Skyreign

17: Scarab

While the Nywanese citizens were completely unaware of any danger beyond the walls of their city, they did read some of the urgency in the faces of the Skyreign crew as they passed by. Some would turn their heads in wonder as to why the rush. Then, they would resume their own business, paying no further mind.

Laura, Sam, Darrick, Edge and Grace hastily made for the local skyport, just under a kilometer from their ship, attempting to catch up with Rose.

At the skyport, flying vessels came and went from landing pad to landing pad. They ranged in size from as small as hovering bikes, up to the grand rotor-driven battleships, or similarly-sized freighters. Towers around the area housed traffic controllers who would direct the flow of aircraft, either from pad to pad, or to clear them to leave or enter Nywan.

Also at the skyport was a small airship. It was a Nywanese troop transport with several externally mounted vector rotors and a number of swiveling turrets. As Laura and crew approached, the airship opened its broadside doors for them.

Out of the door came Haren, whom they hadn't seen since they arrived months before.

"Roselii did say you would follow," Haren crossed his arms, then wearing the more appropriate Nywanese military attire: tan-colored armor that was light and flexible, with red embroidery lining the sides and across the chest-piece. In the center of the chest plate was an embossed triangle, not upside-down or point-up, but in fact on its side, with three dots placed in the center that were in no specific geometric relation to each other.

This was the symbol of Nywan. It was on the armor; it was on the flags; it was on their ships.

And it was in the hearts of the people who bore the symbol.

"Did she say where she was headed?" Laura asked—in Nywanese. The words still did not come too easily, but the sentence was right.

Haren raised a brow, then grinned, reverting to his native tongue, "she is well on her way to the command tower, due west of here. Please—enter my ship. It is not as large or spacious or elegant as your own vessel, yet it has seen me through a great many endeavors."

Nodding, Laura stepped forward, the others following, as she asked, "Why didn't you tell us you were one of their Generals? You said you lead the Kulu'jai."

"I do," Haren pointed at the first dot on the top of the triangle on his armor, "the Kulu'jai was one of the founding tribes of Nywan. The ground forces consist mainly of the Kulu'jai."

Laura simply took the answer and stepped inside, taking a seat that was lined up along the innards of the fuselage.

Two soldiers were at the rear end of the ship, brandishing their rifles.

Those two soldiers were the same ones that helped capture her and her crew before.

Yet somehow, she felt they didn't recognize her, so she just let it be.

Or perhaps they simply had no grudges from the past, and decided to forget the incident entirely.

Or they didn't care. That was the more likely story.

The others piled in, Sam being the last one to have not boarded. He stopped outside the airship, shouting in, "I have to find Olsein! I think he went to the dome near our hovel!"

"Leave him, he's fine there," Laura replied.

"No," he shook his head, "I have to find him."

Laura didn't know what compelled him to find the old man, as the danger she sensed looming didn't seem so immediate. But she somehow felt this was what he was meant to do. "Fine," she nodded, "we'll meet you back at the hangar."