FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

Xelzix led Jake down a hallway to what appeared to be an elevator. The doors of the elevator closed and Jake felt it sink downward into the floor of the ship and then begin to accelerate sideways around the inside of the huge cylinder of the ship. The elevators must run around on tracks under the floor so they could pop up at various points without their tracks or equipment intersecting any useful space. The elevator continued for a short while sideways around the curve of the cylinder then slowed to a stop. Then it began to accelerate again along the length of the cylinder for a time and came to a stop once more and then rose back up to floor level.

The doors opened and the two emerged into a wide open area that seemed almost like a mall. There were several of the crocodile-like people who were Srythryn's species milling about in shops on multiple levels and at one end was a large food court where many sat talking around tables. The air was indeed very warm and humid but not as much as Xelzix had implied it would be. Rather than smelling sterile and clean like the rest of the ship had, this place was a bit musty and had a light scent of sweat and hard work from many bodies crowded closely together. It was quite pleasant and earthy.

"This is the common area reserved for members of the crew. Their families are all in the living space beyond. The crew like to have a place where they can come at the end of the day and share some camaraderie before they go back to their families," Xelzix explained.

Jake looked around in wonder as he once again saw that the entire ring of this section of the cylinder was wide open like the shipping bay had been and all the way round the ring the same layout of shops, counters and tables and large sections with lush green plants and fountains and benches repeated many times over. As he looked up the sides and straight overhead he saw what looked like hundreds of crocs sitting at tables or milling around shops and sitting on benches in small parks up the sides and even upside down way at the top a mile or more up. It would take him some time to get used to the shape of the ship and the artificial gravity from the cylinder's spin forcing everyone out to the walls as though the whole thing were floor and there was simply no such thing as 'ceiling', at least in these open sections of the ship. It was strangely disconcerting to see large reflecting pools of water suspended upside down way up there. He couldn't look up at for too long before he would get a strange sense of vertigo like his body was starting to think he was the one who was upside down and was about to fall 'down' to where everyone else was. As soon as he looked back down and saw everyone else upright in relation to him the sensation would fade.

It looked as though there might be thousands of crocs occupying the space. Jake wondered what else made up the ship for the rest of its length. Srythryn had described it as being over a hundred miles long. If this was just a hangout for the crew he wondered how massive the living space would have to be to comfortably hold all of them and all of their families, not to mention the doctors and nurses and teachers and bakers and gardeners and so on and all of _their_families too. How would they handle the food situation for so many people? How do they deal with the waste? It was an entire city of crocs living in one giant ship. He wondered if he would ever be able to find his way around this place on his own.

Xelzix led Jake toward the nearest food court and before they'd quite reached it Jake heard a loud, booming voice yell, "Jake! At last! Welcome back to the land of the living!"

Jake looked over and saw a grinning Srythryn standing at a table near the center waving them over. It was easy to recognize him since to Jake it seemed like less than an hour since Srythryn had handed him off to Xelzix. Jake smiled and waved at the large crocodile. It was good to see a familiar face in the massive crowd. He hadn't recognized the voice at all. It was warm and masculine and resonant and it suited Srythryn perfectly, whereas the hand held translator the croc had been using when they'd first met had sounded generic and flat. The translator built into Jake's head must be much more sophisticated, or perhaps it was simply the fact that it was tied directly into his auditory system and was now giving him extremely hi-fidelity sound.

"I will take my leave now, Jake," Xelzix said, "Though I am somewhat outgoing and sociable compared to the rest of my secretive race, I can not handle Srythryn's people when they are at their leisure. They are truly boisterous as you will quickly find. I think you might enjoy them quite a bit if you give them the chance to grow on you. I will be seeing you more before we arrive at our destination. For now, I will leave you in Srythryn's good hands."

He then turned to head back towards the bank of elevators.

"Xelzix! Come back! Join us for a drink!" bellowed Srythryn, and then he laughed as he watched the small grey alien lean forward and increase his speed and duck into the nearest elevator without even looking back.

Jake headed over to the table where Srythryn was standing.

Srythryn was shaking his head as Jake arrived and said, "I've been trying to get that scrawny little man to join us for a bit of relaxation in the common room since he first came aboard a few hundred years ago. I swear by the Granth's dangly neck flaps I will someday succeed!"

