Litvir rubbed his eyes as he entered the cockpit. Thankfully, the Thantir Two’s self-repair systems weren’t damaged, they’d only been taken offline, so the automated glass repairs had finished up quite quickly. Everything electrical though was still a bit iffy, and the heating was currently off, meaning the ship’s average temperature was about 263 Kelvin.
“What is it, Tenuk?”
Tenuk, to his credit, had done a great job getting the important stuff working. His time spent as a Divine Guardian, piloting the Kiniseon One, meant that his skills translated pretty well into Decay Lord ships. He was currently standing up, not wanting to use the captain’s chair that was still covered in weird, green and red blood.
“We got a transmission. Just in time as well, I just got it working.”
“And you have not answered it?”
Tenuk shrugged. “You’re the boss currently. You should answer.”
The psionic Decay Lord grunted and sat down in the co-pilot’s seat. That being said, Litvir currently couldn’t get his telekinetic powers to work, and had shut down his telepathy until he could develop additional protections against mind-invading Voidborns. He tapped a nearby console and accepted the transmission.
“Hello, Decay Lord Litvir speaking. Who is this?”
“Hey Litvir, is Galyn there?”
Litvir recognized the cold, mechanical voice that was doing its best to sound chirpy. “Hello, Kal. Which one of you am I currently speaking to?”
“This is Leh…” Kal seemed to pause for a moment. “The green one with explosion powers. Sorry, forgot that you lot aren’t quite used to us being six separate beings yet. We just sent out all the messages we could, and we just sent you our list of contacts so you can do the same. Is everything alright? You were slow to pick up.”
“No…” was Litvir’s blunt reply. “Same Voidborn that attacked you, just attacked us.”
“Oh no, do you need help? We can come and help right now if you need us!”
Litvir glanced over to Tenuk, then turned to look down the main corridor. With all the doors open, he could see right down to the cargo bay, where he caught a glimpse of Relkir, who had spent the last two hours trying to break open the cube that currently contained fellow Decay Lord Seimeni. Standing in one of the closer doorways was Phovos, who was currently going from room to room, checking that the injured Decaylings and Decay Lords were stable.
“We are not in urgent need of help, but Galyn is not in a good way. He is currently in one of his cocoons, but none of us are feeling right.”
“What happened? Did anyone get stabbed?”
“A handful of us, yes.”
“Not good. Okay, send us your coordinates, we’re coming right now.”
Tenuk quickly typed out a message and sent it to Shield Six, their fellow Thantir ship, then prodded Litvir.
“They didn’t even discuss it.”
“They have a telepathic link between each other. It is pretty common out here, especially among groups that have been together for a while. Retvik, Arkay and myself had one for a while until we were separated.” Litvir explained. “Is there a problem, Leh? We are all alive here, even if our abilities are acting up and Seimeni is stuck in a box.”
“Okay no we’re definitely coming over right now…” Leh trailed off. “Just got your coordinates. Stay where you are. And, while you’re at it, who got stabbed?”
Tenuk and Litvir glanced at each other. Litvir looked back down the hallway and called Phovos over.
“What is it, boss?” Phovos muttered. “You want an update? I don’t have one.”
“Kal is on their way over, they are insisting. They also ask who got stabbed by Ahkron.”
“Uh… I think just Galyn, Teekay and Eksi, ser… Everyone else just seemed to take a normal physical beating, and it… kinda just ripped Elksia’s wings off with its bare hands… She’s kinda not doing too well. None of us are.”
“I understand… sorry…” Litvir couldn’t help but apologise. He felt somewhat bad, it had been his stolen telepathic powers that had knocked everyone out. With a sigh, he turned back to the transmission. “We just checked, Leh. Three of us were stabbed, including Galyn.”
“Stabbed with what?” For a being with a mechanical voice, Leh sounded awfully concerned.
“Golden spears. A particularly large one was used on Galyn. We removed the spears and they are currently being stored in a separate container in the cargo bay. May I ask, why are you suddenly so concerned about us?”
Leh clicked several times. “Gotta get you checked out for Kenic Spores. Voidborns are known for leaving horrible parting gifts in the beings they failed to kill. Nasty things, basically a ticking time bomb. It’s what we pulled out of Arkay when we treated him as a Decayling, and he was absolutely riddled with them because he blew up an entire army of Voidborns.” Leh hesitated, then clicked again. “You should be fine, but better safe than sorry, as long as no Voidborns entered anyone’s heads.”
Litvir swallowed nervously and didn’t respond. This was immediately picked up on.
“He got inside your head, didn’t he?”
“Yes. He used my telepathy to knock everyone out. But I removed myself from the situation as fast as possible so he could do no further damage. I have since shut off my psionic abilities to avoid further damage, although it is difficult to do so…” Litvir was now visibly concerned, and Tenuk and Phovos had both noticed. “Am I infected with a Kenic Spore? Or am I destined to meet a far worse fate?”
“Don’t worry, we just gotta get you checked out for mind control. Don’t want you suddenly deciding to kill everyone on board for your new master.”
“Oh…” Litvir glanced upwards as Phovos patted him on the shoulder, then made her way back down the hallway. She’d heard movement and wanted to check it out. “Well… I do have some shielding against that sort of thing…” Litvir paused, then looked back up. Phovos was back and she looked upset. “Apologies, Leh, but I need to go. I have an injured crew to look after.”
“No worries! We’ll be with you in two hours, assuming we don’t run into any more evil ancient Voidborns!” With a soft crackle, Kal closed the connection. In the mean time, Tenuk had set up an alarm, to alert them when their ship would arrive.
“Is something wrong, Phovos?”
Phovos nodded. “Retvik is awake, but he’s asking me some really awkward things and asked for you.”
Litvir sighed, then got up. From the way Phovos was acting and from what he knew of Retvik and Phovos’s relationship, he’d worked out what was going on. Retvik had a concussion, and Rethans always had… weird symptoms when it came to concussions.
“Stay here and take a quick break with Tenuk, I will deal with Retvik then keep an eye on everyone for a bit…”