Jenora is gone from the station the next time Zephyr checks, but sitting at his communications station is a message from her. Visual shows a small room, which could be any one of many inside the station, and Jenora herself, sitting there smiling.
Jenora says, "Hi. Sorry I missed you; I tried to get in touch with you before I went back downside, but I figure you were probably off hunting again. So I'll just leave this."
Jenora says, "Not a lot to say on the personal front; it was good to meet you, and I hope to see you again, hopefully once things have calmed down a bit. I'll be mostly down on the surface for another several days until Andromeda is recovered enough that we can bring her back on board here and let her go back to work without seriously hurting herself."
Jenora says, "I do have a little gift for you, however." She leans forward to press a button, and the visual changes to a 3d navigational map of the area. "While I was out searching around, I found an asteroid with some fairly good iridium deposits on it." A spot on the map lights up, and the image zooms in on the spot and the station. As it gets closer, co-ordinates and a velocity vector appear on the plot.
"It was an Icarus, or a sun-toucher... one that gets in quite close to the sun on its way around. Most of the ice and lighter materials have been blasted off already. All I had to do was give its course a little nudge to send it towards the station." Another line appears, tracing out the projected orbits of both the asteroid and the mining station to the point where they intersect. "It should arrive in a day and a half. If you talk to Ceres, it should be easy enough to arrange a towship to bring it back in to the station itself so it can be smelted down."
The image switches back to Jenora, grinning a bit. "Hopefully you can make good use of the material. I'll see you later, and maybe help you put things together if you haven't finished already. 'Bye for now." And she reaches over and shuts off the transmission.
Zephyr settles back in his cabin's desk seat and thinks. o O {A whole asteroid? But how'd she find it that quickly? Didn't even know she had a ship here, and...asteroid prospecting takes time?} Puzzled, he pads down the stairs to the main deck, and once on the Eidolon's bridge, keys up a full sensor sweep of the asteroid at Jenora's given coordinates.
The asteroid is basically as described, with a lump of concentrated iridium in the center. It seems to be glowing as if it's still hot.
Charon looks over Zephyr's shoulder, sort of, since he's hanging from a ceiling fixture.
Zephyr's ears flick as the first results are displayed. "Can't be right. That _can't_ happen naturally." He directs all of the ship's sensors at the mass of rock and metal, brings up a rotating three-dimemsional hologram of it, then...just sits back and stares. "It is. Solid, in the center. Like it was cast that way..." He shakes his head, wondering, then starts to turn to stand up...and catches a bit of motion from above out of the corner of his eye. Ducking into a crouch and rolling off the seat, he stares up at the intruder...then relaxes. "You?! How'd you get in here?"
Charon chirps, "Through the door."
Zephyr rolls his eyes. "I know _that_, I mean the ship's supposed to tell me when a lifeform comes on board." He tilts his head. "That is what you are, right?"
Charon blinks. "That depends."
"Is your ship alive?" the little dragon asks.
Zephyr says, "Depends on?" He blinks. "Alive? Well, she's got a mind of her own sometimes, but not in organic terms, no. She's got an AI-enabled FTL processor core that might make her seem that way sometimes, is all." catches sight of his hologram again. "Um..By the way, you've been..flying? around the station all this time. Do you know where I might be able to find Ceres?" "
Charon nods, "Yes. Do you want to find her?"
Zephyr rolls his eyes and grins. o O {This is _like_ talking to an AI.} "That's the idea, yes. Also..." He thinks, then turns and points to the hologram. "What do you think of this asteroid? How could that get to be that way?"
Zephyr eyes the little dragon as he listens. o O {Still can't figure out whether it's alive or just really, really good biotech. I haven't seen much of that sort of thing...}
"Jenora set it spinning on its long axis and then melted it evenly. Then she stopped the spin so there would be no centripetal forces to prevent metals from settling in layers by their density," the dragon says.
Zephyr blinks! "But...How'd she do that? You'd need at least a dozen ships with tractor beams and the laser power of a battleship to put out that kind of energy?"
Zephyr shakes his head. "She must have one heck of a tractor beam. My projectors would go past burnout in a second if I tried to stop a spin of that much mass. Didn't even know she had a ship..."
Charon blinks, "I don't know about that. She did it all herself, I was watching."
Zephyr's ears perk. "You were? What kind of ship did she have that could do that? I didn't see anything but Chirr'T'Thar ships docked here last night?"
Charon blinks in confusion again. "She did it herself."