A few crocs around them chuckled. Jake suddenly noticed that almost every crocodile in the area was now looking directly at him appraisingly. He was not used to being the center of attention and he began to feel uncomfortable under their stares.

Having spent most of his life in three piece business suits he was self conscious about his state of undress, but he realized that nearly everyone was dressed the same way, even Srythryn. They all wore only snug shorts made of a thin stretchy material that allowed their thick tails to protrude out the back and that was all. The shorts did not do much to hide the shape of their contents and most of the crocs had very large packages between their legs. Jake could clearly discern two large testicles and a thick looking penis in them. He looked down and noticed his own equipment was clearly outlined as well.

Jake scanned the crowd again. He couldn't say why, but he did not find it odd to be looking out over a massive group of crocodiles who were all looking back at him. For some reason he found them all very attractive. They looked natural and healthy and strong and capable. The males were all thickly built and powerful looking. They were almost a foot shorter than Jake on average. Most had some variation of rich, dark green or gray hue to their skin with a very pale light greenish gray color along their breasts. They all had somewhat rough and scaly looking dark, greyish-green rows of ridges on their backs running along their entire length from the tip of their thick tails right up to the top of their heads.

Some appeared to be female but they too only wore shorts and nothing else. They were much narrower of frame and appeared somewhat taller than the males though they still seemed fairly strongly built though not nearly as heavily muscled. Unlike the males they had no large bulges in their shorts. Instead, starting at the top of their chests and down their bellies they had two rows of multiple bumps with nipples on them. He presumed they must give birth to entire litters of babies to have so many. It looked odd for a crocodile to have nipples but he supposed it was no stranger than the males having what looked to be large testicles and penises hidden in their shorts. He was fairly certain that wasn't the norm for true crocodiles back on Earth. He though he remembered from some nature program that their sex organs were hidden inside their bodies. These were right where Jake felt they should be, in plain sight. These creatures must be some sort of cross between warm blooded mammals and cold blooded reptiles. It was obvious they suckled their young. Perhaps they even had live births instead of laying eggs.

Their heads seemed as though they might have started out looking just like a crocodile's long ago but had evolved to be upright tool users so the head sat at a right angle to the vertical spine and could easily look straight down at their hands. Their two eyes faced forward and had the vertical pupil and what looked to be an inner eyelid with a heavy lid over top the eye like many reptiles on Earth. The eyes were larger in proportion to the rest of their face and more expressive than Earth crocodiles too. There was something very sexy and appealing about their eyes that he couldn't quite place. It was almost as if they always had a playful, sly and inviting look to them.

Their face was primarily occupied by their long snout that was flat with rows of large teeth. The snout looked to be less than half as long as a crocodiles would be as though it had shortened as they evolved. Unlike crocodiles they actually had lips that covered the teeth most of the time except when they talked or showed them in a smile. The lips toward the front were thicker and fuller almost like a humans lips but wider and slightly narrower. He supposed that it would almost be necessary for intelligent creatures to evolve some sort of lips to aid in communication if not only through spoken language but expression as well. You would never be able to see emotion on a real crocodile back on Earth but with the lips and the facial muscles that accompanied them these were able to smile and could likely show all types of other emotions as well. Their nostrils were on top of the end of their snout facing slightly forward and looked to be able to pinch off completely. They had no ears but did have slight, barely perceptible bulges where their ear holes were and two ridges on the top of their heads, one behind each eye.

Their skin looked perfectly smooth and dry similar to a snake skin and had a nice scaled pattern that was difficult to discern at their backs where their color was darkest, but very easy to see and attractive around the sides and front where the lighter shades of green were. The skin was smooth over most of their bodies but was only slightly rough along their backs where the long rows of ridges were. They had muscular arms with strong looking hands with thick, stubby, clawed fingers and very muscular legs and long feet with short stubby toes that also had claws on the ends instead of toenails. They stood upright but had the benefit of a long thick tail that reached the ground and ran along it a foot or so to give them a stable, tripod-like stance almost like a miniature T-Rex. In fact, now that Jake thought of them that way, he wondered if instead they were descended from some sort of dinosaur. The ones on Earth were supposed to have been warm blooded. Maybe Srythryn's people were closer to those than crocodiles, but over all he primarily saw what looked like an anthropomorphized version of crocodiles staring back at him.

