A Tale of Arcane Space: Lost & Found

Before we begin, a few notes for clarity: All characters engaged in romantic and sexual activity are adults over the age of eighteen. Although the primary genre for this is Sci-Fi/Fantasy, elements of this story can also fall under the headings of erotic couplings, group sex, anal, voyeur/exhibitionism, lesbian sex, and interracial/nonhuman sex.

This story contains a few scenes that contain graphic violence, but I feel it's important to note that none of that violence is in any way connected to any of the sexual content.

All characters, events, deities, prayers, locations, and interpretations of classic fantasy races in this story are my creation. Any resemblance to existing persons, real or fictional, is unintended and coincidental.

All that aside, I hope you enjoy this story, and I look forward to your responses! It was great fun to write, and I strongly suspect that I'll be doing much more with the setting and characters in the future. Big thanks to the support and input of my beta readers, too many to list here, but you know who you are, and I appreciate you.

Finally, this story is part of the GEEK PRIDE 2020 event on Literotica! If you enjoyed this story, please check out the stories by my fellow authors who also contributed! Without any further ado, ON WITH THE SHOW!

***

With an annoyed sigh, the Orc helmsman looked up from the scanner display on his station's crystal-screen. "It's a Sun-Damned flake of scrap, Cori. You're acting like my nephew snuggling his plush Tarrasque."

"Shut your tusk-hole, Norrish. This shard is our ticket to big things. Better things. GLITTERING things." She held up the piece of rough-edged metal, and inspected the short line of red light emanating out of it. "You're off-course. Correct two degrees spinward, one degree nosedown."

Norrish glanced at a readout on his console, and pointed at the large crystalline monitor at the front of the bridge. "Nope. Gotta clear that big chunk ahead first. Gimme three minutes, then we'll adjust after." He looked up. "You know, there's more to life than just money."

She gave him a scornful look. "You're kidding, right?"

"I'm serious!" He gestured around the room. "I mean, yeah, money makes the galaxy go 'round and all that, but we take jobs that help people, too. And this one? We might be digging up some amazing historical artifacts, history of your people and mine. I'd do that for free. Hold on, I need to handle this next bit really carefully." He bent down over his console again, making minute adjustments with his controls every few seconds.

The tall crimson-skinned Goblin gave a frustrated growl, and paced back and forth behind the helmsman, distracting herself by reading a chapter of her favorite book (FORBIDDEN LOVE ON SOLAR WINDS, by Delashi Herekit, who happened to be a distant cousin of hers) on her handheld crystal-tablet. Her booted feet echoed softly on the wide Kobold-forged steel deck, and she looked around at the empty stations. Her usual chair at Sensors was to her right, the console a mix of technical monitor readouts and a liquid-mercury scrying pool, embedded into the machinery and suspended in clear dura-plas, with a backup tactical station for the seat next to her. Communications and Engineering would sit at the stations to the helm's left, and the main tactical array was set before the chair next to Norrish, facing front. There were short steps down next to the helm and tactical seats that led to a smaller deck below him, where the five-meter-wide main monitor against the front wall showed a slowly shifting maze of asteroids.

The interior walls glowed a faint sky-blue color, illuminating the ship's bridge with simple enchantments. There were two doors at the back of the room, one going to the lift, the other to a corridor that ran most of the length of the ship. Cori touched the gold and bronze plaque welded to the wall next to the lift, smiling as she read the ship's name: ENDURANCE.

Just then, the ship rang like a struck bell, and she felt a small vibration through her feet. "What the hell was that?"

A calm voice came from the audio speakers. "Micro-asteroid impact on the port bulkhead. Well within our shield's kinetic tolerances. Nothing to worry about, Cori."

"Thank you, George." She traced a good-luck sigil in the air with her fingertips, the glowing image hanging in the air for a moment before fading away. She checked the light pointing out of the shard, and held it up for Norrish to see, who nodded and made some minor course corrections. She groaned as the monitor showed two city-sized rocks passing uncomfortably close. "I hate asteroid belts."

"You're in the wrong line of work then, Coriolis." Clicking his mandibles with amusement, the black-shelled Tientang emerged from the hallway behind them, and sat down in the gunnery chair next to Norrish as he adjusted his sash. "Maoxian Jia like us seem to spend half our lifetimes in places like this. Always good finds in a belt."

Coriolis rolled her eyes. "For Void's sake, Cap. You know I don't speak Sanchong."

Norrish just laughed.