Zephyr rolls his eyes again. "You said that. I'm just curious...Did she have a ship this size, larger? A mining vessel? Can you at least tell me what kind of power or tractor projector she used? I might be able to upgrade mine?"
Charon frowns, "You already asked that. She did it herself."
The dragon looks at the projection screen. "Can you see the moon from here?"
Zephyr shakes his head in frustration, then looks up and perks his ears. "Rr? Oh...sure." He turns to tab on the panels' lighted black surfaces, quickly bringing up views of the moon complete with dimensional grids. "Like that?"
Charon drops down into Zephyr's lap. "Point it at the side facing the mining station."
Zephyr brushes his fingerpads over a control surface. The view rotates to show the change. "What's there?"
Charon watches the scrolling moonscape, then says, "Stop there," and points a claw into the projection. There are two very odd looking craters there..
Zephyr pauses the display, then zooms into a closeup of the crater. He brings the same view up on other screens, in other spectrums. "What is it?"
Charon twists his neck until his head is nearly upside down. "See the claws and toes? They're Jenora's footprints."
Zephyr blinks...Then rotates the image and flattens it out. "That does look like..." He looks down at the little dragon. "What, she carved those? She's a sculptor, too?"
Charon scrolls the display some more, until a bigger imprint can be seen. It looks like a giant laid down in the dust.
"Carved?" Charon blinks again.
Zephyr nods. "Rich or something? Must be, to afford to do work like this... Not bad, though. Looks like someone stepped...and was lying right there." He grins. "I'm glad you told me who did it. I might have thought there were aliens that large around if I found it myself."
The little dragon just stares at Zephyr.
Zephyr looks back puzzledly. "What?" He takes a moment to busy himself with downloading the asteroid data onto a storage crystal chip. "What're you staring at me for?"
"Jenora made the shapes. She prepared the asteroid," the dragon explains.
Zephyr nods and chuckles. "I believe you. So she's got one heck of a mining ship and is a decent artist. And I'm grateful to her about that asteroid, too bad she didn't leave a forwarding address." He smiles. "And as soon as I find out from someone who made a tractor system that good, I think I'll be buying one."
Charon stares just a bit longer, then asks, "Why do you want to find Ceres?"
Zephyr holds up the data crystal. "Jenora said to ask her about reeling in that asteroid. I need that metal to fix the ship. Can you show me where to find her?"
Charon nods, "She's easy to find."
Zephyr smiles. "Good. Let's go, then? I'll just grab a holoprojector on the way out, need to show which rock I want." He pauses, and thinks..."Is there anything she likes, any luxury good or anything? I don't ask favors without a gift, and I've got plenty of stuff back in the hold..."
Charon shrugs with his wings. "She likes to play."
Zephyr mmfs. "That's helpful." He shrugs. "Well, if she likes to play, I can play." He gets up slowly to allow the little dragon to lift off his lap, then prepares to follow it. "Play what, though? Stalk-and-pounce, sports, what?"
Charon flies down the neck of the ship, and calls back, "All sorts of games."
Zephyr sighs and rolls his eyes. o O {Can he be any more vague?} He pauses in the neck corridor to grab a small holoprojector and data transfer unit from one of the compartments, then runs after the dragon. A minute to return to his cabin for a neat, tooled-leather pouchbelt with a more formal light ornamental baldric, all the clothes he needs to wear for a normal outing, and he's off to follow Charon and find Ceres.
Charon waits just inside the station's airlock. "Ready?"
Zephyr nods and pads after the tiny dragon. "Lead the way..."
Charon nods, and flits up to the intercom panel. Pressing down the 'collision alert' button, he yells, "Where are you Ceres?" into the pickup.
Zephyr yelps! and jumps at the warning horn. "What'd you do?! That's an alert panel!"
Station wide alarms go off, bulkheads slide closed and a lot of frenzied Chirr'T'Thar bounce around.
Charon smiles, "It's how they talk to each other, I've seen them do it. I never heard the horns before though."
Libra's voice suddenly comes over the intercom by Charon, shouting, "Why did you push the alarm? Nothing is on station sensors!"
Charon turns back to the intercom, "Zephyr wants to talk to Ceres, do you know where she is?"
Zephyr leaps to the panel and slaps the 'cancel', then tries to explain. "This little dragon thing hit the alert, sorry..." He glares at Charon. "That's _not_ the right button. You hit the one for a collision alarm. Good going."
Charon smiles proudly at the encouragement.
Libra growls, "You hit the collision alert warning? By the First Mother's haunch dimples, STAY AWAY FROM THE CONTROLS CHARON!"
