he top center of the gate's frame. That frame was hollow, filled with equipment that made the Stargate operate, and from what he remembered reading, that piece of technology out there had nearly 5,000 Faey workers and engineers in it. _"Stabilize course and speed, keep at least 10,000 _shakra_ from forward traffic. Rig dropship for gate passage once course and speed is stabilized, contact Stargate Control once through."_

Jason checked his controls and saw that the ship's course and speed were stable, no minor fluctuations that would cause it to drift off course while it approached the gate. "Gate passage mode," Jason said, reaching up over his head and flipping a series of switches on the overhead panel, which caused the engines to shut down and most systems in the ship to disengage, plunging them into red-hued dim murkiness from the crimson emergency lights. The PPGs and power plants were placed in shielded mode to protect them and their systems from the spatial distortion of the Stargate, and the gravimetric engines were offline. The ship would coast on its own forward momentum, "Gate pass mode enabled. Handoff is to Draconis Stargate Control, acknowledged."

_"Stargate Control out."_

"Vultech-1 out."

"So, now we coast through under our own momentum," Luke said, reciting what he'd learned when Jason taught him about class three operations as Jason shut down the communication system. "And all our plasma systems have to be offline, especially the engines."

"Or our engines disrupt the gate, and we get tossed into a random stretch of space," Jason finished. "If we don't get ripped apart in the spatial flux."

"Let's not have that happen please," Songa said in a slightly weak voice.

Jason felt a little anxious as they saw the small freighter ahead of them vanish into the gate. He'd never been through the gate, so he had no idea what to expect. Luke kept looking at him, then looked back to Songa. "Miss Songa, is it gonna make me sick?"

She laughed. "You never feel a thing, Luke," she told him. "I've never seen a gate pass through the front windshield before, so I can't tell you what it looks like, but you never feel anything. Not even a vibration."

"Oh, that's good then," he said with a relieved sigh.

Songa was right about that part. As the dark shimmering surface enveloped them, there wasn't even a vibration in the ship, not even a sense that they moved, changed speed, or anything. It was surprisingly calm. The view, however, wasn't quite so calm. The shimmering before them suddenly stretched like a rubber band, as if space itself was pulled back, and then it snapped forward with such sudden speed that both Jason and Luke flinched. And once the stretching snapped back to what Jason would consider a normal appearance, it parted like a curtain, and Jason found himself staring at a large blue planet some distance ahead, so far ahead it looked like a beach ball from that distance.

"We're through," Jason announced, then he reached up and started resetting the switches to take them out of gate mode. As soon as he reactivated the communications, he keyed the mic. "Stargate Control, Vultech-1," Jason called as he continued to flip the row of switches.

_"Vultech-1, Stargate Control,"_ the male Faey on the other end called. _"Destination?"_

"Aryxa, Merum continent," he answered.

_"One moment. Maintain course and speed, stay on comm."_

"Understood."

Luke gaped at the planet before them as Jason finished restoring the ship's systems, half-light and half-dark from the angle at which they viewed it, a beautiful blue, white, and green jewel floating in the heavens. "It does look like Earth," he whispered, so as not to be picked up on Jason's mic.

"Told you," Songa chuckled.

_"Vultech-1, Stargate Control."_

"Stargate Control, Vultech-1," Jason returned.

_"Come to heading 178 by 4, the lane is loose. Speed is restricted to one half, there are no traffic restrictions. Hand off is Pegasus-4 once you pass the inner marker."_

"178, mark, 4, one half, handoff to Pegasus-4 at the inner marker, acknowledged," he replied. Jason had no idea where that marker was, so he accessed navigational charts for Draconis and quickly located it. It would take them nearly a half hour to get to the boundary set by the marker.