They were very athletic looking and somehow just seemed to exude confidence and even kindness as they all smiled at him.

Jake suddenly realized as he looked around that all conversation nearby had ceased and all of the crocs stared and grinned at Jake. He felt self conscious about not only being stared at, but being caught so obviously staring at all of them too. He'd even been staring blatantly at their private areas. He'd been looking them over and analyzing them as though they were animals in a zoo, yet really it was more like Jake was the zoo inhabitant and they were the visitors staring in at the weird creature.

"Stay and relax with us after your ordeal, Jake. I know it seems like only moments to you since we snatched you off your home world just in time for you to see its destruction, then being dragged back here by a bunch of aliens and killed by a complete stranger. For me it has been several months while I waited for your return. It's been far too long a time since we spoke and I have been anxious to see the results of Xelzix's talented efforts."

Srythryn appraised Jake's new muscular body up and down and front and back and even took one of his hands and lifted his arm up to look underneath.

"Look at you! You are truly stunning to behold! I knew I would be impressed but I had no idea quite how much. I've encountered thousands of races in my long life but none that looked anything like you. Your skin looks so supple and smooth! The tufts of hair under your arms and on your head look so soft! The light fur that decorates your body here and there is so appealing! Your race is truly possessed of a wonderful, natural beauty, Jake. It's a good thing we're out here in 'polite' company or I may not be able to resist laying my hands on you," Srythryn boomed and chuckled.

Jake blushed as he noticed most of the other crocs who'd been staring at him were now nodding and smiling their agreement. Some of their stares bore right into him. Many were dwelling on his crotch and some crocs at tables further back were even rising out of their chairs part way to look him over from head to toe with the look of hungry diners checking over a buffet. He was something they had never seen before and he would likely be the object of everyone's curiosity for quite some time. He was not prepared for this. He began to understand Xelzix's reticence toward joining them in the common area.

Jake leaned in closer to Srythryn and asked in a low voice, "Is there somewhere more private we could go? I hadn't considered what an oddity I would be to your people and how much I would stand out. I'm a bit embarrassed by all the stares."

Srythryn grinned, but instead of whispering his response, his voice got loud enough to carry even further over the crowd and he bellowed, "Please accept my apologies, Jake, I had not considered that you might be a shy wallflower like Xelzix!"

Jake cringed at the volume and tried to shrink down a little to be less visible.

Srythryn chuckled and turned to address everyone else in the vicinity, raised his arms and boomed even more loudly than before, "Look away you fools! Can't you see you're embarrassing our guest? You're staring at him with your tongues hanging out like a hungry batch of hatchlings getting ready to fight over their mother's last available teat!"

Many of the crocs laughed and someone at the back shouted, "It's time for a ribbing! Who's first?"

A male croc with a deep voice shouted, "I'll go first! I am no hatchling, and I doubt he has a teat worth suckling anyhow, but I would be more than happy to suck on what he keeps between those big legs!"

More crocs burst into laughter and Jake began to blush more furiously.

"That's enough of that, Slithris! You will not be sucking on any part of Jake that he does not present to you willingly! I might warn you that from what I managed to drag out of Xelzix, Jake is quite well endowed compared to the rest of us. You may have the most practiced mouth on the ship, but it will likely not be up to the task in this particular case!" yelled Srythryn to more laughter from the other crocs.

"The only way to find out for sure is if he will let me try! At least let him bring it out and show it to us all that we may bask in its grandeur!" shouted Slithris to more chuckling from the crowd.

"You are persistent aren't you, Slithris? I know well from personal experience that you are able to create a vacuum like no one else can, and if Jake ever needs his internal organs sucked out through his manhood I'm sure he will call on you. For now, if he prefers to keep his treat hidden from view that is his prerogative!"

More crocs laughed and chortled.

"Perhaps Jake could hide what he keeps between his legs by stuffing it into the gap I keep between_my_legs in order to protect it from Slithris' unwanted attention!" yelled a clearly female voice, "If he is as well endowed as you suggest then it may not quite fit right but he is more than welcome to pull it out and try to push it back in as hard as he likes and as often as it takes until it does! I believe I have the patience to allow him to work at it all night!"