"Adventurers, Coriolis." He gestured towards the monitor with his lower left arm, his segmented fingers open. "Rock-runners, balaguro, salvagers, bouken-ka, aventurier, treasure-hunters...our profession has many names, old friend."

A dark-haired human head popped up from an open access hatch on the wide floor in front of Norrish. "My mom keeps emailing me to bemoan that I've fallen in with, and I quote, 'MurderHobos'. Got that runic circuit-line for the weapon systems fixed, Captain Liang. Just needed a touch of the ol' mending-wand in a couple spots."

Turning his mantis-like head towards his engineer, his compound eyes glowed a soft satisfied red. "With all due respect, Enrique, your mother thinks that Hot Chocolate is, and I quote, 'a drink awash in sin', and that males of all species need to cover up their wrists to avoid 'scandalous public nudity'. How you managed to survive twenty years in that house without going insane, I'll never know. I barely lasted that one dinner."

Enrique pulled himself out of the hole, and replaced the cover. "Why do you think I'm better with gear than with people, sir?"

Coriolis stepped forward and ruffled Enrique's thick hair, which drew a squirm and a quiet "stop that!" from him before she relented. "You're doing fine, squirt. A couple years in false-grav and close quarters with scum like us, and look at you now! Worldly, broadened horizons, and vaguely self-confident." She gave an exaggerated wail of disappointment. "Woe and Lament! If only you liked pussy instead of cock! Your loss, hume."

"For the love of The Lady of Spring, what mammalian basilisk-crap are you all up to now?" Ducking her head as she entered the bridge, the Draconian arched an ivory-white scaled brow-ridge. "What the cloke, Norrish? We're still hunting for this mystery? Speed it up, already."

The helmsman just pointed to the monitor again. "Hey, if you'd like to try your hand at navigating a density-level four 'stroid-belt, take the stick. Get off my ass, Snowdrop."

"Well, I guess when you've got this piece of junk with an aging Arcane Drive reactor and leaky engines to fly, I have to keep my expectations low." She rapped her knuckles against the hull, leaning over to read a display at the engineering station.

"I'm RIGHT HERE, you scaled bitch." A face made of golden light manifested on one side of the main monitor, a heptagon with two triangles for eyes and a shifting soundwave-display where the mouth would be. "And my engines are NOT leaky. Enrique tuned them last week. So keep up that 'junk' talk. I dare you! I'll nano-craft a new airlock on your quarter's bulkhead, and pop your precious spear collection out into the vacuum, you get me?"

"You space any of my collectibles, and I'll rip out your core, you pissant A.I.! She raised one clawed hand. "Try me, gem-head."

The golden face manifested a pair of eyebrows, to better express its disdain. "GEM-HEAD? I'm an Emerald-rated Arcane Intelligence, you cold-blooded harpy, and you will address me by my proper designation and name of Omikron George!"

"Okay, okay, settle down you two." The captain raised one of his upper arms, waving its long scythe-spur to get attention. "George, please apologize to Snowdrop for calling her a scaled bitch. Snowdrop, please apologize to George for calling his ship-body junk. I am very satisfied with both of your performances as part of this crew. I know we're all eager to see the fruits of our labor, but let's keep our heads clear." He glanced around. "...Where's Lindauriel?"

Enrique jerked a thumb back towards the hallway. "Elf-boy's down in the cargo hold. Doing his morning prayers."

***

In the ship's largest compartment, a lone figure sat cross-legged on the floor. In his lap, he cradled a sheathed dagger, a black feather encased in a small block of grey-tinged clear plastic, a pendant bearing the image of a woman wearing a cloak made of up endless knives and blades, and a half-eaten breakfast burrito resting on a napkin. His eyes were closed, and he reached up with a dark-skinned hand to brush a lock of his long red curls out of his face. When the hair instantly fell on his nose again, he grumbled, opened his brown eyes, reached into his shirt pocket for a length of cord, and tied his curls up into an impromptu ponytail. After a moment's pause, he closed his eyes again, and his whispered prayers echoed softly off the largely-empty cargo hold's walls.

'You Are Not Alone.'

Blessings upon and blessings from,

Youngest of Gods and yet Most Ancient

Coldest and yet most Kind

Silent in all things save for our final moment,

'You Are Not Alone.'

Mother of Winter, Third Sister of Three

All things end, but let it be with mercy

All things die, but let it be without pain.

All things change,

All things strive.

We revere you and your wonders,

We kneel at the hem of your cloak of blades,

We pray for the light of your divine fire,

To cleanse the dead, to give rest to the weary,

To warm the living, to banish the darkness.

