Just as Suzy promised, Troy was back on his feet the next day. The human spent the craziest night of his life strapped to the medical exam table, making love to his tigress captain, female skunk archaeologist, his doctor-vixen, and his domineering engineer, a rambunctious rabbit. The events of the prior night stuck with the human as he tried to fulfil his duties as first officer, but the other furvoids seemed to be different creatures in the daytime.
"Morning Troy, how's your foot?" Captain Ember Riley asked.
"Uh...fine, thanks," he said, sitting down at the table in the galley. Ember handed him a bowl of cereal, but this time it was meant for humans. The meaty mystery cereal from before was now replaced with frosted oat clusters.
"I don't know how you humans eat this stuff," she said, sampling a flake. "Too damned sweet if you ask me."
"It's an acquired taste, I guess," he shrugged. "Do you need help on the bridge, Captain?"
"No, why don't you see if you can help Audra pour through the texts. I received a communique the disease is getting worse on our home planet. If you could perhaps help her we might find that damned stone sooner," Ember said.
"Yes ma'am," he replied.
"Troy..."
"Yes Captain?"
"Are you okay?"
"Uh, why do you ask?"
"You seem very quiet today. We...didn't freak you out last night, did we?"
"Oh, no. I get turned into a sex slave by four furvoid chicks on a regular basis," he said.
"Last night was...I'll admit, we were a bit out of control. I apologize for that. It won't happen again."
"Right, well, I'll just take this cereal with me and uh, visit Audra," he replied. He left the galley and entered Audra's quarters.
"Oh...hi Troy," she said, blushing immediately.
"Audra," he began, but she interrupted him.
"Troy, I'm so sorry, I would never want to cause you pain, you know that; I was in the moment and..." she said, nearly on the verge of tears.
"It's not your fault, if anything I came to apologize to you."
"We went way too far," she continued.
"Piper," Troy said softly.
"What about her?" Audra asked nervously.
"She dominates you?"
"It gets awful lonely in the void," Audra said quietly.
"I'm not judging you, hey, it's alright. I just...I don't want her to hurt you," he said.
"I like to be hurt, remember?" she said weakly.
"There's a difference between playful punishment and abuse. I'll protect you from her," he offered.
"You're sweet, Troy. I don't need it, really."
"Well, maybe I can at least help you with these ancient texts," he countered.
"Are you hiding the fact you're also an archeologist from us too?" she teased.
"Sorry, history and archeology were things I kind of slept through in class," he said with a laugh.
"Well, you might not find this task to your liking," Audra replied.
"I might find the subjects boring, but I also like a challenge. Maybe my primitive human brain will see things different than you might."
"Alright," she chuckled. "Well, the thing is, the Chelali race were famous for their riddles. The healing stone is of great importance to them, so they went to great lengths to hide it. Only those who are enlightened can hope to find it, so they made the riddles so difficult and vexing, it would take a truly advanced civilization to crack their codes."
"Well, let's see this one here," Troy said, pulling a copy of the text. It was in Furvoid, but he switched the language to English.
"Thrice a stone unturned, twice a stone burned, once a well to drink, never a chain is linked. Well, that makes a bunch of sense," he said.
"This particular riddle makes no sense, because none of the temples have any matching descriptions," Audra said, sipping her tea.
"Well," Troy said, taking another bite of his soggy cereal, "do you have the original text, I mean in their own language?"
"You speak Chelali?" she snickered.
"Not a word, I just want to see them. Sometimes, the idiots see things the geniuses miss," he replied with a playful wink.
"You are not an idiot, Troy, and I wish you'd stop saying that," she reprimanded him lightly. "Nevertheless, here they are," she said, pulling up the digital file of the original sandstone carvings.
The sandstone was in a writing form totally alien to the human. It consisted of angular lines and geometric shapes. Scholars used a sort of Rosetta Stone at the main temple to decipher the language, but the riddles had stumped all those who sought their treasure.
"Huh, that's funny," Troy remarked, looking at the writing.
"What is?" Audra sked, perking her ears up in excitement.
"Oh, it's probably nothing, never mind I said anything," Troy said dismissively.
"Troy," Audra again scolded her lover.
"Well, I don't know anything at all about the Chili Pepper language..."
"Chelali."
