Waiting Shapeless

Chapter 37. Orbiting Gnumus

Tyler: Human

Tyler was filled in on the plan. Even if the Circuit Queen was innocent, they had too many unanswered questions. They were going to go back to the Circuit Mothership and confront her.

The team was scattered around various sections of the ship as they awaited their arrival. Tyler was tinkering with the little black box they had used to find Short, Byralnus was reading something from a screen in his chair, Bai was in her room fetching something, and Heva was taking a short nap.

They were enjoying the short period of free time as they waited, all except for Jirabi, who was sitting at the cockpit keeping an eye on the ship diagnostics.

It was then that Jirabi got the message.

"Captain?" Called out Jirabi from the control room. "Captain, come and look at this. You're not going to believe it."

Byralnus got up from his chair and swiftly glided over to the screen that Jirabi was standing over.

Byralnus quickly read the message on the screen. "Hi guys this is Short..." Byralnus read aloud. "I'm back on Gnumus—but I don't want you to come find me so I'm not going to say where." He glanced at Jirabi in astonishment.

"Short is still alive?" He said surprisedly.

"Yes and back on Gnumus!" Replied Jirabi, rubbing his chin. "I wonder how he pulled that off?"

Byralnus scanned the long message, reading quickly. "Malba." He said, stopping before getting to the end. "This is something the whole team needs to hear."

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"You are all probably wondering" read Byralnus, his crystalline voice resonating clearly through the ship's lounge. They were all gathered and sitting comfortably there as he continued to read the message from Short. "...How I ended up back on Gnumus. It's not important. But because I know you are all dying with curiosity, I will simply say that the Pardos had better things to do and didn't want to waste his time with me."

They all looked at each other in confusion.

"The Pardos had better things to do?" Murmured Bai. "He is literally a hit-man!"

Byralnus paused and glanced up at her from the screen. "Let's save our questions for the end, EkirBai."

"I was thinking the same thing" whispered Tyler to the Quibeek.

Byralnus continued with the message. "The thing that you all really need to hear is my side of this story, from the beginning. Believe it or not, I am actually a high ranking admiral. I was out on a hella boring diplomatic convocation in the Retriplis universe when my fleet was attacked by... HER. It was, yes, the Circuit Queen! Ooooooooo how could you not see that coming, jokes, I already told you it was that uhhh..."

Byralnus' voice faded as he reached a swear word in the message. "B-word." He finally said, flinching.

It was interesting hearing Bryalnus read through the script without the dramatic voice it obviously called for.

"She destroyed my fleet, killed my army, and made an attempt to disconnect my memory core, which would have completed her plan of changing me into the mass murderer 'lunatic' that would be perfect to frame.