Jason and Luke spent that half hour making sure they were ready for the approach. They went over maps of Draconis, projected as a hologram over the center console, then double-checked their navigation systems. The one thing Jason did notice, though, was the large amount of traffic. There were ships _everywhere_, dropships, personal craft, small cargo ships, and even larger freighters that had their own jump engines, and there were Sticks by the ton moving containers from freighters parked at large distances from the planet and vice versa. When the controller said the lane was loose, Jason didn't pay much attention until he saw how much traffic there was. There were ships of every size and shape, both ones he'd seen either live or in pictures and ships that were _clearly_ not from the Imperium, and that surprised him a little bit. He'd never considered the idea that species and governments from outside the Imperium would come here, but obviously they did. Traffic became thick, so much so that Jason had to abandon his other activities and concentrate on piloting the craft, since he was weaving in and out among slower moving craft, faster moving craft, larger ships and smaller ships. Jason flipped on the gravband local channel in addition to control, so he could hear local transmissions between ships. He was surprised at the amount of chatter being flung back and forth on gravband local, a frequency that only had a range of about five miles. It almost sounded like a group of angry commuters for a minute, as pilots barked at one another, but there was also quite a bit of inane conversation as pilots who obviously knew each other were conversing over open short-range gravband. He was sure that there was quite a bit of sending as well, but Jason had his talent blocked and was putting up a false front of a nervous pilot on his first trip to Draconis... which is actually what he really was. Songa was actively shielding Luke and herself, which was her job on this venture, preventing other Faey pilots from picking up his thoughts, which might give them away. To a Faey out in another ship, the dropship he was in only had one occupant, for they could only sense one mind within it, and a rather nervous mind at that. That nervousness in his public thoughts caused a slightly larger cushion of space around him than there was around other ships, as the Faey pilots, sensing his unease, gave his ship a wide berth.

Once they passed the inner marker, they were set on a narrow windowed vector approach to the planet, which now totally dominated the windshield. Jason had to circle around to the daytime side of the planet, and then he began his slow descent into the atmosphere, staying on his assigned entry vector. The ship shuddered and rocked as they descended through resistant air, as the featureless blue and green below began to take on more and more form, more detail. Aryxa was a coastal city on the northeast side of the small southern continent, and Jason descended out over the open ocean, intending to hook around and approach. "Bring up where this place is, Luke," Jason ordered as he slowed their descent even more, dropping down out of a cloud to look upon a beautiful blue sea. "The universal location code."

"I already have the ULC," he answered. "Punching it into the nav system."

"Good."

Using the Universal Location Code, the navigational system brought a cursor up on the cockpit windshield showing him exactly where he needed to go. After getting clearance for approach from Aryxa control, he contacted the warehouse and got landing instructions. They approached the city, and Jason had to take a moment and gawk at the lovely glass towers rising along the coast, as well as the smaller buildings that surrounded that downtown display of Faey engineering, with its elegantly sloped towers and love of tapered buildings. The Faey didn't like to build anything straight up and down, nearly all of their large buildings tapered as they ascended; either in delicate angles or in steps, like the stepped pyramids in Central America. The location of the warehouse was near the coast and to the left of that metroplex, a small shipping warehouse called Mezour, a Makati shipping company. Most of the reason why Jason chose Mezour was because it _was_ a Makati company.

The Mezour compound was a series of nine warehouses enclosed by a common fence, and like Jyslin and Meya had described, the space between those buildings was dominated by green. Grass, trees, shrubs, flowers, all neatly tended, almost looking like a garden, making the place look less like an industrial compound and more like some kind of park with buildings built within it. A triangular logo was made of colored flowers between the two largest warehouses, just beside a large landing pad which held two Sticks and another dropship, which was also where he was instructed to land. As they circled to get over the landing pad, Jason darkened the windscreen so nobody could see inside, turning the windscreen black and impenetrable from the outside, and dark on the inside, the windscreen mode for when the ship was bow-first to a star. He extended the skids as he saw several red-skinned Makati in blue uniforms waddling around, interspersed with several Faey, also in blue. Jason extended the landing skids and set her down with a light touch.

"Welcome to Draconis," Songa said.

"Welcome to Draconis," Jason grunted, taking off his headset. "You two stay up here and keep quiet. Now let's see how well I can pretend." He picked up a datapad, opened the hatch separating the cockpit from the cargo compartment, went down the four step ladder to the cargo bay, took a deep, cleansing breath, then opened the forward hatch.