Another round of laughter and hooting burst out among the crowd.

"By the Granth's braided back hair, no!" yelled Srythryn, "I hate to disappoint you Risthl, and all of the other ladies in the room as well, but Jake's tastes lean only toward the coarser sex as well they should. Only males will appeal to him. He is a man after my own heart, and with luck and if I play my cards right he may soon be after some of my other parts!"

Jake blushed more and the crowd laughed and then grinned at him. Something told him his interest in Srythryn was reciprocated. He wondered if he would have the courage to do anything about it some time.

"Suffice to say that the ladies are out of the running before the contest to win him over even begins!" Srythryn bellowed.

There was a rousing cheer among several of the males in the crowd and some boos from some of the females and more laughter all around and Jake blushed further, wishing he could simply vanish and reappear somewhere else entirely. He eyed the bank of elevators wondering if he should just rush off as Xelzix had done and disappear into one of those.

Srythryn noticed Jake's growing discomfort and decided to end the torture and direct the crowd's attention elsewhere, "In any case, Risthl, he'd likely get sucked right into that gaping maw you keep between your legs! We need all hands to prepare for the coming jump and we cannot spare the search party to go in after him! Speaking of which, where is your husband? I have not seen him for at least a week! Did he fall in and is still trying to find his way back out of there?"

The waves of laughter crashed over again and even Risthl chuckled while shaking her fist at Srythryn.

"I'm right here, Srythryn!" yelled another croc a few tables away who was presumably Risthl's husband, "I finally found my way back out yesterday! The good news is I found Slarslith in there too and managed to bring him out with me. We have our chief engineer back!"

There were loud cheers and more laughter but then they quickly began to die down as Risthl slowly stood up at her table and stared in seething anger at her husband.

An uncomfortable silence began to settle in and then Risthl said in a loud and menacing voice, "You will apologize, my dear husband, for that vulgar attempt at humor suggesting an unlikely capaciousness for my delicate love tunnel! I will have you know that there are many other eligible men besides you aboard this ship. In fact, you likely passed some of them on your way out with the engineer. As soon as our attorney finds his way out too I will be filing for divorce and marrying one of them instead!"

The room burst into roars and guffaws and some crocs nearly fell out of their chairs as the husband blew a kiss toward his now laughing wife who turned and raised her arms to the crowd in triumph accompanied by many cheers.

"All right, that's enough now! Risthl is the clear winner! Jake has likely been caught off guard by our banter. Let us give him some time to recover. As you were," Srythryn said loudly and then he turned to Jake and smiled and said, "We do like to rib each other when we relax, Jake, I am sorry if we've embarrassed you. You'll get used to us in time and learn to give as good as you get I'm sure."

Most of the other crocs had already returned to their conversations though some still grinned at Jake and some were still scanning over the length of his body with some intensity.

Jake himself had been laughing toward the end and had forgotten his own embarrassment already.

He sat down at the table with Srythryn and someone came over and dropped a large mug containing some sort of thick, orange colored carbonated cold drink in front of him. It looked sweet and refreshing. Jake smiled his thanks at the croc and then brought the mug up and sniffed. It smelled sort of like pineapple juice mixed with some type of citrus. He took a large gulp and was nearly bowled over by the level of alcohol-fueled fire that bloomed in his mouth and throat. Jake coughed and sputtered and Srythryn laughed and clapped him on the back.

"The drink is a bit strong for you I'd imagine," the big croc said, "We call it Blarp after the sound we make as we vomit our intestines out when we drink too much of it. It takes us the better part of our early manhood to learn to take it."

"I'll be fine, Srythryn, thanks," Jake sputtered as he took another smaller sip to show that he was man enough to handle the toxic brew.

He had to force himself not to cough it up again and he tried not to screw up his face too hard so as not to show how uncomfortable it really was for him as the powerful liquid burned its way down his throat, but his eyes had begun to water involuntarily and his face began to flush from the effort.

Srythryn laughed again and said, "You look as though you're trying to pass a twenty kilo krondar egg! Why don't you switch to Fizzlefrizz? It's a drink our children often enjoy."

