Ten Years Later

“Who do you have assigned to go out on the scouting missions?”

Captain Markus looked over at General Ranier. He had been watching the blue planet below them called Earth. They had come across the solar system a year ago, surprised to find that it had satellite technology and even a few spaceships. So far, they had managed to keep their presence a secret from the Earthlings. Through monitoring communications and transmissions sent from Earth to their satellites, his people had been learning everything they could about the race.

The Earth people had humanoid forms similar to their own humanoid forms, but they did not shift. In fact, anything involving shifting or other alien races seemed to be a myth to the Earthlings. Markus and some of the other warriors had been working on learning many of Earth’s different languages. On Drakonia, they only had one language. How did Earthlings get along with one another when they couldn’t even understand each other’s speech?

What surprised them the most was that despite the Earthlings’ advancements in science and space, they naively believed they were the only living, thinking beings in the universe. Their movies created for entertainment showed that they did not hold a high regard for beings from other worlds. It was this reason that General Ranier ordered that they keep their existence unknown.

“I have four teams that will cover the areas known as China, Scotland, Greece, and the United States of America. We had studied the planet’s history and stories hinting of dragon lore, and these four locations seemed to have the most stories. The four leaders of the teams are Warriors Roc, Zan, Kale and myself. I’ll be heading up the team going to Arizona in the United States.”

“I noticed you did not have Warrior Sonar head up a team. Why is that?”

“Sir, I plan to take him with me on my team but I don’t think he’s able to lead a mission.”

“I noticed that you reduced many of his warrior duties after his…episode.”

Markus sighed looking back out the window. “I may be overprotective. He’s been my only family these past ten years. I feel guilty that I didn’t see his problems until it was almost too late.”

His best friend Sonar suffered a break in reality about two years before. They had stopped at a planet that had a friendly atmosphere to allow their people on board to take a break and shift into their dragon forms. If Drakonians went too long without letting their inner dragons out, they sickened. Their people could live for centuries, but a sick inner dragon was deadly to them.

While on the planet, Sonar had a conflict with another Drakonian male who wanted to share sex with the same female. The female chose the other male and Sonar lost his temper and attacked the male. The female was accidently injured. Both males were punished, but Sonar had never really been the same since then. He was worried that something would push Sonar to the breaking point and the general would have to order his friend’s death.

“Perhaps Warrior Sonar should remain on board the ship. If he has another episode, it could expose us to the Earth people, and they aren’t ready to interact with a dragon-shifting alien race.”

“I understand your hesitance, but I will take responsibility for him. Perhaps spending time on the planet’s surface will do him good.”

“If he does have another episode…”

“I will take care of it,” he said, it but he wasn’t sure he could do that. General Ranier must have thought the same thing.

“I’ll also send Captain Roan with you.”

“I can handle my team and anything that comes up.”

“I know you can, but you have to interact with the Earthlings while searching for signs of our people. Having another experienced warrior will be helpful to you.”

In other words, Roan was going to be on his team whether he wanted or not, and Roan would ensure that Markus handled Sonar.

“Yes, sir.”

“When do you leave?”

“In stages. I leave with my team immediately; we will be arriving in Arizona when it is dark. The other teams will depart at times that fit their location to arrive in darkness.”

“You will need to restrict your communications. Once you arrive, contact us and then you have five days to search before you move on to a new location. No communications again until the five days are up. We’re using a pulse signal to scramble their satellites until you have landed. Good luck and safe travels.”

Markus placed his closed fist over his chest. “Until we meet again.”