Chapter Four Hundred and Thirty-Two. The Jurassic Park Solution.

Chapter Four Hundred and Thirty-Two. The Jurassic Park Solution.

Kharvic stared at the massive figures that had appeared.

One of them had spoken Lovar, shouted, really, and had the form of a Lovar, albeit the ashen wings weren't normal, although it might have been part of their armor.

The other was a truly gargantuan feline, easily half again the size of the other figure, which was itself twice the size of a Lovar. It sat primly as it calmly licked its paw clean.

He stepped forward to speak but then stepped back as more figures appeared, all abnormally large.

One of them, wielding a shield and a mace, moved in front of the others, taking up a defensive stance, while another conjured a massive canine creature, and the last raised a staff, a dark green glow sheathing the top of the weapon.

The last raised a staff of its own, and a brilliant yellow light flashed out, filling the room.

Kharvic blinked, turning his head to look behind him as the cries of the wounded had been silenced. He turned around fully to stare as it appeared that every single injury had been healed.

"Bob," he heard one of the giants say from behind him. "Are those..."

"Adorable anthropomorphic cat people?" Another voice replied. "Yeah, I think they are."

Kharvic turned back around in time to see the giant's weapons disappear, followed by their armor, leaving them clad in shirts and slacks.

More importantly, he could now see their faces, and while they had slightly deformed ears, they otherwise appeared to be Lovar, if oversized.

He cleared his throat before speaking, which drew their attention. "Greetings," he began, inclining his head and clasping his hands in front of his chest. "I am Kharvic, captain of the Husrtall'kalwin. On behalf of the Lovar and the Dharlings aboard our ship I thank you for coming to our aid."

The man who had been the first to appear nodded. "I'm Bob," he said, then began to gesture to the others. "This is Monroe," he stroked the feline, who began to purr, an action that vibrated the deck beneath their feet. "Mike," He pointed to the man just ahead of him, "Amanda and her summons, Auruffra," he gestured to the woman a few feet to his left with the huge canine. "Dave," he pointed to the man on his other side before turning and holding out a hand to the blonde-haired woman behind him, guiding her to stand beside him, "and Jessica."

"We're adventurers," Bob continued with a smile. "And we're here to help."

Lilalyaslywain looked up at their saviors, carefully inspecting them.

They had a Lovar shape, but their features were broader, and their ears were rounded. They weren't proper ears, but nicer to look at than the sharp pointy ears of the Lovar. Each of them were stunningly good looking, if you were into that sort of thing. She wasn't interested in that sort of thing, but she knew more than a few Shallihs who were.

What truly drew her attention was the massive feline. He was magnificent. The oldest of legends said that they were descended from great cats who had long ago left their world and that, over the course of thousands of generations, they had changed, becoming something different. If ever there was an example of feline perfection, here it stood, right before her. His coat was perfect, voluminous, and clean, without a hair out of place. His claws and teeth were impeccable.

She could sense that while he was likely smart, he wasn't sapient. His eyes held the wisdom of a canny hunter and the cunning of an apex predator, but they lacked that spark.

Stepping forward, her ears perked forward, and her tail swishing slightly, she stood next to Kharvic.

"My name is Lilalyaslywain, although the Lovar have trouble with that, so you may call me as they do, Lily," She tilted her head slightly, in the way of the Shallihs, showing respect for their strength without surrendering to their authority. "I greet you in the name of Nurrihs. On behalf of the Shallihs aboard the Hurstall'kalwin, I welcome you. May your prey be foolish and your hunts successful."

"You're welcome," Bob replied.

If these people had been like Lovar, she would have said that he sounded awkward.

"How will you be transporting us away from here?" She asked. "Your ship is quite small, considering how many of us there are. Or will you be moving the Hurstall'kalwin?" She glanced over and up and Kharvic. "I know the captain would prefer to move the entire ship." Her tail swished. "Honestly, we wouldn't mind either. It saved us, after all."

Kharvic coughed. "I'm sure they have a way to move the ship, Lily," he said.

"Oh fuck no," Bob interjected. "This thing is huge. The biggest portal I can open is just over a hundred and sixty feet in diameter."

"I have seen that spell," Lilalyaslywain nodded. "Is that how you will move us?"