Several crocs around chuckled and Jake rolled his eyes at the jab and took another swig. He didn't feel the sensation that had caused him to cough up the drink this time, but he was afraid that might be because it had eaten through the nerve endings in his esophagus already. He could feel warmth blooming in his belly and already he felt a pleasant light-headedness begin to warm his brain.

"I'm not sure if Xelzix warned you or not, but the nanos in your body will not protect you from death by alcohol poisoning or at best the pain of the worst hangover you could possibly imagine if you over do it, Jake. At least have something to eat so the Blarp will have something else to dissolve besides just your organs. Even the most seasoned of us would not risk drinking it on an empty stomach. Let me get you something," Srythryn said, and he got up and threaded through the tables toward a long counter at the back.

No sooner had Srythryn left than a huge and powerful looking croc who was clearly sporting a thick erection in his shorts stumbled over and fell into a chair at the table.

"Hullo, shweet Jake, I'm Thristtttd, I'm Thrisssslst..." the bleary-eyed croc hiccuped and shook his head and continued more slowly and deliberately, "My name iss Thriststris an f'you would allow me, I would very mush like to do my abasloot best to try to impreginatechoo. Imagine the booful clush of eggs we could make t'gether!"

The croc's breath was thick with the cloying sweet, fruity smell of Blarp.

Much to Jake's astonishment and amusement the translator in his head was actually adding a slurred sound to the speech it was generating to replace the croc's own hissing. The technology had done an amazing job of giving all the crocs their own unique voices even differentiating between males and females. It was perfectly modulating volume and flavoring their speech with anger or humor as appropriate during the ribbing earlier and now he found that it was even sophisticated enough to make Thriststris sound as drunk as he clearly was. He was amazed.

Before he could respond to the lewd suggestion, two more crocs came and smiled and winked at Jake and then each took one of Thriststris's arms and lifted him up out of the chair and dragged him off into the crowd while he protested that if they were really his friends they would not stand in the way of true love. A third crocodile stayed behind to apologize for his friend's forwardness.

"Please, do not mention this to Srythryn," the croc implored, "He warned everyone that you may not be prepared for our open sexuality and not to come on too strongly too soon so as not to upset you. To be honest, I personally feel it's simply a ruse to keep you all to himself. You do not look so delicate to me. In any case, I hope that you do not take offense to Thriststris's clumsy attempts to lure you into his bed. Try not to hold it against him. He is one of the most sought after males on the ship so it really is an honor to have him forget about all the rest and come after you."

The croc turned to leave then hesitated and turned back and said, "If by chance you did not take offense to his suggestion and actually found the prospect appealing, then please know that my name is Stisslyss and I am much more experienced in the art of attempting to impregnate other men than Thriststris and would be most happy to take his place until he sobers up. Or, if you prefer, I would just as soon have you try to make _me_swollen with eggs. I doubt we would succeed but I can't imagine anything I'd enjoy more than to try it with you."

The croc then grinned and turned away again to go and find his friends.

Jake chuckled as he watched the croc bumping into others and nearly tripping then apologizing as he kept glancing back over his shoulder at Jake while walking away as though hoping Jake would get up and follow him.

As Jake looked around the crowd again and still saw many crocs staring intently at him and winking whenever their eyes met, and some of them rubbed at their bulging crotches while smiling straight at him, it began to truly sink in that he was not being made fun of here. They really did desire him this much. He could right at this moment choose a partner and they would happily lead him off for a fun night of frolic in their bed. He was flattered and excited by it. He began to wonder if the croc earlier was right and Srythryn had told everyone not to come on to Jake just as a ruse to ensure he would get the first crack at Jake. He found himself hoping it was true.

He'd been attracted to Srythryn since he first saw him come out of the hatch of the shuttle back on Earth. There was something about the masculine confidence, the strength and grace, and now the obvious sense of humor and over all kindness that was powerfully attracting Jake to the large crocodilian. He suspected there might also be some subconscious feeling of Srythryn being his savior since he risked his own ship to pull Jake off of the planet just as it was about to be destroyed. In a sense it felt to Jake that it was Srythryn that was responsible for saving the sixty eight year old dying man and turning him into a healthy twenty year old with a new lease on life. In the end it didn't really matter to him exactly why he was attracted to Srythryn but he was, and he intended to do something about it as soon as it seemed appropriate.