Sweet smelling air blew into his face, air that was warm and pleasant, air that was the air of an alien world. The air pressure outside was only slightly higher than the air inside, causing a brief influx of air into the cargo bay, and then Jason stepped out onto the steps and down, under a yellow sun, as three uniformed beings, two Makati and a Faey, moved towards him. Jason hid both his trepidation and his wonder and looking at an alien world, as he looked at the tall brown-barked trees between two warehouses in front of him and the narrow-leafed shrubs ringing its trunk at the base, and then the bell-shaped, drooping flowers that were grown around those shrubs. The logo was made of small daisy-looking flowers of many different colors, which created the ringed starburst within the triangle.

"Good afternoon," the Makati on the left said in flawless Faey. "You're from Vultech?"

"Yes sir," he answered. Jason noticed that he had tiny horns poking out of his short white hair. "I'm supposed to pick up, uh," he grunted, looking at the pad in his hand, "nine containers and five pallets."

"We have it ready," the Makati answered. "Can you turn your ship so your cargo door faces that building over there?" he asked, pointing to the warehouse his dropship was facing. "It'll make loading a little easier."

"Sure, no problem," he said.

Jason turned the ship around, then came out and supervised the loading of the containers by a crew of Faey and Makati using hovering loading equipment, hovering forklifts and floating platforms that picked up the containers from above and carried them slung underneath. Jason and a Makati stood side by side, the Makati on a small hovering platform, as they checked the manifest of each container against a shipping order to make sure that nothing was missed or left out. "Lots of stuff in these. Your company a reseller or do they use it?"

"I think they use some and resell the rest," he answered. "They do their thing, though, and I do mine. I try not to get involved, most of them don't really like me all that much."

"Why is that?"

"Cause they took a huge chance hiring a Terran pilot, I suppose," he answered. "As far as I know, I'm the only one."

"The controllers around Terra must be surprised to see your face," he laughed.

"I keep it audio only, just because of that," he answered. "I have to admit, I'm surprised by how this planet looks."

"Your first time here?" the Makati asked, and Jason nodded. "Does it look a lot like your planet, or nothing like it?"

"Almost exactly like it," he answered. "That tree over there almost looks like a _maple_, and those shrubs wouldn't look out of place in a garden back home. Those little drooping flowers are like nothing I've ever seen, but those ones making up your logo look like _daisies_," he said, using English for the names of the Earth-specific flora. "What does your planet look like?"

"Much different from yours or Draconis," he answered. "We have much less water, and the planet looks like a big tan ball from orbit. Most of the planet is covered in a plant that you'd think was much like grass. The Makati are builders, but we're also subterranean by nature. We like to build large cities _under_ the surface, not on top of it. We have cities as big as Dracora, in vast underground chambers that we burrow out of the earth and rock. We like to leave the surface as untouched as possible."

"Why is that?"

"Because that's the way it's always been," he shrugged.

"Huh. Learn something new every day, I suppose."

"You gonna stay and look around a bit? Do some sightseeing before you leave?"

"I wish I could, but I'm on a schedule," he answered. "This planet is beautiful, and I feel really... weird, being here. My people never left our own planet really, and standing on another planet's like something that most of my people never really thought possible five years ago."

"You were behind Faey technology eh? Well, when the Faey first met us, them and us were about the same in technology."

"Really? Did your people fight them?"

"Oh yes, there was a big war, but in the end, we ended up allying ourselves against the Gormin, and that alliance just held. The Makati became part of the Imperium. We've basically been part of the Imperium since it they started calling it the Imperium."

"Why did the Makati join?"

"I can't really tell you the specifics, but I can say that it's mutually beneficial. We don't like to fight, we like to build. We let the Faey do the fighting; they're more suited for it. While they fight, we build. Most of Draconis was built by Makati engineering firms, you know."

"I didn't know that."

"We did," he said proudly. "Of course the outer appearances are their preference, but the Makati do the engineering and oversee the construction. They tell us what they want it to look like, and we make it happen. Faey can make good battleships, but they're not very good civil engineers," he said with a grin and a wink. "Anyway, the Faey do the fighting and they protect Makan, and the Makati build the infrastructure of the Imperium."

"Makes me wonder why there aren't many Makati on Earth then."

"Where?"