But in that final darkness,

May the souls of the newly dead

Hear thy voice:

'You Are Not Alone.'

He took a deep breath, and opened his eyes. "Still feels like it sometimes, though." he murmured to himself. He looked down at the burrito, and with a gesture, it hovered upwards to eye level. He opened one hand, and a small burst of silver fire flew from his palm and surrounded the spicy breakfast. It was reduced into ash in moments, and then even the ash was consumed into nothingness a moment later. "Please accept this small offering from my meal, blessed Queen of Silence." With a smile, he willed the fire to vanish.

There was a trilling meow to his left. The elf looked down, and Ghast, one of the ship's three cats, sat there with his usual regal bearing, a disemboweled corpse of a rat laid on the deck before him. Ghast looked at him expectantly, and Lindauriel laughed. "Is this for me, fuzzball?" Ghast gave another mewling sound, batted at the small body with a grey paw, and then meowed again, louder.

"You want to make an offering too? Well, Master Ghast, as this ship's resident chaplain, I'll be glad to help." Another gesture, and the messy rodent carcass rose into the air, consumed moments later by a new release of silvery divine fire. A few tiny embers even sought out and consumed the small drops of blood left on the deck, and Ghast rubbed along Lindauriel's leg in purring satisfaction.

"Good kitty, you precious little hunting machine," he said with a laugh. "The Queen of Silence honors and appreciates your offering." He reached down and scratched the purebred Hakathian Blue's ears, and Ghast's purrs grew louder still.

"So what is this, Reverend Moonblossom? You're teaching Triune prayers to the cats now?"

The cleric glanced behind him, and Coriolis was standing in the doorway. He shook his head with a laugh. "If cats learn how to draw blessings from the Gods, we're all in deep trouble." He gathered his things, stood up, and shook out his hair. "Really, there's no need for the 'Reverend', Just 'Lindauriel' is fine." He gave Ghast another ear-scratch. "I read once that when cats leave a dead animal for you, it's out of pity, because they think you can't hunt for yourself. Still, I figured it'd be easier to clean up with a little flame, rather than go find a broom and a mop."

"Well, if you're done with your daily observances, Captain wants everyone on the bridge." She held up the piece of metal that they'd worked so hard to obtain, now enchanted to hell and back. "Shard shows us getting close."

Lindauriel Moonblossom allowed himself a moment to take in the sight of her. Tall compared to most, about an inch over his slender height, she was a wealth of curves that never ceased to fascinate him. Wide hips, strong legs, superbly toned arms, and a firmly curved bustline that had rendered him speechless when they'd first met. Straight black hair that reached her shoulders, and a pair of heavy-lidded eyes that had seen far too much, but still kept a smoky sparkle and a smile regardless. He'd been part of this crew for six months now, and nearly every night of that time had ended with him fantasizing to climax about this frighteningly dangerous woman, imagining her gloriously naked as she pirouetted through a lethal display of skill with both sword and spell. She'd demonstrated her value to the crew on countless occasions, and thoroughly deserved to be the Captain's second-in-command. But for all that he found her utterly mesmerizing, she seemed to find him boring.

She turned and walked back out, pausing momentarily to make sure he was following her. "So I've always meant to ask. Why does a Goddess of Death need you to burn up part of your breakfast? She want you to starve or something?"

He chuckled, trying not to stare at her leather-clad backside as she walked in front of him. "It's just a token sacrifice, to show that the Queen is not far from one's thoughts. Funny story, the ritual actually got started three hundred years ago when a High Reverend decided he needed to go on a diet, and came up with--"

"--It's too early for heavy theology, Lindy. Maybe another time."

He frowned at her choice of nickname. They walked in silence for a few more moments. "So... I guess the ritual worked? That Shaman-mage from Icetower Station sure wanted a lot of credits for it."

"Well, Sympathy-Links like this are illegal magic. We're only using it to track this shard material back to whatever it came from, but she could also cast it on someone's hair or nail clippings, and then control or kill them from a distance. Cost the Captain a small fortune before she'd even admit she'd ever heard of such spells, and she only took payment in gold-note cash."

"Huh. Did she teach the ritual to you, then?"

As they reached the lift, she shook her head, and touched the door-open contact. "She didn't offer -- but even if she had, I wouldn't have taken it. I'd just as rather not have something that dangerous in my toolbox. Too tempting to use it, you know?"

