The Black

“Captain, we are at the jump point, exit coordinates laid in, eta, 2 cycles”- the voice from navigation rang out in the mostly silent bridge.

“Transfer to the Helm” Cpt Silu responded.

“Helm received. 10 seconds to jump………..3…… jump drives ready.” Lyrian's voice range out

“Helm, jump at your Discretion”- Silu nodded to his niece.

Lyrian waited but a moment, then engaged the drives and Traveler leaped into subspace. “Jump complete, drives stable, all systems nominal.”

“Well done” Silu nodded to all and keyed his comm “night watch to the bridge, night watch to the bridge, jump complete. Senior crew stand down. Concord, you as well.”

Silu leaned over to the screen on his command chair to monitor the confirmations coming in, including the shutdown of the absurd power readings inside hanger 3. ‘I need to ask more about that’ as the readings faded as Mackenzie shut down Concord.

“Concord coming off standby.” came the slightly deeper voice of the ‘Human’.

Silu nodded to the night watch as they filed in, relieving the senior bridge crew with a smattering of small talk. Relief being the prevailing topic.

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Doc Icario turned his attention from his console as the door chime to his private office next to the infirmary chimed, “COME!” He announced. Simultaneously giving permission and unlocking the door by voice command, the door slid open, and Silu entered with a bottle in one hand, and pair of tumblers in the other.

“And what do I owe the occasion?” Icario asked, raising an eyebrow.

Silu chuckled pouring a pair of stout glasses of their tribes traditional whiskey, “I hear you spent a bit of time with our newest resident over our stay at Bricus...” he handed the glass to him, “care to compare notes?”

An ‘hour’ later, and a few more pours of whisky down. Both men had thoroughly settled into their chairs. Silu leaned forward, “So, I’m inclined to grant his request from our first conversation. My concern is Tribal law.. He is not Delmar, he may not understand. Worse he may feel pressured into going through the motions. I need to make some calls.”

“That may not be as big an issue as we may think. We can have him on as a security contractor for a time. That would give us some breathing room… as for the rest, we shall see.” Icario took a sip to cover a smirk.

“My old friend, you know something,” Silu gruffed.

“Suspect, not know. We shall see” Icario’s unrepentant grin finally broke through “SOKAL!” And both finished their drinks before heading to their respective cabins.

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The next morning, Mac wandered into the infirmary to find Icario at his more public desk in the infirmary proper, “Ah, Mac. What can I do for you. “

“Doc, I need a vest and some weights. If am going to keep myself healthy, I need to exercise. I can do most of it in my room under my own gravity. But I need a weighted vest for my runs. Assuming the floor can take it.” Mac winced at that last part.

“I figured as much after my Tili found you and your later explanation. He indicated to a rather more industrial looking floating pallet. “This should be about right,” in the pallet was a vest and a set of weights. Doc stood and followed him over, “the vest currently has enough weights to cover the difference in gravity. Next to it are a few extra weights for you to use should you want more or less weight.”

Mac hefted the vest and put it on. It felt about right, His body almost visibly uncoiled as he bounced on the balls of his feet, and smiled at the return of the familiar tension in his legs as the weight settled in.

“This will do nicely, Doc. How did you know my size. Is there a tailor in the family?”

“Ah, No. The bio-bed, however, probably knows more about you than you do now.” Doc laughed.

“Ah, true” Mac hefted the extra weights in one arm, and kept the vest on. “Off to go run, warn your poor wife for me, I wouldn’t want her thinking something’s going wrong in the compartment again.”

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Martin was settling into the rec room after breakfast rush, “Tristen! You’re gonna get dizzy running that loop too long!”

Tristen just scoffed at his friend, “One of us has to work off all that fruit cake!”

Martin gave a belly laugh at that and threw a towel at Tristen as he went by, only to have it caught and slung around the running man’s neck.

As Tristen kept up his pace as he passed the entrance, the door hissed open. As he passed a light thumping sound heralded a pinky skinned Delmarnoid figure wearing a strange green colored shorts, shirt, and a strange vest the same color light grey of a void suit.

Tristen coasted to a stop, just staring. “Who the fuck are you!”

A belly laugh erupted from the pudgy cook, “Mackenzie!!! Finally got your sleep cycles set? Tristen! Meet Mac, Mac… Tristen, a gym rat who never seems to know when to quit!”

Martin ate a previously thrown towel in the face for that one. “Speaking of, what the void are you wearing?!?”

Mac gave a chuckle, “It’s a running vest of sorts. Doc had it fabb’d up for me to compensate for your gravity. It’s so I can do my running without spending the extra laps.” As Mac finished the explanation, Tristan finished his interrupted lap and walked up to the shorter being. Sizing him up.

