Three Colonial Ships, filled to the brim with minerals and resources, followed a more majestically designed and built ship carrying Lord Gravax, Grim, and one of the Blood Mutants, Cherry Underwood.
Together, this lot was assigned to visit the Cyclitharans’ home planet to strike deals on alliances towards the Ethisian versus Granian War. Having managed to bargain a small deal with them, Lord Gravax had presented his idea to the Granian Council Members, Tribal Leaders, and Lord Grania himself who, at first, was impressed by how the Granian was able to convince a strong species into joining them in War.
However, the former Lord, Grim, had asked a series of questions that had opened up some concerns that were now shared with the rest of the higher-ups. Thanks to him, Gravax, himself, and a Blood Mutant were now on their way to the "soon-to-be" allies hoping to get something good from them.
"I know they only assigned us but why did you have to bring a Blood Mutant?" Grim and Gravax, currently in the majestically designed ship leading the convoy, conversed amongst each other while Cherry remained in a small room made for her.
"She’s our backup in case the Cyclitharans refuse to heed to our negotiations." Gravax grinned.
"Then if that’s the case," Grim continued to ask, "Shouldn’t we have brought Ace? He’s the strongest of them all so his presence would be more useful to us than with her."
"Exactly my point," Gravax answered. "I don’t want this notion that only the red-haired male is strong enough. The others have potential that we’re all reluctantly sitting on. For goodness sake, she can create clones in her likeness unlike the brother, the golden one can make lightning, and the other woman can scream flesh off bones. They each need to be given their own time to focus and grow.
"Ace has the system to thank for his strength so I’m taking it upon myself to help these ones grow stronger. Why should we only rely on one yet we have three others that, if given enough time and training, can become as strong or even stronger?"
As the two continued conversing with each other, Cherry remained in her room with one other Granian assigned to keep her company. Lily, the shapeshifting Granian, sat awkwardly in one of the room’s four corners while Cherry remained still on her bed. The Granian was the equivalent of a tour guide/companion since she and Chris knew much more about Human culture and Akrina than most of the other Granians. This gave her the opportunity to make the Humans feel more comfortable and also answer any of their questions concerning Granian or Akrinian culture.
While the Granian remained still in awkward silence, the Blood Knight, creating small tchotchkes to keep herself entertained, occasionally glanced at said Granian who, nervously, made sure not to give the Human any weird looks.
"You’re scared," Cherry spoke and Lily jerked up a little, almost as if to refute that claim.
"No, I’m not," she lied. "What ma..."
"Your heartbeat’s uneven," Cherry answered and then looked at the Granian again who, according to her orders, was currently in her Human form. "I can hear how uneven it is."
Lily took a breath and sat up saying, "Well, has it occurred to you that Humans and Granians have different heartbeat rates?"
Instead of answering Lily’s question, Cherry sat up and looked at her with a weird twinge in her eyes which started to glow red. Seeing this reminded the Granian of the Blood Knight’s brother who also had the same feature.
Cherry quickly raised her hand and laughed as soon as she watched Lily flinch in fear of losing her life.
"You’re on edge. Why’s that?" she asked and then got back to what she was doing prior to the conversation. "Do you have some phobia for us Humans? Or Blood Mutants?"
"No," Lily answered while staring at the floor. "I...I’m scared for my life, that’s all."
Reminiscing for a moment, Lily began to explain her weird and sort of rational fear she had towards the Humans saying, "I wasn’t very kind to your brother and his red-haired friend when on Earth. I was told to act like a Human and the one whose likeness I copied wasn’t of the best character so I adopted it and mistreated him."
"Oh," she wondered, "so now that he’s a powerful being that can kill you with a flick of his wrist, you’re scared he’ll enact his revenge, right?"
Lily didn’t answer but that was enough for the Blood Knight to catch on. Instead of making the conversation more awkward and intense than it already was, Cherry shifted it somewhere else, a topic that would make their condition worse than it already was.
"Has it occurred to you and Chris that your Human forms are a little bit...outdated?" Cherry asked and the Granian looked confused. Examining herself, Lily failed to spot what the Human had meant. "The rest of us are considered adults back on Earth. You and Chris still look like high school freshmen. Can’t you switch a little?"
"Unless I copy the likeness of another who is older, I can’t," Lily answered. "Why do you care?’’
"Is there anything else I have to do on this long trip?" Cherry answered the question with her own. "Go find something else to do, Granian. And change back to your lizard form...before I do to you what Ace should have done." ɪꜰ ʏᴏᴜ ᴡᴀɴᴛ ᴛᴏ ʀᴇᴀᴅ ᴍᴏʀᴇ ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀs, ᴘʟᴇᴀsᴇ ᴠɪsɪᴛ 𝙣𝙤𝙫𝙚𝙡⁂𝙛𝙞𝙧𝙚⁂𝙣𝙚𝙩
At those words, Lily got up and sprinted out of Cherry’s room, leaving the Blood Knight alone with a maniacal smile etched on her face. However, that smile slowly turned to a blank, facial expression with a bit of anger added to it.
It was mentioned earlier that Cherry’s eyes glowed as red as her brother’s; not because of Eneraflux, nor because of whatever Blood Energy manipulating trick she was taught but because of something much more intense, something that was done to her against her own will.
Not too long ago, precisely after the raid on the dwarf planet, Cherry and Ace had a conversation concerning her ranking up. The Blood Knight had already made it clear several times how she didn’t want to become a Blood Bishop, nor did she want her brother to make her one.
However, since she was slightly weaker than Ace, who, at the time of doing so had "her best interests at her", Cherry was coerced into being ranked up, but not from a Blood Knight to a Blood Bishop but rather something, which in her eyes, was a better substitute and at the same time worse.