Srythryn returned with a large platter of some sort of roasted fowl surrounded by a pile of vegetables that smelled incredibly inviting. Jake hadn't realized quite how hungry he was and he immediately dived at the platter and began to devour everything on it. Srythryn looked on with astonishment as the food steadily disappeared from the plate. He didn't say a word so as not to interrupt Jake's momentum until the food was almost gone.

"That was a dinner for two under normal circumstances, Jake. You must be hungrier than I thought," he laughed, "Let me go and get you another."

The croc moved to get up but Jake quickly put his hand on Srythryn's arm to stop him and said, "No! You don't need to go. Stay right here. It's plenty, thank you."

Srythryn looked at him suspiciously and then looked around the room.

"Did something happen while I went for the food? Did someone do something to upset you?"

It wasn't Jake's intention to get anyone in trouble. He just didn't want anyone else swooping in on him when the object of his interest was sitting right here at the table with him.

"No, not at all. Your people seem absolutely terrific, Srythryn. I think I'm really going to enjoy my time here," Jake said.

Srythryn's face split into a wide grin.

"I am truly glad to hear you say that, Jake, as we may have many opportunities to spend a great deal of time together. Xelzix and a very large contingent of his people live and operate out of my ship. They are the source of much of the funding that supports its operation and also in return for allowing them to use it as a mobile resurrection site all of the crew carry contracts for the insurance of return. Since Xelzix is assigned to your contract, each and every time you die and are reinstalled you will find yourself back on this ship and we will be spending a great deal of time together while we take you back to where you need to be. That is why I told you before that I hope you will learn to live a life of adventure and take many risks. It would mean I could spend a great deal more time with you."

Jake smiled and nodded and turned back to polish off the last of the food. When he'd finished it he washed it down with a few more careful sips of the Blarp. He didn't want to get as drunk as Thriststris but he did want to loosen himself up a bit so that he might have the courage to ask Srythryn if he wanted to get more intimate and explore each other. He'd already decided that he was not going to waste any time and he would begin his life of adventure right here and now. He would not allow himself to be too afraid to try new things with new people. He would do his best not to have any regrets the next time his life came to an end, no matter how many times it came to an end. One by one he planned on taking things from the huge mountain of regrets from his former life on the one side of the scale and move them over to the side of accomplishments until there was not a single regret left. He had all the time in the universe now but he intended to use each moment like it might be his last.

While he waited for the drink to have its effect he asked, "How much time do we have, Srythryn? How much longer will it be until I get dropped off at my destination?"

"It will be just over two more months," Srythryn replied.

"I'm glad to hear it, but why so long? We've already been traveling for over three months while I've been going through the process, right? In our science fiction movies back on Earth the ship would usually stretch and snap into a flash of light and then you'd be at your destination," Jake chuckled.

"That is not completely inaccurate as it happens, but it describes only one part of the journey. This ship is equipped with a warp generator and a wormhole initiator. The wormhole allows us to travel instantaneously between two parts of space by traveling, in a sense, outside of space. Outside of space we can ignore the laws of physics and can appear to travel much faster than the speed of light. Instantaneously in fact. However, the wormhole we are able to generate is vanishingly short compared to the distances we need to travel. In a sense, it would only allow us to instantaneously travel several miles or so at great cost of energy, which by itself is a completely useless function. That is where the warp generator comes in. It can literally generate a bend in space outward from the generator along one of the three dimensions. This would normally serve no purpose since it does not actually bring anything closer to the ship in the normal sense. All it really does is reduce the distance of non space, the area outside of space, that exists between the two locations in true space. The bend in space is imperceptible from within and does not disturb anything. Traveling around a bend in space would seem like simply traveling in a straight line and it would still be the same distance."

"I don't follow. How can it be curved and straight at the same time, and why bend it if it doesn't really bring anything closer?" Jake asked.

