A Shallow Grave

Getting back to the tree I once again went to her and looked at my protectors' beautiful features, I knelt beside her and straightened up her hair, I noticed two small horns sticking out from under her hair, what beast could she have evolved from? Getting up I decided to hide her beneath the boulder, so I began digging with my claws, a few hours later my paws were sore and a little bloody.

Inspecting her over I noticed that my protector was covered in a thin and soft outer coating, like fur except it wasn't attached to her skin, it was interesting that it wasn't badly damaged other than a few areas that were pierced or slashed open. There was a shiny piece of it attached to her arm, it was really pretty with little lights moving around on its surface, shaking off the desire to touch it I picked her up and brought her into the hole and slowly covered her up with the dirt.

I walked into my cave and started to skin the bears' limbs I had collected from the bloody battlefield. I hung the hides on an overhanging root, small bits of flesh still hung from the hide and the smell from the rawhide was strong with that tangy scent of blood in the air, ignoring the smell I reached down grabbing one of the limbs from the floor. I bit into the meat, it was tough and still filled with blood that leaked down my chin and onto my body.

I could feel the energy coursing through my body as I devoured the beast meat, my muscles tightened and condensed as an ache spread through my body, just like mother had taught us our bodies wouldn't go under drastic changes unless our blood deemed anything of supreme value that we needed to survive. Our strength would increase quickly if we ate from anything that was stronger, faster, or smarter than us, of course, you could eat things of similar strength to your own and grow slowly which was significantly safer than trying to hunt and kill something beyond your own strength.

The bear had been stronger than me by a large margin before my first evolution and normally would have given me a very large body and increased my physical strength by a large degree, but my first evolution had been with my protectors flesh and blood, though she had been very strong and very fast I seemed to be in an infant stage of her people. If she stood before me now my head would be just past her knees. Though I was very strong for my size, I was much stronger than my previous body but I still felt a little off balance while running. I would need to get used to it and fast if I wanted to search for mother and the burrow, as the ache in my body subsided I started to feel drowsy, I went outside and grabbed some large leaves to make a bed I laid them in the middle of the cave and collapsed into them.

The DawnBreaker-

In the captain's quarters Captain Mcgregor sat at his desk looking over the orders that had been sent over, he was to take the Dawnbreaker, a frigate class vessel, to planet Eddok and investigate the energy disturbance that had erupted over the northern hemisphere two weeks ago. The original mission to test the new engines was delayed and given fully to a second vessel that had also gone under the refit. The new engines were supposed to, if the theory panned out, get them to at least one third the speed of light which would be a large step forward than years in cryo-sleep through space. The new mission had been given an updated security status with four corvette class vessels racing to catch up with them to act as added security, there was even a possibility that Cruiser class vessel would be inbound depending on what his superiors though once they read the report.

He pressed his communicator," Have engineering finish the installation of the new engines and integrate it with the command deck, once they are finished have the AI conduct a simulation with the new engine's parameters and send the report over once it is done."

"Yes Sir!"

A crisp reply came over the com from his lieutenant, the order found its way down to engineering who had just completed said task, once they sent back the green light the simulation was run with the onboard AI which was completed within a few seconds and sent back to the captains desk, from when the order left to receiving the report only half an hour had passed. Cpt. Mcgregor looked over the data which passed all safety regulations, another order came down soon after, that nonessential personnel was to enter cryo for one year and eight months, they would be within orbit a month after they woke up.

The Captain went to the command deck to oversee the first use of the engine aboard his ship, "XO, let's get this show on the road, begin the shake down on the new engines and see if we can cut some time off from our intended arrival date."

"Aye Sir!" The XO began calling down the orders to prepare the engines. When the shake down was complete the onboard AI gave the all clear to the captains screen, "Alright, let's take it nice and slow give us twenty percent on the engines," the order was confirmed and the helmsman began the acceleration, everyone on the command deck watched the screen showing the stability of the engines as they climbed in speed. The readings showed no abnormalities so the output was increased to fifty percent and then was finally stopped at seventy percent.

"The readouts look good, we have already doubled our previous top speed while at fifty percent it looks like we can reach Eddok in about a year, unless we push the engines at full the entire time, though our escorts won't be able to catch up with us until a seven months after we reach Eddok with the pace we are going." The captain looked over the star chart while new data streamed in and updated their ETA, it also showed that they would be low on fuel, even with using solar energy to recharge the ships' batteries, it wouldn't be able to keep up with the expenditure so they would need to stay in Eddok's orbit and recharge slowly once they arrived.