Chapter Text
It was halfway through one of the long night cycles of Yautja Prime when Ahn-tuill woke from sleep to the sound of an urgent trilling from the holo-tech in his quarters. He heaved himself up, sighing in annoyance at his disrupted rest. Sleep was hard to come by when it seemed that every damned sain-ja, leader, and all that fell between were vying for his attention. If Ahn-tuill had known that being granted the title of Enforcer would entail this much time around youngbloods, he would never have accepted the council’s decision to promote him.
Striding across his spacious quarters, not yet bothering with lights, he reflected that the consequences were worth it for the perks, especially considering the glorified closet he had lived in on his clanship. From across the common room, he spotted the holo, which was angrily projecting maps and scrolling through words so quickly he could hardly read them. The ones he did read were not promising, but filled him with the excitement only the prospect of future battle could.
Ic’jit, dha-viath, kv’var, kiande amedha. Almost every sentence in the scrolling holo was sprinkled with them. They spelled trouble. The presence of Bad Bloods at a hunt was never good, but paired with dha-viath, disaster, and the Hard Meat that warriors favored hunting, the prospects of the situation were downright grim. Ahn-tuill pulled up the maps again, but was unsurprised when he spotted the location. It always seemed that when something went wrong, it went wrong where oomans could get involved.
If Paya had ever chosen a time to be on his side, Ahn-tuill wouldn’t have to deal with the fallout of releasing an alien scourge upon the unsuspecting and ill-prepared ooman population. Checking the maps again, he moved around his quarters, gathering his armor and equipment. He made note that a visit to the armory or medical center was necessary, as his field medic’s kit was running low on supplies. After the third time he’d nearly hooked one of his greying gold quills on his mandibles while bending over, Ahn-tuill rumbled with annoyance, cursing his sire briefly for passing on the trait of his particularly long tress as he tied them back with a leather band. In the back of his mind, he made another note: to make sure that he had extra lengths of leather to use in the future, as no piece of equipment, even the high-tech and finicky ones, seemed to break as often as the heavy-duty band he kept his tress at bay with.
By the time he had gathered up everything that could be supplied in his room alone, Ahn-tuill was expecting the beeping at the doors to his quarters that alerted him to a visitor. Deactivating the lock, he secured his armor and faced the door as it slid open. The red-orange face of Dhi'ruata-di was one he had been waiting on, so tall she was barely able to fit into the doorway. She strode into his quarters as though they were her own, stopping just in front of him. Ahn-tuill respectfully inclined his head, not willing to risk the notoriously ill-natured female’s wrath with impropriety in the face of the right hand of his clan’s council.
“Honored Dhi'ruata-di, I received a transmission from the hunting ship Striker. Have there been updates on the status of the ship’s skirmish with the Ic’jit clan’s ship?” He turned slightly, careful not to give her his back, lest she think he was disregarding her presence as he activated the maps on the holo-tech.
Dhi'ruata-di chuffed in amusement, her mandibles clacking together. “Always on top of things, Enforcer?” She looked to his already packed equipment, “One would think you were more than eager to leave Yautja Prime.”
Ahn-tuill moved to defend himself, but the Ancient female shrugged off his response, continuing: “I, nor the others would blame you. The homeworld is many things, but exciting is… not one of them, unless you enjoy watching youngbloods fighting.” Dhi'ruata-di and Ahn-tuill shared a chuckle at that. “But, I am not here to discuss why you would want to leave. The ship Striker lost the last of its transmission feed not long after this information was relayed to us.” She motioned to the maps. “The most likely course of action is to assume that the ship has crashed. We are also relatively sure that the deserter ship went down with it along a similar trajectory.” She thumbed at the sharp black quills on her brow, a tic Ahn-tuill had seen her perform for as long as he had known her.
“The trajectory, is it… a negative course?”
Dhi'ruata-di laughed again, “Yes, the transmission feed was accurate in calling it a potential disaster. An active hunting and chiva ship has crashed within spitting distance of an ooman civilization. Not a large one, but the problem lies not in human discovery.”
“The kiande amedha.” Ahn-tuill realized with a growing sense of trepidation. The release of the hard meat aliens in an unpopulated area would be chaotic enough, even in their larval stages. If the larvae got to the ooman settlement, where they could infect the unprepared citizens, it could very well be catastrophic.
“Sei-i. If the released parasites get to the oomans they would quickly be overrun.” Dhi'ruata-di turned to the maps, pulling up the predicted trajectory of the two ships. “We cannot assume that the crash killed the kiande amedha or the Bad Blood that crashed further from the settlement. The nearest ship our clan has to the ooman’s planet has responded, but the council does not have high hopes.” Ahn-tuill must have made a questioning noise, because she continued, “The Leader is capable enough, but most of the sain-ja are newly Blooded, and unsuited for the task.”
“You wish for me to provide backup?”
“No,” Dhi'ruata-di started, shaking his shoulder with camaraderie Ahn-tuill didn’t expect, “when you arrive, they will be your backup. You will take over and eliminate the threat, leaving no trace.” She leveled him with a piercing yellow stare, and the enforcer barely overcame the instinctive reaction to lower his head in submission. Dhi'ruata-di did not want deference, not when she was placing such an important assignment in his capable hands.
Ahn-tuill carefully reached up to place his hand on the taller yautja’s spiked shoulder, returning her gesture. “I will not disappoint.”
Dhi'ruata-di turned to leave, “No. You will not.”
***
Short hours later, Ahn-tuill watched the green-orange of his homeworld fade into the blackness of space. Others might feel uneasy watching the planet fade into the background, but the enforcer found himself happy to leave the sprawling, marshy jungles and harsh deserts that made up most of Yautja Prime behind. Since he had been a youngblood, perhaps even as a suckling, Ahn-tuill had been a traveler. When he was in one place for too long, he wasn’t happy. It was this, heading off, possibly even to his own demise, that filled him with a heady sort of excitement, fear and exhilaration warring in his mind at the prospect of a new experience.
This mission, however, filled him with more foreboding than most. His now updated documents had traced the path of the two crashed ships to a mountainous region, and the stored data for the ooman planet stated that the cold season was setting in. While it had the chance to slow his progress, the cold weather would definitely slow the parasitic kiande amedha, hopefully enough to give Ahn-tuill an upper hand on beating them back. By his calculations, it would be nearly seven cycles before he arrived at the astoundingly blue planet. He would have to move quickly thereafter, because, while dealing with the Hard Meat spawn was the top priority, there was also the Bad Blood clan to deal with. From analyses of the ship they had been spotted in by the Striker, there could be up to twenty Ic’jit alive and loose among the still undeveloped oomans.
Yes, he would have to be quick if he hoped to cull the trouble before it had a chance to take root.