Charon blinks, and pouts. "Okay, Libra."
Libra's voice growls to the station, "It's Charon again. Ok, what did you want Charon?"
Zephyr slaps a paw over his eyes and takes a deep breath. "That one....you only push when something's about to hit the station. It's to warn of danger. _Not_ to talk to people!" His ears flatten at the shouting, then he turns to the panel. "I made the mistake of asking him if he could find Ceres. I'm looking for her. He..um..hit the button."
After a few seconds, Libra, a bit calmer purrs, "She's in the main arboretum on break. Signing off."
Zephyr thinks o O {Great way to make a good impression before a favor...}
Charon says, "I told you she was easy to find."
Zephyr takes another deep breath and counts to ten in several different languages. "Thank you, control. Sorry about that." He tenses, and his claws flex involuntarily. "That's...not what I meant." He gives Charon a look, then sighs and pads towards the arboretum. "Come on...You know more about the asteroids than I do. Just...don't touch any more panels, okay?"
Charon follows along quietly.
The little dragon can't help but wonder why the Chirr'T'Thar use so many machines. It seems they're always complaining about them when they don't work, and the one time one of them DOES work, they still complain about it..
Zephyr, not wanting the little dragon to feel bad, gives him a friendly midair scritch as he enters the arboretum...then goes about sniffing to try to track Ceres before she pounces him again.
The arboretum is being used a great deal more lately, so more scents waft on the air. Ceres can not be seen, but the sound of paws digging sand can be heard for a few seconds, then some rustling of leaves in an alcove.
Zephyr, not finding a specific scent he can track, listens, ears swiveling, and tracks motion. Hearing the digging and rustling, he pads closer to the alcove, trying to peek without being noticed...in case it's something he doesn't want to be invading on.
Charon perches on a tree branch, and wonders why the star fox doesn't just call out.
Ceres kicks dirt with her hind legs behind her and then pads out, about to bump into Zephyr without noticing him.
Zephyr grins, not having been pounced this time. His tail waves. "Ceres! Hello there...I've been looking for you."
Ceres, wonder of wonders, looks slightly embarrassed for a minute, till she realizes Zephyr just showed up. She grins and headrubs, "For me? Really? And I'm off duty too!"
Charon waves to Ceres from the tree.
Zephyr splays his ears and returns the headrub, having learned it to be a seemingly standard greeting. "Libra said you were...I don't want to take too much of your off-duty time, then, but..." He pauses, and his ears blush a little. "
Charon blinks, "Why are you both blushing?"
Zephyr looks slightly embarrassed. "I hate asking favors...But Jenora said you might be able to help me with something?"
Ceres just smiles in a very obviously predatory manner. And it's clear she's not hunting food.
Ceres tilts her head at Zephyr, waiting.
Zephyr blinks and looks up at Charon. "I am? Um..." He looks back at Ceres, ears swiveling a little at her look. Missing vulpine cues, he doesn't know exactly how to interpret it. His ears just blush more as he begins again. "Well, it seems you might be able to help me fix something that burned out a while back, that needs something hard that can take a lot of heat."
Ceres ohs and nods, "You mean something like an iridium/osmium alloy, maybe lined with a polymerized ceramic?"
Zephyr nods! and blinks. "Jenora told you already? Or someone did?" He smiles. "Anyway...there's an asteroid near here with a core of almost pure iridium. Jenora suggested that you...might be able to help be bring it in?"
Ceres shakes her head, "No, we use that sort of thing for plasma conduits all the time. Sure I can help you bring it in, if you'll let us use any left over ore in return for hauling it in." She looks rather disappointed that this is ALL Zephyr wanted.
Zephyr nods and smiles warmly. "Thank you. It's what I need to repair my ship..." He tilts his head. "It's just that I feel funny asking for favors without offering anything in return...Charon didn't know of anything you liked, other than you liked to play games?" He grins. "I was into athletics in the past, and am pretty adamant about keeping in shape...if your sports aren't all geared for quadrupeds, and I wouldn't be too far outside the rules, I'd be glad to play some?"
Ceres smiles widely and purrrrrs, "Did Charon tell you what type of games I enjoy? ;)"
"Fun ones?" Charon suggests.
Zephyr glances up at the little dragon and chuckles. "No, Charon can be a little...vague at times. Are the rules that strict as far as species, or no?"
