Waterstrider

Canvas Town, Tseludia Station, Pantheonic Territory, Fourthmonth, 1634 PTS

Wei listened attentively to the report, finding its contents to be potentially concerning. He had asked to be personally informed of any moves the Redwater Sect made, but this news was outside his expectations. He had thought they would lay low after the failed attack on the Celans, but it seemed that their leader had other intentions.

He was sitting in his office, a finely furnished room just down the hallway from the far larger and more ornate residence of the clan’s matriarch.

“I see,” he said as the report concluded. “Keep up the good work, Hiryot.”

The younger man, who was actually the son of Wei’s second cousin, bowed.

“I shall endeavor to do so, Elder Wei.”

With that finished, Wei closed the connection, Hiryot’s form disappearing from the tablet he had been contacted on. He set it down on his perfectly organized desk, and picked up a cup of tea that had long since gone lukewarm. Wei took a moment to enjoy the rest of the tea, leaving behind only the dregs that had settled at the bottom of the cup. He rested it back on the small saucer.

As he stood up, Wei arched his back, stretching his arms out to eliminate aches and pains. He cycled some genesis miasma throughout his meridians, shoring up strength in some parts of his body and reinforcing it in others.

When he was young, he would have said that such use of martial arts, solely to relieve minor pain and annoyance was emblematic of a lack of respect for the institution he had learned it from. He had found himself mellowing out as he grew older, however. Particularly after he married and had children.

It had been a lifetime since then. His oldest children had become greybeards just like himself, none of them having enough talent to fully form their cores. It was sad to know that he would likely outlive many of his own children, but that was simply a curse that nature placed on powerful martial artists.

Wei wondered just when he had become the sort of man who spent half his time thinking about the past. He chuckled to himself as he finished circulating his miasma, his body once again feeling as hale and healthy as that of a young man.

The Hadal Clan’s headquarters took up an entire two levels of a stack, housing hundreds of individuals within its walls, with all sorts of training halls, offices, places to relax, and other amenities. One could almost spend an entire lifetime within the headquarters without needing to leave.

It was the largest building designed in a traditional Canvasian style on the station, and most hatches that had been in the original building had been removed, replaced with doors and archways.

Wei slid open the door to his office, enjoying the comfortable sliding sensation it made as he recessed it into the wall by hand. He had still not become used to the fundamental alien nature of the hatches that most of the station’s population was so used to.

The thought brought with it another chuckle. His body looked old, but his mind and soul were far older than he seemed. While he was very advanced on the path of martial arts, Wei had not yet escaped the hands of time, and doubted that he ever would. The allure of immortality did not compel him as it once hand. He found his responsibilities to his family far more important.

It took barely a minute for Wei to make his way to the wide double doors that marked the entrance to the matriarch’s residence. He had only just begun to stretch out his hand to knock, when he heard a voice from inside.

“Come in.”

He did as his matriarch bid. Wei slid the door open and bowed before Sirena. She was seated on the floor in a meditative pose, but stood as he entered.

“Has something happened?” she asked.

Wei nodded somberly.

“The Redwater Sect has spent all night destroying all the local gangs surrounding them.”

She raised an eyebrow.

“Do we know their purpose?”

“I find it hard to say for certain,” he replied. “They have made an official announcement that it is their responsibility as martial artists to purge those who target the poor, but according to some of the escaped gangsters, their core focus was not on killing the gangsters, but on stealing everything of value from them.”

The matriarch laughed, her voice making a bright and sonorous tone. She was only a bit over a decade younger than Wei, but the speed of her advancement had been far faster, and she appeared about thirty years younger than him in both mind and body.

“I suspect the nearby black markets and pawn shops will be seeing a good deal of business, soon.”

She paused, rubbing her cerebral dantian. It was a habit that she had picked up from her mother, Wei recalled. Sirena had been doing it for almost a century in subjective time, by now. A memory of Sirena as a child trying to copy all of her mother’s mannerisms and habits flashed through his mind, and Wei had to suppress a smile.

She had changed a lot in that time, gone from a cute younger cousin who he had doted on, practically a sister to him, to a leader that he deeply respected. Small details such as her mannerisms reminded him that she hadn’t changed completely. He was proud to see how far she had come.

“Do we have any idea what they might be needing so much money for?”

Wei shook his head in response.

“It is hard to say, but I don’t believe so. Their internal renovations near completion, and their existing sources of funding should be more than enough to continue training their new disciples. I had expected them to focus on that for at least the next few months.”

“As had I,” sighed Sirena. “I suppose it is possible they found an item on the black market they wish to purchase, though I suspect such a thing would have been offered to us first.”

“It is also possible that the Riverfiend’s condition is worse than we had anticipated,” suggested Wei.

Sirena considered the matter and nodded.

“That is indeed a possibility. I need you to keep an eye out.”

“Of course, Matriarch.”

He bowed, turning to leave.

“Oh, by the way, Wei.”

Wei shifted back to face her once again.

“How has the matter with the Justice Office and that Poisoner gone? Do we know who they are?”

“I’m afraid not, Matriarch. There are no poisoners within our vassal organizations nor the Redwater Sect, and neither our nor the government’s investigations have borne any fruit so far.”