“What do you mean, our gravity is some of the highest known to the galaxy” he asked looking over the vest. And the extra weights under Macs arm.

“Well, me and Doc haven’t refined for perfect accuracy. But we estimate Terra to be just a touch over 2 times Delmar’s gravity.” Mac shrugged at the dumbfounded Tristen. He then shrugged off the vest and hefted it, “this is roughly the difference between what I weigh in your gravity. And what I should weigh in mine. Wanna give it a go?”.

Tristen looked convincingly like the Delmar equivalent of the gym rat. He was much sturdier than the leaner Doc Icario; or the softer, lithe, slender frames that seemed typical of Delmar Females. Mac shrugged and held the vest open for Tristen to shrug into, "you sure about this? Im not entirely sure how heavy this is in your 'kilo's'

" Im good to go. lets see what you got", Tristen responded

.... "Okay.." and Mac let go of the Vest. An inelegant grunt escaped Tristen as the added weight slammed him to his knees.

"Holy shit" what all Tristen could muster. struggling to his feet and staggering off down the running loop. Another belly laugh escaped Martin as he watched his friend rally, struggling to make a loop.

Tristen, made it most of the way back to Mac before finally succumbing. He fell heavily as he was driven bodily to his knees, then to his belly. "Little.... help.... can’t.... breath..."

"OH shit!" Mac vaulted over the 20 yards to Tristen in explosive leaps, grabbing the poor Delmar by the Vest and hoisting him up to standing. Tristen wiggled out of the Vest as Mac supported the extra weight.

"That's... that's how much..... I would............. weigh on........... your world?" Gasped Tristen, leaning on the wall, recovering.

"I'm not sure. Thats how much I would weigh. How much do you weigh" mac asked. Tristen walked over to the console in the corner and stepped up on its foot plate. "

" 30 kg" Tristen responded after a second.

Mac nodded, "then you would be a touch lighter. I weigh 41kg in this gravity without the vest. 83 kg with the vest... you probably topped out around 70ish kg with that vest on."

Martin started clapping "Congrats Tristen, you just beat your own lift record, then ran a lap with it! who knew!"

Tristen let out a low singsong sound somewhat like a whistle, "dam".

Mac put back on the Vest and started stretching, "Whelp, I need to get my running on. You up for a running partner?"

"Sure, but you keep the vest, that way I might have a chance!" laughed Tristen. The two of them resumed stretching as Tristen had stopped running long enough to need to warm up again.

Their backs were to the door as Tili and Lyrian walked in. Tili had been warned that Mac would be running and decided to observe/monitor the deck plating to see if it needed to be reinforced. Lyrian had been given some time off on account of Uncle Rico's passing. Lack of anything else to do, curiosity carried her footfalls. She had followed her mother, dressed to go for a run. They were about to speak up when Martin waved them over frantically making motions for them to keep quiet.

As they got closer to the jovial cook he whispered to them, "Just watch, this is gonna be good" before he noticed that Tili was the only one who followed. Tili looked a question over to her daughter, only to find an empty space.

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Mac had figured out how to download his workout music to his data pad over the last few days and was currently listening to one of his more ancient songs from a band called "Black Sabbath" when there was a tap on his shoulder from the other side of him from Tristen. he tapped the left side of his translator buds to pause the music and turned to find himself looking face to face with Lyrian, minus her void suit, but sporting what he guessed was the female version of sports attire and minus the traditional Poncho he had only seen her or any other Delmar female in so far… and….she was fucking gorgeous. It was clear that when Doc said that their species had developed very similarly, that he wasn't kidding. her race had a fair amount of Gender dimorphism so while the males were considerably taller than Mac, she was only about a half head taller than him. The Dimorphism continued along Human lines. Lyrian was what earth would have called a C-cup which fit well with her long lean body. Mac brain shorted for a second, "Uh... hai... *cough* what's up" 'God dammit Mac, get it together' was all he got out before pointedly going back to stretching. trying not to stare 'these people’s idea of personal space is... not'

"Care of another runner?" she chimed in that beautiful song voice that the translator infuriatingly persisted in translating so well into English.

"Uh.. Sure. One more can't hurt" Mac responded, standing up and bouncing lightly on the balls of his feet sending a slight tremor through the deck plating, turning his music back on but keeping it quiet for conversation.

"She's a regular, and quick too. She'll keep up" Tristen added.

Lyrain did a quick stretch and warmed up as Mac and Tristen started off and started off herself with them as they passed by on their first lap.

