Chapter 41: Celestial Drifter

Jake stared at the two bright yellow eyes staring from 30 metres above him.

The creature moved forward, it's body coming in range of Jake's flashlight, it's large scale figure revealing itself.

It's skin seemed to reflect and absorb all light, meaning it was able to change its properties to suit it's needs.

It's large and tall body resembled a sort of stocky and long body.

The creature got closer, compared to its body it had a small mouth, this made sense as the Atlas had said it feeds off energy, and communicates via telepathy making the mouth functionally useless in deep space.

It's face was large and long with no nostrils or gills visible on it, it did however possess what seemed to be some sort of pointy ears just to the back of its head.

It had 4 limbs which resembled the limbs of the lizards of earth, much smaller than in comparison with its body which meant they rarely used them.

The most surprising thing was it's rear, while Jake expected a tail it had some sort of large tentacles, 4 in all equally spaced apart, constantly moving.

'Wow.' Jake thought as he gazed on the alien creature.

The creature spoke again, it's voice much clearer but Jake could still not understand it's words.

(It says that you're an odd-looking creature.) The Atlas translated the entity's words.

'Well tell it, it's odd too.' Jake spoke.

The creature spoke again as it got closer to Jake.

(It's asking you how it's going to fit through the hole.)

'Tell it to wait here, we will launch a few more torpedoes to enlarge the gap.'

The Atlas conveyed Jake's words and the entity responded with agreement.

Jake and the Entity took a few steps back as he ordered the ship to launch torpedoes again.

Jake watched as the ship flew back before a large explosion blasted near the hole, Jake ducked down to avoid any debris.

When Jake woke up and looked around, he noticed a light blue sphere surrounding the entity as it calmly watched the explosion.

When the hole was big enough, the entity spoke once more.

(It says to climb on.)

'Wait what?' Jake was a little nervous about the large alien beast as it kneeled gesturing to Jake.

(It's not being aggressive and also when else would you get a chance like this.) The Atlas encouraged Jake to hop on.

The beast was tall and Jake used the suit's in-built thrusters to land on top of the entity.

Jake felt odd as the skin of the best felt as hard as rock but as flexible as rubber.

'This feels odd.' Jake spoke as he examined the skin of the beast.

(It's completely organic, how it managed to evolve, the conditions and time required for such evolution must have been astronomical.) The Atlas spoke, impressed by the entity.

'Do they have a name for their species?' Jake asked.

(Strævaß. That's what it said or you can call them Celestial Drifters.)

'Hmm Celestial Drifters, I like that.'

In the next moment, the creature let out a low hum before it started to float and head towards the gap.

Jake watched its movements which were both graceful and majestic as it travelled towards his ship.

Jake hopped off before thanking the creature, which seemed to understand Jake's gesture.

'Okay Atlas how do we help it?' Jake asked as he got inside the ship.

(Well it needs energy, and according to what it said it needs a lot of it.)

Jake thought for a bit before speaking "The power supply, can we expose the main battery and use the engines to boost its power."

(That could work, if we also reroute the backup and reserve cells as well we could create a large enough charge.)

'Well let's do it then.' Jake spoke as he got to work.

The Atlas explained crudely to the Entity of their plan and what it had to do.

An hour later, Jake had managed to expose the backup battery below the ship and switched on the main engines.

Jake had rerouted the power to the backups and under the advice of the Atlas, he disabled the limiters that would hinder their plans.

'Atlas, what's the percentage that the ship explodes, taking us and dozens of miles of the planet too?' Jake asked as he did his final preparations.

The Atlas instantly responded (27% per cent.)

'Eh, good enough.' Jake said as he had already gone this far and he trusted the Atlas' calculations.

The entity after silently waiting for Jake to finish moved to the front of the ship, it had explained to the Atlas that it just had to be near an exposed source, and not directly in contact with it.

Jake looked at the entity not as he fired up the engines, the power surging to the backup power as warnings went off around him.

For a few seconds nothing happened, then Jake noticed it had gotten quiet. Alarms were still blaring but he heard absolutely nothing.

Jake looked at the creature, the area around it started to get blurry, it's body releasing blue sparks and shocks.

Soon it's skin started to move around, as if searching for something, and then a bright blue flash suddenly emerged from the body of the creature, expanding and being contained by the blue sphere or shield it seemed to be encased in.

Jake could not even react as the blue light collapsed and for a few seconds Jake looked at the creature and it spoke again.

'Thank You.' Before it disappeared and Jake's ship was surrounded by shimmering stardust as the sounds started to return.

'Atlas, did it just...' Jake trailed off as he gazed at the aftereffects.

(Yes it seemed to have teleported and it managed to even speak our language.) The Atlas finished Jake's sentence.

(I will document the creature and the results of my findings, congratulations Jake, you have discovered a completely unknown species.)

A few days later:

Jake was currently at his home in New Canberra after completing his Job. Jake had managed to take another route out of the system before making it back home, although a bit later than he expected.

The Atlas' information seemed to be correct, the SRB was never informed of Jake's presence and the media had reported the incident as an unexpected solar storm.

"Jake, when I write the Inter-Stellar Exam, can I also join you." Lyra who was sitting next to him asked with a smile on her face.

Ever since Jake had informed the family that Lyra would be ready to write the IS Exam, Lyra had been on Cloud 9.

She was extremely angry when she found out Jake had taken Aria instead of her with him when they had saved Seraphina.

Jake had promised her that the next time he would take someone it would be her, which is why she studied even harder, wanting to pass the IS exam as fast as possible so she could join Jake.

"It's dangerous Lyra, and I don't want to put you in harm's way." Jake spoke in concern.

Lyra poured as she squinted her eyes "You promised me." She spoke, reminding Jake of his words.

'Ugh, Atlas, what do I tell her.' Jake asked the Atlas for advice.

(Be a man of your word Jake. Take her with you, besides it would be more efficient with more crew members.)

'Wait you too?' Jake spoke in disbelief as he expected The Atlas to agree with him.

(Listen, Jake, you can't keep them away from danger forever, plus it will be beneficial for both of you if she were to join you. She will be able to learn more with you than she will alone. Also if you want them to know about me, you will have to involve them in your activities, not directly but even having them in a support role will greatly improve our chances of success.) The Atlas explained to Jake.

'OK fine, you win.'

(Another thing Jake, I know you don't want to stay away from your family for long, but sometimes we might have to do things that will take us months or perhaps years to do. Would you want to miss out on years of their memories and time together by keeping them half a galaxy's distance away? Would it not be better to stay together.)

Jake said nothing as he reflected on the Atlas' words.

The Atlas portrayed a scenario to Jake, where a trip which he expected to take a few months seemed to go horribly wrong,

and when he finally managed to go back he met his sister Iris, who seemed to be an old gray-haired woman, shocked that her brother who seemingly had been lost to the stars had returned.

Jake snapped out, realising what he had to lose if he went all in trying to find a way to protect his family, but never being able to see them in the process. It would essentially be another way of losing his family.

5 Months Later:

A familiar ship had just passed through the Hyperlane, coming into view of Celis Station, which seemed to be in a much more functional state.

3 people were standing side by side looking at the station from the cockpit.

"Aria, get into contact with the station, Lyra do a quick maintenance check on the internal systems." Jake spoke to the two girls next to him.

"Roger." The girls spoke in unison.