Ceres chuckles at Zephyr and nods, "He sure can. Well, I'm not sure if my mates are going to be around tonight or not, but if so, we can make arrangements. I was curious, there are no females or males of your kind. I was afraid maybe you were one of those races that only mates for reproduction. C'mon, lets go warm up the tow ship and talk on the way." at which she bounces out the hatch, obviously excited at the prospect.
Charon asks Zephyr, "Can I come along?"
Zephyr says, "No, we also...wait...mates?" He pauses, ears swiveling, then pads quickly after Ceres. He looks entirely and completely mystified. "What? What does mating have to do with...Ceres?" He stops only to look back at Charon. "I'm not sure at this point...", then he chases off towards the towship and Ceres again. "Ceres? Wait! What does mating...." "
Charon flies after the flustered fleeing fox.
As the confused fox chases after Ceres, he's just in time to see her behind and tail disappear into one of the airlocks, as she moves towards the command deck, getting ready to power the systems up.
Zephyr closes and seals the airlock behind him out of habit, then quickly chases up to the command deck. "Er...Ceres?"
Ceres is already sprawled on the command couch and is turning on the various systems, she purrs without looking at Zephyr, "Yes Zephyr?"
Charon stops at the closed airlock, but doesn't try any of the controls.
Zephyr opens the small hologram generator he brought with him, clicks the data crystal into its slot, then sets it on a console and lets it project a three-dimensional image of the asteroid. "Um...Those games, you said...What does mating have to do with..." His ears blush. "I mean, no, my species doesn't just mate for reproduction, I'm just...ah..surprised?" He grins nervously, tail swishing slowly.
Ceres's torso turns around to face Zephyr. While well furred, it's still very clear she's a female mammal. After a second she giggles, "You don't know much about the Chirr'T'Thar, do you? ;)"
Zephyr looks for a moment, then licks his nose nervously and grins again. His tail keeps swishing slowly. "I..mm..no, I don't." He coughs, then absently smoothes his chestfur and stretches as he glances over the console. While thick-furred himself, his own build is recognizably male and species-wise, mostly muscle under the fur. "I haven't had time to study you much."
Ceres smiles, "We're a very sensual race. We enjoy life, and, while reproduction is tightly controlled, who we take as lovers is up to us."
Charon looks at the buttons again. Hmmm. He tries scratching on the metal door.
Ceres leans over and licks Zephyr on the nose, "And I think you're very nice. And very sexy."
Zephyr blinks, then smiles again. "I...think I see that, now." He chuckles softly. "The control has never been a problem for my race, we're only fertile for less than a month per one of our years. And..." He trails off, jumping a little, then swishes his tail a little harder, hesitating, and then offering a soft noselick back. "Thank you. I'm...flattered." He smiles, more warmly than nervously this time."
Ceres smirks, "And luckily our male only likes females, so I can have you alllll to myself. ;) Ok, Zephyr, make sure Charon is all strapped in and then we can get that rock of yours."
Zephyr pauses as he hears a scratching...then sighs. "The dragon..." No stranger to spacecraft, he glances over the panel next to him, selects 'int views', and 'A/L 2', assuming airlock 2. Then selecting 'open inner', he lets Charon in, waiting until he's clear before resealing the lock.
Charon finds his way to the cockpit.
Ceres purrs a request over the radio, and grins as she gets clearance to depart. She blinks at Zephyr, "Why was he outside?"
Zephyr looks curiously at Ceres again, ears flicking softly, then blushing inside. "Because I accidentally locked him out. I was...um...distracted?" He grins, tail swishing slowly.
Charon hops onto the back of a crashcouch, and perks up. "Can I fly it?"
Ceres giggles and snugs Zephyr, "Why thank you. Now, settle Charon in on the middle seat. I've already locked him out of any control functions."
Zephyr giggles and snugs back, much more relaxed now. Still slightly nervous in the movements of his tail and ears, but more relaxed. "I think that's a good idea, after what I saw with the alarms." He makes sure Charon's secure, then grins. "Ship...ah...looks secure to me."
Charon squeaks as he's strapped down.
Zephyr chuckles at the little dragon, gently fuzzling him. "I think that's a no on the flying. See if they'll give you a sim."
Charon pouts. He can fly good in space.
Ceres nods and her hands move over the console. The ships pulls away from the airlock with very little noticeable shudder of the ship. The repulsors move the ship away from the station until there is sufficient distance for Ceres to turn on the mass drivers, accelerating the ship to cruising speed.
Zephyr pokes at the sensor controls for a few moments as he familiarizes himself with the interface. Luckily, it's graphical and designed for beings with senses close to his, and in a few minutes he's able to sweep and bring up tracking information on the asteroid. "Charon said Jenora did this. She must have one heck of a ship."