"Yeah, them too. Anyway, I do know a thing or two about space travel, and some of these symbols sort of look like the maneuvering flight paths I would take to avoid neutron stars," he said.
"Which ones?" the skunk asked.
He pointed to one.
"This is the word for sand...what else do you see that jumps out at you?"
"That one, and that one, oh and this one here, too," Troy commented, pointing at the symbols.
"Ocean, island, hilltop..." she translated.
"Know of any temples on any planets that match all of those requirements?" he asked.
"Checking," she said, putting the parameters in the computer.
"Valga 2, but we've been there already," she said in a deflated voice.
"Didn't find anything there?"
"Nothing more than a few clay pots and trinkets."
"It was a good idea though, Troy, really. I would have never thought of an idea like that," she said rubbing his hand with hers.
"Hey, what's this one?"
"Which?"
"That one, over there. Looks sort of like a globular cluster," he replied.
"It means flames."
"Flames? Did this Valga 2 have anything to do with flames?"
"Not that I recall. Wait, now that you mention it...there was a sacrificial torch. But I looked inside, it was empty."
"What was that text again, I mean in English? The riddle that is."
"Thrice a stone unturned, twice a stone burned, once a well to drink, never a chain is linked."
"Burned. Burning, torches, unturned," he muttered aloud.
"What are you getting at, Troy?"
"What if you went there and thought you uncovered everything, but you didn't?"
"Are you saying I missed something there, Troy?" Audra asked.
"Well you are only human...uh Furvoid," he corrected himself.
"That planet is days from here. The captain isn't going to waste time going on a hunch, especially for a place we already checked," Audra complained.
"I don't know why, I just feel there's more to that planet than you think."
"Troy..."
"Once a well to drink, twice a stone burned," he kept saying to himself.
"What are you getting at?"
"These aren't riddles, they're instructions!"
"What?"
"You said yourself, these chili pepper people," Audra didn't bother correcting him and let him continue, "were very advanced, yet they clung to tradition."
"Yeah, so?"
"So, what if they expect those who seek their treasure to perform the same rituals? Anyone can come in with a pickaxe and a shovel and dig around for treasure, but only one who is enlightened to their culture can gain their secrets. You said as much yourself."
"So you're expecting me to tell the Captain to turn the ship around, travel to the temple, try to recreate their ceremonies, and suddenly the answer will appear?"
"Well, I just..."
"Relax, babe. You sold me. I'll go inform the captain."
They went up to the captain and Audra explained Troy's hypothesis.
"And you think it's plausible, Audra?"
"Well, Captain, so far, all we've found on our digs is enough junk and trinkets to keep food in our bellies, and barely at that. Maybe a fresh perspective like Troy's idea might help."
"If you're wrong, we'll have wasted valuable time looking for the stone while our people die."
"But if he's right, Captain..."
Ember looked at her two crewmembers and smiled wryly. She punched in the coordinates in the computer and the ship slowly came about. "Well Mr. Wooten, you may very well be the best abductee I've ever kidnapped."
"Let's not get too excited until we get there and find out if this hunch of mine is right or not," he cautioned.
The Shield Maiden entered the planet's atmosphere. They flew over an ocean until they reached a sizeable island with a temple on a hilltop. Troy gathered his weapons and accompanied both Audra and Suzy into the temple, while Piper and Ember remained on the ship. It was a hot, tropical island, and steamy mist wafted over the jungle below the hilltop temple.
Troy was both excited and nervous. He kept his finger close to the trigger of his gun and constantly scanned every direction for even the slightest hint of danger.
"You're making me nervous," Suzy complained to Troy.
"If you're not already nervous, I don't know what you're doing here," Troy snapped at the doctor. The vixen ignored the comment.
"Well Troy, there it is, the ceremonial fire pit. They would make offerings and burn them as offerings to their gods," Audra said. Troy examined the stone, torch-like structure. It was just a bowl, devoid of any flammable substances.
"Thrice a stone unturned," Troy said, looking at a rough spot in the cobblestone floor with three stones seemed to form a rough triangle. They were only slightly darker than the rest of the floor. Troy got on his knees and pried them out of the ground. A foul smelling, black ooze stuck to the bottoms of the stones.
"Ugh, what is that?" Suzy asked, pinching her nose.