"Terra," he said, correcting himself. To the Imperium, Earth was called _Terra_.

"Well, have they done much reconstruction there, or are they just using the original cities?"

"They're using the cities that are there."

"That's why. When they start building new things there, then you'll start seeing us showing up, so we can survey sites and oversee construction. And I'd bet that there are _some_ Makati there already, if they want to install modern public transportation and such."

"Ah, well, I don't live in a town big enough for that," he shrugged.

"There ya go again. But eventually, you'll start seeing us. When the Imperium wants things rebuilt or revamped or upgraded, they'll call in a Makati firm to do the engineering, and the Makati will most likely hire and train Terran workers to do the actual construction. Why send an army of Makati to do the work when we can hire locally and train your people up, so they can learn to build it themselves?"

"Ah, so the Makati train most Faey engineers?"

"For civil engineering, you bet," he affirmed. "For plasma systems and such, you'll see as many Faey as you do Makati engineers. But the Faey just don't have the soul of the Master Builder, so they leave us to do what we're good at. That's why our being part of the Imperium is mutually beneficial. We get to do what we're good at doing, and they protect us, since fighting is what _they_ are good at. Alright, this pallet's good," he said, waving a pallet on that was stopped for inspection. The Faey female, a very young one with _pink_ hair, winked at Jason from her seat on the platform and started it into the dropship. "Where's my next container!" the Makati shouted. "Let's get organized, people!"

Jason rather liked this diminutive Makati. Their conversation continued drifting into non-work related subjects as they inspected the containers, as the Makati asked him about being a pilot, and how it felt to be one of the rare Terrans that moved outside boundaries of his home planet. "Well, it's nerve-wracking in one way," he said, looking at two Faey that were looking at him as they passed by. "Back home, we used to stare at every Faey that went by, since we never saw them all that much. Here, everyone stares at _me_. It makes me feel like I'm in a glass bottle."

The Makati laughed. "I imagine it does."

"Now that I know how the Faey feel, maybe I won't stare at them so" he started, but then a familiar shiver up his spine made him quickly look around. He looked in the direction of that feeling, and then saw him. It was a Kimdori, coming out of a door to a warehouse, a male Kimdori with black fur and wearing no clothing, carrying a datapad. The Kimdori looked right at him with eerie yellow eyes, then gave him the slightest of nods, as if acknowledging the fact that he knew he was there, and knew he could sense him.

"That's a Kimdori," the Makati told him. "I'm not all that fond of 'em. They always give me the creeps."

"He's staring at me," Jason told the Makati, covering the fact that he was the one that stared first.

"Just look away or he'll come over here," he said. "They do this thing where they grab you under your jaw, and they never ask to do it, they just do it. It's some kind of custom, but I don't like people touching me like that without asking first."

Jason looked down, and held his pad up near the Makati's so they could synchronize their lists as the last pallet was brought in for inspection, its contents on a reader affixed to the side of the titanium box. "Last pallet," the Makati noted. "Alright, we have here three molecular sprayers, two portable metallurgical analyzers, two BZ-14 probes, five Class V PPGs, two" he cut himself off when a shadow blocked the sun, and both of them looked up to see the Kimdori. He was a hulking brute, a head taller than Jason, with coal black fur, wickedly long yellow claws, and peering amber eyes that stared down at them. Before Jason could react, he reached out and put his large clawed hand on Jason's neck. Unlike the times when Jason was touched by Miaari and Kiaari, this time he _felt_ the other side of that contact, of that communion. He felt this Kimdori, felt the creature's _mind_ through that touch, that communion. In that moment, the combined memories, thoughts, experiences, dreams, hopes, and fears of two separate entities were joined into a single communal being, a single mind, a single _soul_, made up of two parts. Thoughts and memories flowed freely between them. This Kimdori was named Grahl, and he was of the Mekh clan. He was a young Kimdori; only five years free of his mother's den, currently on what Jason learned was the _sojourn_, a period in a Kimdori's life when he or she was to roam the vastness of the galaxy for ten years and learn, observe, interact with other cultures and expand his knowledge. Once his sojourn was complete, he would return to his clan to be educated and trained. He was at Mezour because he was working for a Faey shipping company as a pilot, earning money that would help him move on when he was ready to explore another part of the galaxy, once he felt he was ready to leave Draconis.

