Harem Reborn

We moved to the shuttle that would take us down to the domed city of Centra on the surface of prime. There were a lot of interesting people, and we tried to take a back seat; there was not prearranged seating. Everyone seemed friendly enough, but I kept myself on guard regardless.

Kyrina stayed close to me, holding my hand while I carried out the bag. There wasn't much in it; the plan was to buy things when we got settled. We got a back seat but had to share it with two tiger-like men.

"Hey, come sit down; we don't bite, yet, hehe!" The closest Tigerman laughed, but the other one smacked him.

"Can it! These seem like nice people. You know what this place does to those types, right? What's the point in making an idiot out of yourself before even talking to them?"

The other tiger seemed to be the old and wiser of the two, but I still sat down first and got Kyrina seated by me. This wasn't ideal, but it would have to do; this place was probably filled with killers. I needed to calm down; no one was going to… Was that a yell I just heard?

I turned to check on Kyrina, who was sitting in the seat next to me when I heard a roar come from upfront. Kyrina was fine, but I took her hand and watched around us while glancing towards the front. They were two men or something like that fighting with fists, and the Xenophin man was beating Beastman of some sort to death, but no one moved to stop it.

After it was done, the crew cleaned up the dead body, and everyone took their seats. According to Kret, the younger Tigerman, the Badgerman started the fight, but the Fishman finished it. Tarclaw said it was a dumb fight, so no one stopped it. Why let someone like that come down to start trouble was their line of thinking, it seemed.

This planet seemed to run outside the rules for these three months of storms. Though the UW has been sneaking us in to try and take that power all away from the King. That was our mission, to exploit his mistake; when he won, he only asked to be King of the world, that was all. Nothing about Alexander or his secrets.

"Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I kind of expected it to be like this, but not so soon. Hopefully, we can make it in without any more fights."

"You can count on that! Grab your holy shit handles! Were goin in!" Kret half howled, half roared.

The ship started to shake, and it shoved out bag between my legs and put my hand on Kyrina's far armrest. There was no seat belt, so I kept my arm to help hold her back as the ship shook violently. Most people stayed down in their seats, but some weren't so lucky.

People were thrown around the interior and killed most likely, but I kept hold and watch for UFO's coming at us. After about ten minutes of brain-rattling vibrations and shaking, the ship settled back down. Now I could see why no one would bother to try attacking for the rest of the ride.

The inside of the ship was putrid by the time we got inside the dome and parked. I wanted to race out, but I knew it was best just to let everyone else pile out like wild animals. The pair of tigers were fine to wait, they had put on some sort of thin face mask, and the smell didn't seem to bother them.

Soon we got up and left the place, waving goodbye to Kret and Tarclaw as they disappeared into the crowd. The turned out to be not horrible yet, but that was only because we weren't a threat in their eyes, which was good. There was no reason to show our strength, but we didn't want to seem too weak.

I left the terminal, and there was a bubbled floating platform with a man sitting on each. They had small glowing blue balls on stands that they had their hands over. So that must be the controls, and the rest is like a magic carpet with Dynam.

"Want to go ride in the bubble car?"

"Yeah! We can get a better look at the city," Kyrina said to me, grabbing my hand.

I kept my eyes open as we walked to the taxi and noticed a man coming our way. He was human and looked to be overconfident like some jock with his overcoat on his shoulder but wearing a t-shirt that said, "Go hard." I tried to pick up the pace, pulling Kyrina along with me, but the guy intercepted us.

"Hey, Hey, Hey, now! What's the big rush, guys? And gal too, hmmm."

The man tried to step around me, but I stepped forward into him, hard, sending him stumbling back. The man straightened up and glared at me, but I just smiled and turned away. We started walking again, but I could hear the steps coming up from behind.

I was surprised when Kyrina let go of my hand and turned, throwing a hard punch into the rushing man's side. He had his fist cocked, and he looked like he jumped to punch me, so he was knocked out of the air and off to the side. The was a round of gasps, but it was followed with a roar of cheers. Great, oh well, it wasn't her fault; she was just trying to protect me.

The man stayed down, groaning, and wouldn't look at us as we walked to the bubble things. We were waved down by a couple of the bubble drivers and choose the one closest to us. The bubble came down, and the man smiled at us, gesturing for us to get in.

It looked like he didn't speak our language from his movements and pointing, but he pointed to a crystal-like display stand that had a picture of a nice hotel. He looked at me, and I shook my head; he nodded and flicked to the next one. After seven, we came to our hotel, and the man smiled but then tapped his wrist.

Yes, payment; Irellia had given me a wrist band like a credit card, so I pointed to it, and he nodded and then pointed to a place in front of the crystal display. I placed my wrist on it, and the light flash, then he waved me back.

I crawled into the cushioned back where Kyrina had already made herself comfortable. The driver, whom I know as a Sylica, waited till I was seated before taking off. I had only seen his face shift at the last moment before I turned to get into the back, but I had seen it, just like Maxine.

I guess the Sylica native to the planet speaks another language, but this one seemed nice enough. I crawled beside Kyrina and gave her a kiss.

"You were quite the firecracker out there!"

"Sorry, but I just didn't like him!"

"Hey, I get it, don't worry, we will be fine. This will blow over, and we will get a nice meal in our room and relax for a bit. Then later, we can go check out some stall and get clothes, sound good?"

"Mhmm," Kyrina said as we relaxed.

I felt like we had been driving for a while. Contrary to the transparent dome we had seen from the outside, the inside was foggy, so we could only make out shapes. We had just been enjoying the ride when suddenly we came to a stop. I was about to ask if we had arrived when the place we were sitting dropped out.

I was partially holding Kyrina, and I was able to catch her and land, but the disk sped off. I looked around, and the area we were in did not look friendly. I looked at Kyrina and then put her down, she had a puzzled expression on her face, and I couldn't blame her.

I looked around some more, and the place looked deserted, and there was sand everywhere. I looked up, and I was shocked to see the clear sky, but it was bright and hard to look at. What the hell is going on? Where did this guy take us?

"Hey, stranger! You look lost."

I turned to the sound of the voice, and there was a man wrapped in clothing from head to toe. He was large but didn't seem that hostile since this was most likely some kind of set up planned with the driver. The man seems to see my tension and put his hands forward.

"Woah, there! I'm not here to hurt you, and I know old Strik isn't the most descriptive about this whole thing, but we head about your little run-in with the thug Arnold. The guy likes picking on rookies, and he ain't no chump to be pushed around like that, so no matter what driver you got in with, you would have come here."

"Why do you want us here? What are we to you?"

"Good of you to ask. First of all, I'm Dresnal. Next, this world is going through a tough time all over the place. The so-called King of the world only cares about his bubble; he has been only sending the minimum over the last three years, and now that the storms are starting, he won't be sending anything, hoping the storms with bury and kill those left out there! I need help! We don't have any great racers, but we do have a lot of hardened people that can help through the storm."

"And what do you want from us besides winning? What do you wish for?" I asked, walking forward while holding Kyrinas hand.

I looked into his eyes, and then I noticed why he was covered in clothing. Under that cloth was a water-like body, just like Sasha. Dresnal smiled at me and stuck out his hand.

"We have people and worlds to save, Sasha says your the one to get the job done, so we will support you! Sooner we are done here, the sooner we can head to Xeno, right?"