Once Avery had finished being updated about what remained of the mercenary fleet’s situation by Kasandra, Jasmine, and Liesel, a heavy tiredness started to overcome him.

A linger sense of panic and adrenaline had kept him going since his less than pleasant awakening, but his body was still in the middle of an extensive recover from his near-death injuries.

"I hope that it’s fine that I’m going to leave things in your hands for a bit longer. For now, I need some more rest." Avery said, barely stifling a yawn.

When he mentioned the word hands, his three partners all glanced down at his currently healing stumps.

It was clear that Avery was not in any shape to be doing anything right now.

"Sure, that’s no problem. We can take care of things while you recover. It’s not like anything truly important is going on currently. All were doing is heading back to the Ainelou System and trying to come to grips with what happened."

Avery slightly nodded his head after listening to Kasandra.

It was the most range of motion he currently had.

The four of them exchanged a few more words together before Avery could not stave off the need to sleep any longer.

His body was still not in peak condition and rest was necessary for him to heal.

’My people made it through. That’s all that really matters.’ Avery thought before unconsciousness took him again.

...

When he woke up again Avery’s eyes flickered open much quicker than before and he felt alert almost immediately.

He could tell that his body had fully been healed and he was back in peek condition.

His eyes quickly wandered over to a small table set up in the room where he saw Jasmine sitting with a tablet in one hand and a computer in front of her.

Now that he was done recovering, the advanced medical pod opened up and released him. The noise attracting the attention of the only other person in the room.

Jasmine’s lips turned up into a bright smile as she saw that Avery was whole again and pulling himself out of the medical pod without any difficult.

Obviously, it had been quite the scare for her during his brief dalliance with death.

"Finally feeling better? Do you want me to get you anything?" Jasmine asked as she got up and walked over to Avery just in case he needed some assistance.

"No, I’m doing fine from what I can tell. Don’t even feel hungry or thirsty like I expected."

Avery figured that he must have been supplied with fluids and nutrients by the machine while he was unconscious.

Though, that did beg the question, how long was he out for the second time?

"You were a real sleepyhead once you knew everyone was safe. Only four hours the first time, but nearly four days the next. But I guess you were pushing yourself pretty hard before you... did whatever you did to close the hyperspace entrance."

Avery’s eyes went wide when he heard how long he had been unconscious.

After his bodily augmentations and the awakening of his psionic abilities, he had typically needed far less rest than the average human.

’I must have been in a worse state than I thought. Maybe I didn’t understand the weight of what almost dying meant. It did not feel all that real since I was knocked out for the worst of it.’ Avery thought, trying to recall the experience he had before he passed out.

A lot of it was blurry, and when he tried to forcibly remember what happened, his head started to hurt.

It almost felt like a warning from his body that he should not try to remember the traumatic experience.

Eventually he just shook his head and let the thoughts head to the back of his mind.

He would like to say that he took this as a learning experience not to mess with powers he did not fully understand, but he knew that in a similar situation, he would not hesitate to do the same thing again.

"So, mind giving me another update? Four days have passed, so I assume that somethings have gone on." Avery said, taking a seat at the table Kasandra had been using.

"Surprisingly, not really. While we were in that system, so much was going on and kept coming in bigger and bigger waves, but everything has been quiet. The atmosphere on the ship is still kind of heavy, but people are starting to recover. It helps that we didn’t suffer any major losses like some of the mercenary groups did. Though the ones that are staying with us and lost their ships are certainly a bit grouchy. But Ezra put any problems to rest two days ago."

There had apparently been a number of mercenaries that were guests aboard the Intrepid that had gotten drunk and aimed their anger at some of the crew.

A few fights had broken out, and that was Ezra intervened.

From what Jasmine told Avery, he apparently beat down anyone unwilling to listen to reason. Leaving them some broken bones and only minimal medical treatment afterward. To let the injuries serve as a reminder.

"He then sent out a ship wide announcement saying that anyone that wanted to blow off some steam could come see him at any time for a bout. Ah, also that anyone causing trouble would be spending the rest of the trip in brig. Needless to say, no one has taken him up on his offer and things have been pretty peaceful. Other than that, we’re just counting on our way back to Alliance space."

Avery was relieved to hear that things were going about as well as could be expected.

He also wore a slight grin imagining the unruly visiting merceries reactions to Ezra laying down the law with his fists.

"Almost feels like I’m not needed to run my own ship. Though, I suppose that’s a good thing. Knowing that I have people that I can trust to keep the vessel going while I’m absent." Avery said, putting his arms behind his back and leaning back in his chairs.

"Yes, you’ve gathered a competent group around you. Myself at the top of the list obviously."

Jasmine exaggeratedly puffed out her chest as she praised herself.

Avery could tell that she was trying to keep things light and casual while he was still getting his bearings back.

Still, it was not long before her expression became a bit more serious as she glanced between her tablet and computer.

"There actually is something that I wanted to talk to you about. It pertains to that... creature we encountered. I’ve been poring over historical and scientific records to see if there’s any files we have downloaded anywhere on that monster."

"At first, I couldn’t find a single mention of something similar, but I didn’t have anything better to do whenever it was my turn to look after you, so I just kept going. Around a couple of hours ago, I think I might have found something. I won’t say that the source is really reliable. But the accounts are eerily similar to what we just faced."