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They were about a third of the way through Mac's 10K. It felt like ten would be enough with the vest thank God, and Mac had started to sweat. Tristen had glanced over a couple of times with a worried expression, now finally spoke up, "Are you ok? you're sweating a lot.. if you were one of us i would be forcing you to go to the infirmary."

Mac looked over with a smile, "It's natural for my species. Doc thinks that Humans and Delmar Evolved in very similar ways. however, it appears that your world stayed in its tropical state instead of shifting to a multi-climate pattern. My species left the jungles and moved to the grassland with less shade, and longer distances to hunt for prey. Where you guys grew longer and kept your tails because you stayed in the trees longer, we lost our tails and developed to be able to run extremely long distances. To keep us cool, (he wiped his forehead with a towel he had snagged in an early lap) we sweat. ALOT", the tree strode along for another few laps.

Mac looked over at the other two, "can i ask a question?" the other two nodded "your skin patterns, and hair patterns, are they natural or decorative. I also noticed the opposite nature of both. curiosity has me on that one."

Lyrian spoke up, possibly panting a little bit, and starting to sweat herself, but at a much more normal rate, for a Delmar at least. "It’s natural.... our world's Jungles are this color pattern... as for the opposite nature. our Scientists think that it was to aid in finding a mate during our more primitive history... can I ask in return, you were a bit pink when we got here, now you are more red in places, like your ears and face."

"Ah, another cooling mechanism, our blood is red, so when I get hot, my body will pump my blood up to areas closer to my skin to aid in cooling combining with my sweat evaporation. Our hair Doesn't really mean much of anything other than genetics. Humans have many different patterns of skin and hair color. None of them are for camouflage, as far as I am aware anyway." mac looked down up at the track, "we are coming up on 5k, halfway there."

There was a squawk from Tristain, "how far can you usually run!!!"

Mac, "I usually run a 10K in Terra’s gravity. the other day before I had the vest, I ran 25 to get the same work out."

Tristen just stared at him, Lyrian, seeing Tristen's face dissolved into giggles.

"Fuck it! 10k it is!!!" Bellowed Tristen as he redoubled his efforts and shouldered up to Mac.

"Well, while you boys keep at it, I think I'm done at 5." Lyrian got out between giggles, peeling off toward Martin and her Mother. She did not notice her mother watching her observe the boys around the track as she cooled down.

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"Do you see what I see"- Martin leaned over to Tili with a whisper and a chuckle. They had been watching the Three of Them Circuit the Rec Room.

"He is very sweet, I'll give him that. But, Mackenzie is not Delmar.” Tili whispered. It was clear she did not like what she was seeing in her daughter. “He Scares me.. So many things we don't know about him" She responded as the settled into more conspiratorial speaking tones, "Ici's Told me about Mac's interaction in with Lyrian just after the battle. She genuinely started feeling better after.”

“That is good, is it not?” Martin’s brow creased. “If he were Delmar, she could do much worse.”

“But he isn’t...Silu and Lyrain have told me about his reaction on the bridge… She was terrified of him... There is an Ice cold Darkness deep inside that man. He keeps it locked away, but it’s there.. His species even shows their teeth to emote happiness...” A shiver ran down her as Tili watched her daughter clearly watching Mackenzie closely.

Martin continued, prodding. “Icario seems comfortable with him, I’ve never known him to make poor judgements in character.”

“ 'All men have a darkness in them. his is well controlled, it's a sign of strength' “ Tili waved air quotes as she recounted him. “but Silu is keeping him watched... This human is so relaxed.. yet so... aware... so... intense. He is a predator, an Apex on his world.. he has to be. Apex races are volatile… I don’t want my daughter bonding with one, even if she could."

“Tili… Lyrian seems to like him." Martin mentioned softly.

"She does... She has never been very touchy with anyone outside of family, but she wrapped herself around him the other day in a 'hug'. That's new for her. She told me he is very warm. I think she liked that… but…" Tili mused, remembering the first day of offload in the mess hall after the captain had forced her precious Icario to stop working himself to death.

"Hi mom! you should run more, it’s fun" Lyrian bounded up, panting, and wiping the sweat from her face and neck. Mac was sweating just as much as she had seen him that first time, but he just kept going. Tristen gamely keeping up.

"Honey, I get plenty of exercise crawling the maintenance tunnels and ladders", She chuckled to her daughter.

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The thumping picked up pace as Tili, Martin, and Lyrian turned to watch as Boys proceeded to be boys and the competition was on.

Tristen had said something to Mac that had him Laughing, "Now you done it! Let’s go!" and they picked up the pace once more.