“What do I need to learn?”

  “Honestly, everything,” Her sigh told me that she wasn’t looking forward to it either. “From basic biology to how our society works. Basic magic to basic combat.”

  I was confused as to why I needed to learn so much. “But I have military combat training already and if you give me a gun, I am sure I could fight without magic.”

  “Your military combat training will serve to hinder you, not help. A Kitsune’s body moves and reacts differently from a human body. Add in some enhancement magic or spells and the fighting style will completely change. Now, you can use a gun, but you still will need to learn magic. Also, our weapons are different than anything you have likely ever used.”

  Memories of marching up Olympus Mons, slogging through the methane swamps of Titan, and racing through a sulfur storm on Venus flashed through my mind. Each sent shivers down my spine. If her training riveled any of those situations, I may have to run away.

  Her hand reached over and squeezed mine. “Don’t worry, you have time to learn. But how about you start by telling me about humans and the training you went through.”

  So, I did just that. Talking for hours as I told her stories. At one point, our trays disappeared, though my cup never did. It also seemed to never run out either. She asked me questions ranging from how humans fought in wars to how the economy ran.

  If a future me ever looked back at the conversation they would think she was milking me for information so they could attack the human homes. I was just happy to be talking about something that I knew. Something from before I accepted some random terms and conditions without reading it.

  Finally, her questions ran out and I was talked out. We sat in silence as my mind wandered through memories of places I would likely never see again. She broke the silence first. “I think I should first tell you about how Kitsune and how we came to travel the stars, eventually learning about the system.”

  Her story captivated me as she told it. Not only because it was interesting, but because the ship projected images and videos in the air around us. Images and videos of the events or places showed the story as it unfolded.

  Long story short, the Kitsune had taken a long time to go from their planet to a sister planet in the system. Fighting amongst each other as each country built colonies and research outposts. An unprecedented flare hit the planet, taking down everything minus the mining outposts. Said mining outposts accepted as many refugees as they could handle. However, they could only do so for so long and they had no way to talk to anyone back home.

  Without any communication with the planet, every country rushed to send aid. Working together, on a scale never seen before, they built a massive ship. Of course, the ship they built was a mess, but it managed to bring enough help to support the colonies for a dozen years. That was enough time for the colonies to rebuild.

  The ship may have been a mess, but it led to some innovations. Innovations that they used to build ships that could reach other star systems. Within a century, numerous generation ships set out for the nearest systems.

  One such system was young binary system. The colony was built around mining and building. Mining the asteroids that were as abundant as they were easy to reach. As such, the economy of the system grew at an exponential rate. Ships constantly flowing out for various planets, companies and governments.

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  A nearby star went out. It didn’t explode nor did it get eaten by a blackhole. It vanished. Scientists turned every telescope on the system only to see a black cloud. This cloud undulated as they watched. After taking some readings, they realized it was flying directly for the nearest system, the binary system.

  Now they had a generation before the cloud would reach the system. A small fleet was dispatched to alter the clouds path by a small amount. Emergency recorders, automatically programmed to return to a nearby colony upon a ship’s destruction, told the story of the fleets demise.

  There were debates over evacuating the system or building up a fleet to take on this menace. Eventually they decided losing the colony was worth defending. Every factory in the system started to crank out ships as every colony and scientist turned to develop weapons and systems for this battle.

  One such system was the ability to pull power directly from space. This surprised me because humans had developed the power tap before leaving the system for Alpha Centauri. Such a massive spike of usage in the local power system caught the attention of the Local System AI.

  The AI, fearing such a massive buildup of forces without any cause it could find, sent a massive, mismatched fleet of ships to the system. To try to talk to them and kill them as the need arose. The standoff lasted for a couple of days as the Kitsune feared such a fleet showing up so suddenly.

  It was then that swarm attacked the two fleets. The System fleet having been too focused on the Kitsune fleet to notice them. The Kitsune fleet not willing to let the aliens know their capability.

  Both fleets sustained massive casualties in the fight. At the end, the Local System AI gave the Kitsune an offer to join the galactic community. Reluctantly, they accepted the offer. Their systems allowing them to build into an economic powerhouse.

  The timeline confused me though. She spoke as if this occurred over the course of nearly a millennia, but only mentioned a few generations. “How many years do Kitsune live?”

  “Um…how long is an Earth year?”

  “Twenty-four hours in a day and about three hundred sixty-five days in a year.”

  “So, one standard year is around…” she looked off to the side for a minute, consulting a calculator or the system about the numbers. “One and a half human years. Four hundred ninety-eight days specifically. Man, human days are either perfect, or not very accurate.”

  “Well, I know it is not exactly that many days or hours, but I don’t know the exact numbers. I never needed to know so even my AI doesn’t have the information.”

  She shrugged, “The oldest Kitsune in our records is around nine hundred eighteen so about fifteen hundred human years.” My eyes practically bugged out as my mouth opened in shock. “What?”

  “The oldest human lived to be two sixty and that was only because he was a suspended animation test subject. Also was the only survivor of those experiments.”

  “Wait, how old are you?”

  “I just turned thirty-two.”

  Kyla rubbed her forehead, “That means you’re not even legally an adult according to Kitsune traditions.”

  I frowned at that. “I am an adult according to my human upbringing.”

  “I know that, you know that, but the Kitsune government won’t see it that way. They will require that you go to school, even if it is only for a year.”

  “And how old are you?”

  “Fifty-nine.” She thought for a second. “Around eighty human years.” I just shook my head. “You don’t have to worry; the species change does grant you the life expectancy of a Kitsune. So, barring any accidents or injuries, you will likely live at least into your eight hundreds.”

  Kyla thought I was worried about my life span. Well, she was right, kind of. Only I wasn’t worried about how short I would live compared to her. I was worried that I would live long enough to see everyone I knew on Earth die. For their children and grandchildren to die. I struggled to hold back the tears that threatened to come out at that thought.

  “Oh, I didn’t mean to make you cry.” She said as I failed. Tears streamed down as I started to sob. My head was in my hands as I heard footsteps move around the table. Her hands pulling me into her as she hugged me.