The
various survey teams gave the equivalent of a shrug when Genys reported what
the Defender had sensed and theorized out in space on the other side of
the planet. They focused on two things. Finding more caches of plates. Or finding
the now-dead nanites, to unravel the alien technology to determine if the
destruction of their civilization had been an idiotic accident, a result of
hubris, or inflicted on them by the planet Draxonis had been fighting. If the
images and impressions from the dracs were interpreted correctly.
A
new cache of plates found just that morning was generating excitement with
Maora's team. The drawings of plants and animals and theoretical genetic code
had been replaced by what might be a written language, along with diagrams of
machines. Hopefully that would include the nanites. More proof of Maora's
theory, that the Draxonans knew their impending doom, and the ceramic plates
were their effort to preserve their knowledge.
Among
the plates were more theorized genetic code and intricate, finely detailed
renderings of creatures that the life sciences team could only, with caution,
label dragons.
“Five
species,” Boran, chief xenobiologist reported two days later. With a tap on his
tablet, the file of his report appeared on the tablets of all the officers and
section heads in the conference room. “We’ve studied them every way we know how
and compared with the sketches Celeste and M’kar got from the dracs’ memories. Because
of the size differential, we can't determine if they are precursors of dracs,
if dracs came from them, or they are two different species. Dracs share
characteristics with all five species but are not direct copies of any one of
them.”
Asking the coastal dracs proved fruitless. They refused to have anything to do with anyone who went to Forbidden Island. They caught on that the pictures M’kar asked them about came from Forbidden Island, and refused to look. Barroo and the other dracs on the Defender spent a large portion of their time on the planet either giving their Humans sorrowful looks, or driving away the dracs who shrieked and scolded. The uninvited visitors from Draxonis had stopped popping onto the ship. The prohibition against Forbidden Island and what it contained was that strong.
When the teacher dracs on the Defender and the remnants of Granny's tribe on Draxonis were asked about Forbidden Island and the existence of the "big ones," they knew nothing. M'kar and Brea estimated they were all young adults and adolescents. Anyone who might have knowledge gathered from other drac tribes had gone with Granny when they stowed away aboard the Defender, and were now tending cocoons on Anwesta Medical Station. M'kar and Genys did not look forward to interrogating Granny about what she might know of Forbidden Island and the "big ones." On a positive note, they had been overseeing the study of Draxonis for nearly six decs now and might never leave.
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