Sirena pursed her lips.

“I see. Keep me apprised.”

Wei bowed once again and turned to leave the room. As he opened the door and prepared to step out, another memory came to mind, a way that they used to interact, so long ago. He turned back to her once more, a wry smile on his lips, feeling that Sirena would likely forgive the whims of an old man.. She glanced at him quizzically.

“I’ll see you later, Little Sisi,” he said.

Sirena flushed, and he chuckled again as he left the room. He hadn’t called her that in over a decade or more, probably. He cheerfully wandered down the hallway. The lukewarm tea from earlier had failed to quench his thirst. Perhaps he should stop by a teahouse or an inn, he thought.

Tseludia Station Exterior, Pantheonic Territory, Fourthmonth, 1634 PTS

Neu’s glands burbled in annoyance as she approached the damaged ship. Just this morning, someone had thrown explosives into the attachment point between it and the station, and now she was here having to find out the reason.

Maybe it was time to quit her job. She had thought it would be an exciting job, hunting smugglers and sensing dangerous technologies and contraband. What she had not anticipated was just how mundane her work was. Day in and day out she had to handle suspicious ships, deal with irate alien merchants, many of whom did not even speak Staiven, and pore over every inch of the ship. She found it exhausting and unfulfilling, and it did not even pay well.

She had prayed to Estrivai for a proper harvest, hoping to fill her pockets, but all she found was a large hidden compartment full of stolen Staiven weapons. This had meant overtime, and she didn’t even receive a bonus for her hard work.

She supposed that’s what she deserved for blindly relying on divine assistance.

According to the reports, this ship arrived carrying passengers from the Janaste system. It was a sleek, streamlined vessel, the sort of design that had little purpose outside of an atmosphere. The ship was composed of a glossy, remarkably smooth black metal, and orange mist dispersed out from small cracks in the exterior, presumably some form of exhaust or heat dissipation. Neu had never been trained in ship construction. All she knew was that this orange glow meant that the ship was created by Celans. That was to be expected, given its origin in the Janaste system.

Neu shifted her hands forward on the control terminals, their fleshy masses feeling comfortable in her practiced hands. Her astro slid forward until she found herself merely ten meters from the exterior of the ship. She received a hail, but chose to ignore it. She did not strictly need to interact with the aliens personally, and she found it taxing to do so.

Now that she was close enough to the target, Neu fiddled with the terminal some more, and her entire ship vibrated under the energies emitted from the sensor. The sensation had felt like it would tear one or more of her glands open the first time she had experienced it, but after tens of such experiences, she had adjusted, and no longer particularly minded it.

At the very edge of her own senses, Neu thought she sensed some sort of object disengaging from the passenger ship’s hull. She shifted the great sensor to cover that area, but felt nothing, and decided it was likely a figment of her imagination. Such happenings were not uncommon midway through a long shift such as this one.

Neu failed to notice the light thunk at the bottom of her own hull.

The vast sensor slowly created a sensory map covering every inch of the ship, completed over the course of a half hour as Neu slowly circled it. The particles released by the sensor permeated everything within range. While there were materials that could block their entrance, they needed to be reported to the port authority in advance, otherwise it was a violation of the law.

After a lengthy period of data amalgamation, the map was complete, and Neu quickly inspected it. There was no sign of blocked areas nor any contraband. Perhaps the target of the explosive was one of the passengers who had died in the blast, not that Neu actually cared about the matter.

She sent a quick message to the crew of the ship, warning them about the medical condition known as ‘cancer’ that the sensor had a chance of causing humanoids to contract. She also informed them of the pre-existing medical conditions the incredibly detailed sensor results had pointed out, such as a tumor in one Korlove’s head or some sort of infection in a Jobu’s foot.

Neu hummed after completing a good deed. She wondered whether the goddess Tseludor would give her blessings if she accumulated enough such good deeds.

A clatter resounded beneath Neu’s feet, and she frowned. There was nothing down there but thrust mechanisms and the hull. She supposed it was probably due for maintenance. It had been over four months since the mechanic had arrived to give it a check up.

Deciding her work here was done, Neu sent the report in and returned to the port authority’s private section of the docks. She only had a few more hours left on her shift, and then she would finally be able to relax. Perhaps she would try out that new nutrient bathhouse that had opened just a stack away from her home. She had heard its viscosity was excellent.

Port Authority Sensor Ships: [Used not only on Tseludia Station, but in most Pantheonic Government controlled stations, these ships use large sensors that bombard target areas with very small high energy particles to create a perfect model of everything within the area. Certain materials and technologies can absorb the particles or warp them around an object or space, but due to the near perfect three dimensional envelope, there are no known species whose technology is capable of hiding without any notice through one such sweep. While their use is expensive and can cause health issues in certain species when exposed, they are incredibly effective at finding contraband. This technology is known by most species beyond a certain advancement level, as it does not require any miasmic technology to construct and utilize. It is rumored the Staiven are able to mass produce them using some secret, more advanced technology on their homeworld. In addition, the Staiven are the only ones able to cut costs by making the ships that carry the sensors manned. The vibration and energy exposure cause health problems in most of the other races. Some expensive Staiven medical clinics use a similar technology to search their bodies for the source of health problems.]