And he _knew_ about Jason. They all did, every single Kimdori. Grahl knew of him, and when he was aware that Jason was feeling the other side of that communion, touching on the part of them that was Grahl, he gave Jason a toothy grin and let go. Jason felt a little disoriented for a second, and then realized that everything he'd seen in their commune was removed... and what was more, he didn't think to look at anything, so surprised he'd been by the feel of it. He remembered Grahl's name, however, and he realized that if he'd thought to look into it, he could have remembered more. That's was when he finally understood what Kiaari and Miaari meant about remembering what they saw. He would have had to make a conscious attempt at retaining anything that came from the other side of that communion. He'd taken special note of Grahl's name and his clan, and recalled that he was on his sojourn, because that had kind of jumped out at him when the bond was firm. But he hadn't looked at anything else, and such, he couldn't remember any of it.

The large Kimdori let his big hand linger on the side of Jason's neck, then he simply turned and walked away without a word.

"See, what did I tell you?" the Makati growled under his breath to Jason.

Jason put his own hand to his neck and looked at the Kimdori as he ambled away. Something very... significant had happened there. He wasn't quite sure what it was, but he knew that something had.

"Uh, I meant to ask, why did I see so many ships that aren't Imperial when I approached Draconis?" he asked, trying to not sound rattled.

"Well, Draconis is a major hub," he answered. "Most other races don't like coming here cause of Faey telepathy, but they _are_ major players in the galactic scene. The Imperium isn't the biggest civilization out there, but we're one of the most well armed, and we're competitive when it comes to technology. And then there's telepathy," he chuckled. "Those species that can handle it come here to do business, some actually come here just to come on holiday since Draconis is such a pretty planet, and there's always diplomats. Just about all the diplomats that come here are telepathic themselves, though. Nobody likes sending someone here who's at that much of a disadvantage."

"What do you think about working with them?"

"I've been around Faey all my life," he shrugged. "I'm used to knowing that they might be hearing what I'm thinking, and they know not to take random thoughts seriously. Trust me, you get used to it."

"I hope so. I didn't see more than like five Faey before I got this job, now I'm around them every day. It makes me a little nervous."

"That'll pass. Just be yourself, friend. They'll get used to you, and you'll get used to them."

"That's so easy to say," he grunted.

The Makati chuckled. "You'll see. Alright, this one's good, and that's basically it. I need you to sign this invoice right here," he said, holding up the datapad and pointing. "And I need your signature to acknowledge receipt here. And I'll need you to come with me and inspect the loading. Once you're satisfied it was loaded correctly, I'll need your signature one more time."

"Okay," he nodded.

After signing for the shipment, inspecting the loading to make sure it was balanced and everything was secure, Jason initialed off on that, said his goodbyes to the friendly Makati, and then buttoned up the dropship. He returned to the cockpit and sat down in the pilot's chair, and gave Luke and Songa a steady look. "Well, that went smoothly. Any trouble, Songa?"

"None at all," she replied. "I may be a doctor, but I'm a good telepath, dear. We've been perfectly hidden."

"Good. Now let's go home."

"Home sounds good to me," Luke agreed with a nod.

                                        * * *

The trip to Draconis had been to buy the supplies needed to refit the dropship for stealth, and it had been thorough. Now that they had everything that they needed, they started the same day.

They already had a plan, and they already had experience doing a refit, so the beginning was very orderly. Everyone already knew what to do, and they'd already worked up a schedule and design plans to go by. They started almost as soon as the dropship was unloaded, and Tom Jackson started his task as soon as it got dark so Luke could take him back to Charleston, where he would assemble his team, gather up supplies, and then fly to Cheyenne Mountain. Jason thought it was a good idea, which would let them get as much done in Cheyenne Mountain as they could while they were refitting the dropship. Tom's team turned into a thirty man regiment, including one of the doctors, Rann. Songa stayed at the warehouse, and Yohnne remained in Charleston to keep watch over Kumi, who no longer needed around the clock attention, but did need a doctor to remain with her.