Ceres blinks, "Ship? Jenora doesn't need a ship. She's a star."
Zephyr rfs at the console as he brings up a diagnostic by accident and takes a moment to figure out how to close it. He stops...and turns to stare at Ceres. "A what?"
Ceres purrs, "A sentient living fusion plasma field, whose physical appearance and size is a matter of choice. Though she makes really cute choices. No wonder Andromeda wants her in her mating group. ;)"
Charon just gives Zephyr an 'I told you so' look.
Zephyr shakes his head, not understanding. "Wait...You mean she's living...plasma? How can that be? She was in my ship, she was a feline! She wasn't hotter or more dense than any other creature, but..." He sighs, and turns back to the console, chuckling softly. "Everyone here is a being of fantastic power? I feel small all of a sudden."
Ceres leans over and scritches Zephyr's ears, "I know. It's all our kech't's fault. He spent two years on that odd planet and he met the oddest people. Makes us all feel a bit small at times."
Charon pipes up, "I don't feel small."
Ceres sighs, "Your body is a giant living ship. You aren't small."
Ceres decides NOT to mention that Charon is one of the intimidating ones.
Zephyr's ears splay. His paws relax on the console, inadvertently making the diagnostic screen pop up again. "Mmf. Copernicus? I talked to him, I've heard a bit about that place. Apparently my namesake ancestor and I have been bouncing around in time, we both seem to be doing all right in different universes."
Zephyr looks at Charon. "That big thing is you also? So you're what..a satellite?"
"Remote probe," the dragon answers.
Ceres nods, "Yes, our bondmate. He's turned out pretty nice, considering he was the runt of his litter. I think he'll be a good sire and father in a couple years when our scheduled time comes up. He's already doing great with Melora's kits. Ah, here's your asteroid."
Zephyr hesitates for a moment, then reaches back over and gently scritches Ceres' ears back, smiling. "Remote probe. Got it." His ears perk. "How do we grab it, tractor beam, or clamp?"
Ceres grins, "Tractor beams are Coper's specialty. So we have the best. I've put that control set onto your console. Think you can work it?"
Zephyr, having figured out how to quash the annoying diagnostic, brings up the tractor display. "Graviton flux, beam diameter, shearing force indicator, ranging...This looks pretty standard, actually." He smiles. "I think so."
Charon stretches his neck, but still can't see any of the displays from his position.
Ceres hmms and nods, then types up a number on the display and purrs, "That's the standard power curve converted to your units. I have a feeling you're not used to mining tractors."
Zephyr blinks! at the amount of power available. "Impressive. And you're right, I have tractors for vessel towing and combat repulsion." He studies the controls, then brings up a mass-distribution diagram of the asteroid, touches 'target', '8 point' and 'auto location'. With that, four indicator lasers mark touchdown at equidistant points on one face of the asteroid, and the ship vibrates slightly. "I think we have it". He touches one more control, marked 'auto stabilize', and then smiles to Ceres. "Look good?"
Ceres leans over, very deliberately rubbing certain ample portions of her anatomy in the fox's face as she looks at the stats and purrs, "Looks just fine from here. ;)"
Charon squeaks as Ceres blocks what little view he has.
Zephyr rfs? then shivers a little and mrrs softly, nosing back into Ceres' fur and brushing with his soft cheekruff. He looks more than distracted for a second, then smiles and reaches up to rub her shoulder. "Um...Ready to go? I'll keep an eye on shearing force."
Ceres pouts but nods, and goes back to her controls, unstrapping poor Charon as an afterthought, "Sure, fire her up and we'll bring it in."
Zephyr tries to focus on his console, the command deck lights hilighting the silky edges of his fur. If there's no others like him, his predator like digitigrade form and coat of soft rust-red-orange and thick white fur with black velvet 'socks' and earbacks probably looks somewhat exotic...but that doesn't make his ears blush any less inside. ;)
Charon takes advantage of his freedom by climbing up the back of Zephyr's seat to look over his shoulder.
Zephyr watches the tractor controls, making sure the beam levels and forces on the ship stay within acceptable limits. "Heavy rock..." He turns to glance at Ceres, jumping as Charon lands, then chuckling. "Why the pout?" He takes a deep breath, relaxing more, then grins mischievously. "Hey, the sooner we get this rock put away..." ;)
Zephyr winks playfully and turns to look over the controls again. Either he's relaxed now, or is still incredibly nervous and is just trying to hide it as best he can.
