

"No, no. We'll keep in touch, I might even take you with me."

"But what about my stepsister and Frank?"

"That shouldn't be your worry. Frank is doing very well at the mansion and Camilla, and she herself is in very good hands with Anubis and Seth."

"True. Still, we should talk to them first and not rush into anything."

"Most definitely," Isis confirmed, nudging Stephen affectionately.

Once on the bridge, the captain briefly introduced his companions, eyeing the Taur very suspiciously when the names Anubis and Seth came up. The first officer in particular, a female anthro-hyena who happened to be from the area of prehistoric Thebes, never took her eyes off the Taur.

"Miss Onari," the captain began, addressing his first officer. "Is there anything we can do for her? You seem tense."

"May I speak freely?" the hyena asked.

"Of course. Fire away."

"I think it's extremely questionable to bring a Taur onto the bridge who has two Egyptian deities in him and then Seth as well."

"Do you have any facts to back up your concerns?"

"No, unfortunately, I don't. I just have a gut feeling."

"May I say something, too?" interjected Camilla.

The hyena looked down at the fox-wolf from above and nodded slightly reluctantly.

"This Taur is my partner, my beloved husband, and I can live with both of them, with Anubis and with Seth. They're not partnered with him, I am, and if I can put up with him, they should be able to for those few minutes."

"I'm just afraid it won't last for a few minutes," the hyena indicated.

"Then just don't pay any more attention to him, First!" the captain admonished. "Is there anything else?"

"No, sir!" the hyena gave through gritted teeth.

"Then they may step away or help us."

"I prefer to help," Onari sighed.

"Very well, very well. We need maps of Sirius B and further Sirius D," Degreen prompted.

"Very well, Captain." The first officer, approached, bent over a computer console, entered a code. "What region are you looking for?"

"We're looking for a plateau," the Taur replied.

"Very funny. There's only one of those on the barren rock, after all," growled the first.

"They're damn right there is. There is indeed only one."

"What, wait ... - That's right. Comes as a hologram," the hyena confirmed.

"Do you know distribution of your troops?" asked Camilla, turning to her Taur.

"If they don't deviate from my specifications, yes," he replied.

The hyena stood right next to him, looking at him briefly. "What exactly are you looking for?"

"It's about losing contact with my troops. They will attack anything that doesn't look like Seth and will do so as long as I don't give the order to stop all actions."

"But they don't look like Seth."

"That's why we're here. I'm just as much a target when I show up there. I can only give the order mentally or verbally, but that would require me to get close enough to the soldiers."

"And they don't have that time, since they'll be blown away before they get there."

"Bingo!" escaped the Taur. "But now that I know the situation, and now that I can see where our landing site will be, we can organize a suitable shuttle now, and also figure out something to get into each of the catacombs without being blown over by a patrol right away."

"Captain!" the Hyena started loudly.

"First? I'm listening."

"If they need backup, I'd love to come along."

"What's the change of heart?"

"This looks a lot like an infiltration mission to me, and at the academy, that was my specialty."

"You served?" the Taur asked in amazement.

"Why not? Just because I'm a woman doesn't mean I can't shoot."

"That's what guys are for who can, but hit anything but the target," Camilla added, looking to her Anubis Seth Taur and winking cheekily.

"I can tell we understand each other," the hyena said conspiratorially.

"I've charted the first catacombs," the taur announced, pointing to the hologram.

"Where?" asked Camilla shortly.

"One there, about 2000 meters from the landing site, a second one again 2000 meters further south, then a third one again 2000 meters, but heading east."

"What's in the caves?" asked Onari.

"The fragments of Osiris," replied the Taur.

"You don't mean to tell me that the mythology is true."

"Yes, it is, or else how will they explain my existence?"

The hyena raised his hands briefly. "Touché."

"And where are the others?" asked Camilla.

"In the other hemisphere. In another eight cave systems."

"So with the 3 ahead of us, we would have all 11 body parts together. The head on Sirius D."

"And where is the thirteenth fragment?" asked the hyena. "According to myth, there are supposed to be thirteen parts."

"That's his penis, and I have it on my body. And yes, I will keep it," the taur explained.

"Good for you," the hyena said, waving it off.

"But it's amazing how many know about ancient Egypt and you gods," Camilla turned to her Anubis-Seth taur.

"The myth lives and will never die."

"No wonder, if you keep coming back," Onari remarked.

"When do we land on Sirius A?" asked Camilla, addressing Captain Degreen.

"If our parking position should clear on schedule, we will descend in 8 hours and enter the planet's atmosphere in 12 hours."

"Is there turbulence?" the Taur echoed.

"No. The atmosphere is still very thin and will probably remain so. The air is just barely good enough for you to be outside. Physical exertion prohibits itself."

"Terraforming doesn't always produce the desired effects," the first officer interjected. "Perhaps it should have been left in this sector in particular."

"I'm going to Styx Grool now," the Taur announced. "Bloody hell, everyone has a name here and I'm just a hybrid."

"If it makes you feel better, I'll call you Anuset from now on. That even sounds Egyptian," Camilla called over to him.

"Anuset? That sounds good. Very good, in fact. Wish me luck, my darling!"

"What could possibly happen to you? I love you, Anuset."

"I love you too."

"Whoa, your sexing is unbearable," the hyena roared between them, waving her arms in the direction of the bridge exit.

"I'd better be going," Anuset said curtly, and left the bridge.

"And since I'm redundant here, I'll be going too," Camilla said still and disappeared as well.

"Excellent, Miss Onari," the captain added. "You and I have a mission now, once we've landed. We're going to locate a shuttle that will take us all to Sirius B and fit on this plateau."

"It can't be bigger fifty by twenty meters," the Hyena replied, looking at the hologram.

"That narrows it down a lot," Degreen reflected. "What do they suggest?"

"We go the not-quite-legal route. You know what I mean."

"Oh, yeah. Like old times?"

"Like old times," confirmed the first.

"Isis, we need to talk," Anuset began after entering Isis' cabin.

"Fine. Somehow everyone wants to talk to me."

"It's about the landing site and the first troops at the caves."

"Did you find anything?"

"Yes. We launched a hologram on the bridge. The first fragment is 2000 meters as the crow flies."

"How big is the plateau?"

"Limited," Anuset reasoned.

"I don't believe it," Isis flared up, "since you're not a robot anymore, you seem to be a typical guy. Constantly oblivious, the main thing is to have a partner to stick your dick in."

"Well, it finds its way on its own."

"Oh noooo!" hissed the human goddess. "I'm going to the bridge and you're coming with me. I want first-hand information. You I can't seem to trust anymore."

As they both stepped out into the hallway, Camilla came running across their path. "Oh hello, you two!" the fox-wolf greeted cheerfully.

"We're on our way to the bridge," the Taur announced.

"That's just great, Anuset. I'll accompany you."

"Anuset? Who is Anuset?" asked Isis.

"It is I," announced the Taur. "I was complaining that everyone here has a name, and yes, I possess two, and no one can agree on who I am and what to call me."

"So I gave him the combination of Anu-bis and Set-h."

"A very good idea," the goddess remarked, patting Camilla on the shoulder. "Let's get going. We need to put our money where our mouth is."