"Think of it like traveling down a long straight ribbon. You are at one end and you need to travel all the way to the other but it would take you a lifetime to cover the distance. If you could cause the ribbon to bend severely enough, the ribbon would loop over on itself and the two ends would come together like a ring. They could not occupy the same space or even touch each other as that is physically impossible but they would come very close in the sense that the non space between them would be shortened to the point of being almost gone. Because they are not in the same space then you would still have to travel the full length of the ribbon around the curve to finally arrive at the other end and it would seem to you precisely as though you were traveling along a straight ribbon. However, if you could somehow travel through the very short non space outside of normal space that exists between the two ends when they've been brought close together, then you would only have a very short way to go. This is where the wormhole becomes useful. Once the other end comes into range we initiate the short wormhole and jump across the gap of non space between the two ends of the ribbon. The warp generator is then deactivated and the ribbon straightens back out. We find ourselves at the other end of the ribbon almost instantaneously. If you could watch that process from outside the ship, which is completely impossible since it would require information to travel faster than light, breaking the laws of relativity, I could easily imagine it looking like the ship stretched and snapped into a flash of light and then simply emerged at its new location."

"Amazing, but that doesn't explain why it would take so long," Jake said.

"It is due to some quirks of the technology involved that I myself don't fully understand. The warp field can be generated anywhere, but there is a limitation to the initiation of the wormhole due to some issues with the differences of charge of the two ends of the hole. Suffice to say that very bad things can happen if there are too many charged particles in the area of space that we wish to open with a wormhole. The charge of the area we jump from must be very close to the charge of the area we jump to. In order to mitigate this problem we must travel outside of the heliosphere of any star that might be in the vicinity into neutrally charged interstellar space. That means basically traveling past the outer edge of a star system well beyond its outermost planets. We need to travel away from the star past a point known as the heliopause, where the gamma rays and charged particles streaming out of the star that make up its solar wind comes essentially to a stop. The area beyond the pause is nearly neutral in charge to any other area that is outside of the heliosphere of the target star where we will arrive. It is essentially interstellar space.

"The only method of travel available to us for that part of the trip to clear the heliosphere involves mundane propulsion. In our case we use a version of plasma drive powered by a matter and antimatter annihilation in a controlled reaction. We can accelerate constantly and build up to incredible speed but we are still shackled by the laws of relativity and the closer we come to the speed of light the greater our mass and the more energy we would need to go any faster. The more energy we dump into accelerating to a faster speed, the more we raise our mass yet again causing us to need even more energy to go any faster. The amount of energy we consume to go faster goes up exponentially. We could never possibly achieve the speed of light which itself is vastly slower than we would like to travel anyhow.

"Still, we can at least get across the radius of a heliosphere in a reasonable amount of time. Your scientists launched a space probe long ago called Voyager 1 that has been traveling at roughly seventeen kilometers per second and has only just passed the heliopause and become the first of your man made objects to truly pass into interstellar space. It has taken the probe thirty five years to do so. Our massive ship accomplished it in just over three months while you slept. In approximately three more days we will power up the warp field and bend the space such that we bring our destination into range of our wormhole initiator at which point we will generate the hole and jump across the gap to a point just outside of the heliosphere of the star around which your match's planet revolves. The star is smaller and dimmer than your own and so its heliosphere is also smaller. It will take us just under two months to travel inward using plasma propulsion to reach the planet and drop you off."

"I see. So part of the trip is old fashioned travel and that's what slows it down. Still, it's astounding that you can jump across a galaxy in an instant once you're out of range of the solar winds. Can you go between galaxies just as fast?"

"No, but sort of yes. In fact, we are unable to travel across a galaxy with one jump let alone from one galaxy to another. There is a limit to how much of a warp we can generate. The limit varies with the size and power of the warp generator, and thus the size of the ship. A ship of this size can jump the equivalent of around a thousand light years at once but to do so would consume most of our available energy and it would take a great while to recharge after that big of a jump as the antimatter used to power the devices must be generated from our stored fuel in advance of any jump. Our destination to drop you off happens to be much closer than a thousand light years so it will take only one low energy jump to get there. The Milky Way galaxy, however, is over one hundred and twenty thousand light years across so in fact this ship would have to perform at least one hundred and twenty jumps to get all the way across it. Each of those jumps would be at maximum distance and would require a space warp that would take days to generate, and then it would take weeks to recharge and prepare for the next jump. It would be a long and grueling trip indeed that would take at least a decade.