Bob nodded. "My friend Kellan has room on his planet, and I'm sure he will help us out, at least until we can get you your own, which," he sighed, "will probably take a little while. How many of you are there? Is this everyone?" He peered at the group.

Lily snorted. "There are one million eight hundred thousand Lovar, and eight hundred and seventy-five thousand Shallihs aboard the Hurstall'kalwin."

Bob blinked.

"That's a lot of people," he muttered.

"Aside from yourselves, no," Kharvic replied.

Bob nodded, then stilled as his staff appeared in his hands.

Kharvic's attention was drawn to Amanda as her staff reappeared as well, and with a gesture, nearly a hundred small canines appeared. The creatures immediately rushed past the Lovar and the Dharlings, spreading out into the hallway beyond before they disappeared.

"The Ruff's will spread out and sweep and clear out to a mile and a half," Amanda said. "I'll get a notification if one of them dies, giving me the direction and the distance."

"Any chance the ship has sensors that will detect the monsters when they spawn?" Mike asked.

"There were video recorders in nearly every space, but those failed a long time ago, and our ancestors didn't judge them to be crucial to the operation of the ship," Kharvic sighed. "They had left to establish an agrarian society, and while we haven't neglected the Hurry's systems, we didn't have any spare parts for them, nor did we have the ability to manufacture replacements."

"How old is this ship?" Dave asked.

"Almost three thousand years," Kharvic replied.

Jessica let out a whistle. "Strewth, that's a fair stretch, yeah?"

"She was built to carry the hope of the Lovar to new worlds," Kharvic said. "Before the Empire weighed down our branches, our trunks were strong, and we reached for the stars."

Suddenly, the room was filled with the cacophony of dozens of furious honks as new creatures appeared.

These were some sort of avians, although rather than beaks, they had muzzles filled with rows of curved, wickedly sharp teeth, clearly meant to rend flesh. As if that wasn't enough, they had winged arms equipped with claws, and their feet had talons, three of them, the middle one being exceptionally long, slightly curved, and judging from the scratches they were leaving on the deck, razor sharp.

Kharvic noticed something else. Unlike the canine creatures, which all appeared to be perfect copies of one another, these creatures were individuals, with each one having slight variations in color or shape.

He turned his attention to Bob, who seemed to have been the person most likely to have brought these creatures into being.

Bob was smiling. Kharvic knew that it was foolish to judge the expressions of these aliens against those of his own people, but in that moment, he would have said there was something different about this smile, especially when compared to the one he'd worn before. This one seemed to hold the shadow of an almost unholy glee.

"Do not harm the Lovar or the Shallihs," Bob ordered quietly, his voice managing to carry regardless. "Now go. Purge."

Kharvic shuddered as the creatures obeyed, darting out of the room, sparing the Lovar and Dharlings that they passed speculative glances. He could almost feel the hunger and the malice radiating from those eyes. Those glances seemed loaded with unspoken meaning. 'We can't eat you, yet,' they seemed to say.

"That should take of the monsters," Bob's voice was filled with satisfaction. "Probably have to vent the atmosphere of the ship when you come back for it, though; the second and maybe the third generations should be ok, but after that, they'll revert, and people will be back on the menu."

"Bob," Mike began, slowly. "Did you just pull a Jurassic Park?"

"I did," Bob said, nodding happily.

"Aren't you, you know, not supposed to summon real dinosaurs that can have more real dinosaurs?" Jessica asked.

"Well, not on Earth or Thayland," Bob replied. "But this is a perfect opportunity to study them in a controlled environment! We have only the vaguest of guesses as to how quickly they reproduce, how long it takes them to mature, or how long they live."

"More to the point, how are you controlling them? They're real." Mike stressed the last word.

"I've got a skill for that," Bob shook his head. "Assuming each of the females lays a dozen eggs and that they don't experience any significant losses, I can handle two more iterations before I'm no longer able to control the offspring." He paused thoughtfully. "I suppose that when I reach the limit, I can just order them not to reproduce, but as we all know, Life finds a way."

"Are you sure that's the best way to do this?" Amanda asked.

Bob shrugged. "They're level five, so they can handle the monsters, and they'll hunt them down to sustain themselves."

Jessica reached up tapped Bob's nose lightly. "And you can order them out of an airlock if things go sideways, yeah?"

"I can," Bob agreed grudgingly.

It was at this moment that Kharvic wondered if maybe these people weren't already drunk on their own power.