Lindauriel looked down at his hands as they filed into the lift, and drew his dagger several inches out of its sheath, his eyes narrowed as he looked down at the runes inscribed there. "I know that one a little too personally."

"What?"

Lindauriel sheathed the weapon and placed it back on his belt. "Nothing, just rambling. Philosophical stuff."

She rolled her eyes, and stretched one arm upwards, reaching back behind her neck to stretch her shoulder. "Clerics are weird -- the lot of you."

He pointedly looked away from how her breasts strained against her jacket in response to the movement. "Everyone's weird in their own special way. I like me just the way I am."

The lift's hum stopped, and the door opened on the bridge. "Is that more Death-Goddess theology?"

"Nope. You never watched 'Mister Wroknar's Hearthfire' as a kid?"

Norrish turned in his chair to look back at the new arrivals. "I thought only Orc children watched that!" He gave a happy laugh, and started to sing. "It's a beautiful night by the hearthfire--"

Lindauriel joined in. "--A beautiful night with your comrades. Won't you join me, come, settle in--"

Elf and Orc finished in unison. "--won't you be my comrade!" Norrish laughed and held out a hand, which Lindauriel gave a friendly high-five to. "I knew I liked you for some reason, Moonblossom."

Lindauriel patted the Orc on the shoulder. "My comrade, the next brawl we all get into, you get healed first."

"Woo-hoo! Go Team Hearthfire!"

Captain Liang gave another clattering laugh. "George, would you be so kind to watch the helm for a moment?"

"Of course, Captain."

The insectoid leader stood up, and faced his assembled crew. "Everyone, I want to take this moment to thank all of you. We are on the brink of what I suspect will be a turning point in our lives. When Cori found that shard of odd metal in this system's oort cloud, I don't think any of us suspected that it would turn out to be Molecular-fused Urutromium. Yes, Norrish?"

The helmsman lowered his raised hand. "Cap, begging your pardon, but are we absolutely sure that's what it really is? We lost the ability to even smelt that stuff after the Sun-Geyser War, and that was five hundred standard years ago."

"Quite sure. One of the top metallurgists in the system verified it herself. Unfortunately, she had the poor wisdom to betray my confidentiality fee, and report her findings to Dag Thurmond."

As one, the crew of the Endurance turned in disgust and mimed spitting on the deck. Even George's on-screen icon mimicked the action, its spitting sound effect followed by a vehement "yeah, fuck that guy!"

"Indeed, George." Liang continued. "The fact that we had to shoot our way out of Zelefon is proof enough for me that we're on to something huge -- and thankfully, we seem to have eluded any pursuit for the time being. That being said... Coriolis, would you be so kind as to do another check?"

Nodding, she stepped over to her scrying pool, holding her hands over to each side of the rippling mercury, her eyes taking on a glow that shifted colors with each passing moment. Her gaze flickered across the pool for a few moments, and then she lowered her hands. "Still clear, Captain. If anyone's following us, then they're out of our range, or they've got stealth-tech or illusion-crafting better than anything in this system."

Snowdrop snorted. "I dunno, Gnomish DreamNoughts would fool any sensors we've got on this ship."

Enrique punched her on the shoulder. "Don't even joke about that! I still have nightmares just from seeing vids about those little bastards." He winced, and cradled his punching hand. "...Ow."

"Snowdrop, please." The captain's eyes turned a reproachful green. "This system hasn't had any Gnome incursions in years, and the local militias did manage to fend them off that last time. You might as well claim that LichQueen Beratri was here to steal away all the naughty little children, like in all the old stories." He sighed. "At any rate, we can be reasonably sure that we are alone out here. And that we are about to find something very old, and very, very valuable."

He swept his lower arms wide, taking in the group. "Cori, you found the shard to begin with, and helped me with the Shaman-Mage and her forbidden ritual. Enrique deserves credit for being the first to realize what the shard truly was, not to mention helping George maintain our home in top shape. Snowdrop, we wouldn't have made it out of Zelefon port without your brute force and martial skill. Lindauriel, your fire and healing backed up Snowdrop magnificently, and I am personally very appreciative of your spiritual insights these last few months. Norrish, your skill at the helm has gotten us through difficult flying that some would call impossible, at capable speeds that go far beyond my best hopes. And let us all thank George once more, for that brilliant plasma-torpedo shot, right up the barrel of Dag Thurmond's--" Everyone paused to spit again. "--pursuit ship's cannon. Sadly, the rat-fucking bastard wasn't on that ship at the time, but we can't have everything. To the crew of the Endurance, I salute and thank you all!"