"The sooner you can chop it up?" asks Charon.
Ceres smiles, "True, true. It's nice to see you're so eager. Well, the connect is holding, I'll change course and head us back. Aurora just finished processing one asteroid, so we can get right to this one. ;)"
Zephyr chuckles softly. "Actually, you might have to unroll me from my tail later. I'm just calm when I'm at the controls of something."
Ceres giggles, "That should be fun. ;)" and guides the asteroid towards the central spindle of the mining station.
Charon watches, hoping to see how the mining station will 'eat' the asteroid.
Zephyr blinks, and grins. "You better be kidding." He watches over the tractor indicators, making tiny corrections to steer the massive rock. "And Ceres? Thank you...for this, and for everything your people have done so far. You're an amazing people, which is why I don't mind..um...you know." He grins sheepishly. "I don't mind adapting to new cultures."
The asteroid finally reaches a point above the center of the station, and when Ceres has Zephyr cut power, a powerful set of tractor beams lower the asteroid into the waiting maw of the processing plant, where a mixture of masers, ion cannons, microwave lasers and other processing equipment are waiting. When it's secure, Ceres purrs softly, "Thanks. We just want to be friends, but too many races just can't believe that. Part of how we get into trouble. The rest seem to condemn us because we want to enjoy life, and share that joy. C'mon, lets dock the ship. ;)"
Charon asks, "Can I fly it?"
Ceres blinks at Charon and ponders, "Well, I can see if we can set up a simulator for you. That's a good place to start." . o O (And he shouldn't be able to wreck anything doing that....I never thought "I'D" be saying that!)
Zephyr smiles widely. "Life's meant to be enjoyed, it's fun...Okay, tractors...off, system shut down. Clear for docking." He gives Charon a look. "I don't think they want holes in the station."
Ceres chuckles, "Well, at least not any new ones. Our mate's sister did a number on the inner arboretum a few weeks back."
Zephyr's eyes widen. "I thought that was an asteroid puncture. I.." He chuckles. "I don't think I want to know." ;)
Ceres brings the ship in for docking, and as the clamps connect, a light flashes for attention on the communication panel by Zephyr.
Zephyr glances down at the comm panel, then tabs the flashing light. "Yes?"
Copernicus's face comes onto the screen and he purrs, "Hello Zephyr. Just checking in with all my mates, and was told Ceres is here. Is she busy?"
Charon pokes his head over Zephyr's shoulder, and says, "She and Zephyr are dealing with docking procedures."
Zephyr shakes his head. "We're just..." He looks at the little dragon. "What he said."
Copernicus ahs, "So you're nearly done for the day?"
"And they're landing the spaceship too," the remote adds.
Copernicus giggles and chuckles, having been around aliens long enough to catch some innuendo and purrs, "Well then Zephyr. I guess I'll leave you to the tender mercies of my mate then. I hope you're well rested. ;)" as he looks at the nervous todd over the screen.
Zephyr subtly reaches a paw up behind himself to gently pinch the dragon's tail. "Pretty much, yes...I've got the..ah.." He blinks, then grins nervously at Coper. "Um...well-rested? He glances at Ceres, then looks into the screen again, ears flicking. "I...well, I guess I'll find out, I think? See you soon, Coper. Um...Bye." He smiles nervously again.
Charon glances at Zephyr, and asks him with a very quiet, serious tone, "What are pancakes?"
Copernicus tries not to laugh at the nervous fox and purrs, "Be gentle with him Ceres. Signing off."
Ceres retorts, "Only if he likes it that way!" as her mate's image disappears from the screen.
Zephyr stares at Charon, not comprehending, then turns to Ceres, ears blushing, then back to the little dragon. "Um...breakfast..food? You can go to my ship and try some, if you like?" He unlatches the airlock below, then gives Ceres another nervous, but interested look.
Charon perks up, "Really? THANKS!" And then the little dragon vanishes in a flap of wings..
Ceres is her normal bouncy self and purrs as she snugs a wing around Zephyr, "How about we go take a bath first? ;)"
Zephyr grins playfully, nuzzling at the wing and reaching a paw up to stroke along Ceres' back. "Sounds good to me?"
Meanwhile on the Eidolon, Charon orders a pancake from the food processor, takes a bite, and drops the rest on the floor. Then he orders another one, and repeats the process several times. Then he discovers the syrup setting..
Ceres prehensile tail curls around Zephyr's waist and leads him off with a large grin on her feline face.