"The distance between your galaxy and the next nearest is a million times larger than its width so it would take well over a hundred million jumps to get there. It would take over 10 million years at best speed to do it. Clearly that would not be feasible for routine travel. Even the ten years to get across an average galaxy would be too long. The First Ones solved this problem to some degree by building worm gates at several locations around the perimeter and inside of most galaxies. These are massive devices that form permanent wormhole links between vast distances in space. As I said before we are only able to generate wormholes that are extremely short. However, the holes can be bound to these large gate-like devices in a persistent and stable connection. The massive gates are built some distance apart in space. A warp is generated between the two gates to shrink the non space between them until it is very short. Then a wormhole is initiated between the two and stabilized and the warp generator is turned off. The gates remain apart in space but are now permanently linked by a wormhole that ignores the distance in normal space. That means you can then take one gate and move it an unimaginably long distance away from the first one, yet you could then turn and enter the gate and instantly pop out the other one. The gate is itself a large ship with its own warp generator and wormhole initiator and can actually jump to a maximum distance of a couple of thousand light years. It doesn't really matter that it might take tens of millions of years to take it out to the next nearest galaxy because supplies, fuel, and shifts of crews can be sent through the first gate to relieve the others who jump through the second gate back to the first to rest and be with their families. As such the second gate can be driven vast distances from the first quite easily. It just takes time.

"Linked gates can be used to go both ways but one gate links to only one other location. Several gates are linked from opposite ends of most galaxies as well as several locations within them which makes travel much more efficient. We only need to travel to the nearest gate and leap across the galaxy to its linked partner at the other end. Most galaxies contain over a million gates so that a trip from any part of the galaxy to any other will require at most no more than a few generated jumps plus one or two gate transitions. Assuming you are traveling out of only one heliosphere and into one other you can take a trip from anywhere in the galaxy to anywhere else and it will take you well under a year.

"There is also a vast network of gates that links all of the galaxies in the explored universe. Travel between the galaxies makes use of hubs that are clusters of gates located out between galaxies. Travel from one galaxy to another involves traveling to a hub gate in the galaxy you're in which teleports you to the hub, and then going through the appropriate gate in the hub to arrive at the destination galaxy. It takes many millions of years to bring a gate across the gap between galaxies, but the First Ones have been at it for billions of years so they have covered a lot of ground. The time it takes for that initial trip between galaxies is what is limiting the speed at which they are able to explore the known universe and make it accessible to everyone. It is not known at this time whether they are already on their way to creating the first link between this supercluster and the next but for the time being there is no known link in place. Most suspect it was started very long ago but just how long it might take to complete is anyone's guess. The First Ones are secretive about it and have not volunteered the information. It would likely take over a billion years to make the first journey and drag the gate out to the next closest supercluster, but it would then be open to exploration by instantaneous jumps across the gap and we could quickly begin to spread into the new supercluster."

Jake could feel his head beginning to spin slightly. He wasn't sure if it was all of the information Srythryn was spewing at him or just the Blarp starting to catch up to him.

He decided it was time to take his first chance in his new body to experience something he'd never tried before. It felt odd to him that his first shot at sex would be with an alien, but it somehow did not feel wrong. He was excited by the idea.

"This is all fascinating, Srythryn, but I wonder if I might turn in now? To me it still sort of feels like the same day that you picked me up on Earth and it's been a long one. I wonder if I could impose myself upon you and come with you to your home and stay there?"

Srythryn grinned widely and said, "You honor me! I had planned to install you in your own place but if you wish to stay with me I would be delighted!"

"I could have my own place later on maybe, but for now I would very much like to stay with you. We've only just met but still you are the only one here that feels familiar to me and I would be more comfortable with you than by myself. Thank you," Jake said.

Srythryn smiled and quickly stood and led Jake to the back wall of the common area and they got into an elevator there. The elevator once again dropped down into the floor of the ship and after some whisking around the curve of the cylinder it began to accelerate further back along its length. The acceleration lasted a long while so they must have built up a terrific speed but the ride was incredibly smooth. It must use some type of maglev technology.

As they whisked along Jake and Srythryn grinned at each other, but said nothing. Jake suspected they both knew what was about to happen and he was extremely excited.

In just a short time from now, he was going to be having sex with a crocodile.