The refit began by sectioning off the warehouse. They hung a curtain from the ceiling rafters that hid the front half of the warehouse from the back doors, covered over the window on the door from the office into the warehouse, and then installed some fans and ventilation. Hiding the dropship was critical because they knew that they would be receiving shipments, and anyone bringing those shipments might see the dropship. They didn't want anyone to have any suspicion about what was going on. The refit team had already passed the biggest test, the ability to control themselves in the presence of hostile Faey, but that was a skill that they wouldn't have to exercise very often. Lincoln only had about two hundred Faey total in it, and they had no reason to come out here, since the warehouse was way, way off the beaten path.

Some contact was necessary, though. Through CivNet, Jason bought a truck and a car to be used, and it was using that truck that Songa went on her food runs. Jason set her up so she could use the corporate account, and she went out every day to buy sundries and perishables for the refit team. She didn't go to the same store twice, and they were still getting the majority of their food from Charleston in shipments that Luke or Jason collected every three days. Some of it was dropped off at the warehouse, the rest was sent on to Cheyenne Mountain.

It was an exhausting time for Jason. When he wasn't working in Lincoln, he was flying the skimmer back and forth between Lincoln, Charleston, and Cheyenne Mountain, which he never really got to see more than the entry tunnel. His visits there entailed him landing with his tail to the entry tunnel, opening the cargo hatch, and helping them unload while the ship was still under power... and that was always _nervous_. The ship's hull was charged, and it required them to wear special rubber rain suits to unload the skimmer, so nobody got electrocuted. When he was at Lincoln, he was always busy. He worked on the dropship. He continued to try to search out the link between Temika and Tim, who had been rather surprised to learn that they were distant relatives, and had jokingly started calling each other brother and sister. He still continued to train people in piloting, and he rather shamefully admitted that his current focus was to get Jyslin up to class three level as quickly as possible. It had nothing to do with any need of the community or the resistance, he just wanted her to be able to pilot a dropship or skimmer so she always had that option if the worst happened and she had to run. The protection of his fiance mattered more to him than anything else. He kept in frequent contact with Tom in Colorado, and also with Yohnne and Kumi back in Charleston, trying to stay up to date on all the matters and issues of the three positions, and also to ride others to do their parts. He contacted Rann every day to make sure he was continuing work on his DNA pattern scanner, which he had plenty of time to work on given that he was only in Colorado in case someone got injured. If he wasn't seeing a patient, he was working on that device.

But, things were progressing well. The refit was ahead of schedule and got further and further ahead of schedule every day, since everyone knew exactly what to do and did it well. The dropship had a much larger surface area than his skimmer, but this time, instead of applying the external layers by hand, they were using a machine, an automated molecular sprayer that coated the dropship in the exact thickness, right down to the _molecule_. That device was literally saving them _weeks_ of time. It looked like a three foot tall spider with six legs, and that was the name it had been given, the spider. They simply programmed it with desired thickness, loaded it with the material to spray, and let it go. It crawled over the ship on its own laying down a layer, it knew where it had already gone, and it avoided those areas it was programmed not to spray. It also checked its own work repeatedly, scanning the surface with an on-board metallurgical scanner to ensure proper purity and thickness. While the spider applied the outer coatings, teams installed the shield emitters, while other teams ran the cabling from the emitters to the ship's existing power and data networks. The software was Jason and Jyslin's job, for Jyslin was good at TEL, but not as good as Steve had been... but any help at all was greatly appreciated, for TEL wasn't Jason's strong suit. They already had a working CMS program module for the skimmer, so Jason and Jyslin put their head together and bent themselves about the task of porting it over to the dropship. The core of the program would remain unchanged, they'd just have to make some alterations based on the dropship's differing construction. There would be more emitters and more doors, as well as the rather tricky three-door layout of the back cargo doors, with the two vertical upper doors and the horizontal lower door, that lowered to become a ramp.

Days blurred into weeks, and weeks blurred into a month, as it got warmer and warmer outside as April faded into May, and the outside of the dropship took on its final appearance as the spider finished its final layer of Neutronium, which had been molecularly aligned so the dropship appeared gray, w