Sam and his team played Droneflag all morning, they were having so much fun that they were disappointed when an early afternoon thunderstorm cut their game short.

As the rain fell outside, they spent the rest of the day inside of Reegan's ship talking about game plans, formations and other strategic discussions. 

It was many hours later when the storm passed. 

Sam walked outside and noticed that it was a clear night sky. He grabbed one of Reegan's large picnic blankets with hopes to sit in the grass and look up at the stars. 

Rufus decided not to disturb Sam but he could not resist the opportunity to borrow one of Reegan's telescopes. It was the same model he used the night they had to run from Adimniss and luckily Reegan kept one on his ship for himself. Rufus grabbed Reegan and they both headed to an open field outside of the camp with the telescope. 

Reegan was thinking this would be a good opportunity to use the information that Toido had gathered. It was his hope to determine for certain their exact location. 

"It didn't take too long for us to travel through the gate that night. We can't be too far from Earth!" Reegan explained to Rufus. 

"Allow me to calculate the position of the anomaly Toido reported initially. There should be a planetoid that is rotating at an accelerated spin with an erratic orbit around the sun." 

It didn't take long to find the object in question, Rufus thought it looked familliar but in his thoughts he wanted to remain objective. 

"There it is! Now lets scan it for identification across the catalog of moons and asteroids in Earth's solar system!" Rufus stated. 

This was a very close object, it was in fact the closest moon like object in the sky of the planet they were currently inhabiting. 

Rufus and Reegan gave each other a grim look when the computer on the telescope confirmed to them it was Earth's Moon. 

"I don't see Earth could it be out of reach of this telescopes vantage point?" 

Rufus asked but Reegan shook his head. 

"Maybe you just can't see it through the increased resonance of this planet? Maybe we should ask Nal about this before telling the others. . . . " Reegan stated. 

"June's coming quick turn the telescope to Jupiter or something!" Reegan exclaimed. 

Candillice had just finished getting some extra training time in with Carlyle, but after the training he had left to get firewood so Candillice went looking for Sam as she had been wanting to speak with him alone. 

"Sam where are you?" She called. 

"Over here!" He replied waving his arms in the air from the blanket he was laying on. 

Candillice rushed to sit down next to him but not before brushing off some of the large ants creeping up on the blanket. 

"That's why I grabbed the blanket to sit on!" Sam told Candillice as she was brushing the insects away. 

Candillice reached into her bag and pulled out some dried herb leaves, she placed them around the corners of the blanket. 

"Nasty biters! These should keep them away!" She replied before laying down to look up at the stars next to Sam. 

They laid there silently for a few moments watching the stars, just breathing the fresh air and listening to the sounds of nature. 

"Sam can I ask you something?" Candillice said breaking the silence. 

"Sure Candillice!" He replied. 

"Well It's just . . . I Had not seen Father in a very long time. . . . What was it like living with him on the blue star?" She asked. 

"On Earth? It was just the two of us, he worked a lot. Some times I would go up to his ship with him when it wasn't dangerous of course. I do the laundry for us or else it never gets done!" Sam told her as she listened attentively. 

"Did he ever mention me? Or Mother?" She asked. 

"No not at all he said he last saw my Mom on an off world mission and he had no way of getting back to her. I thought she was in the space program, MIA he told me and my cousin Ken," Sam explained. 

"MIA?" Candillice asked. 

"Missing in Action," Sam replied. 

"Your uncle Andrew and Cousin Kenneth who are they?" She asked with hesitation. 

"Uncle Andrew is my Dad's brother and Ken is Uncle Andrew's son," Sam replied. 

"Andrew and Aughustus or Bradley have the same father?" Candillice questioned further. 

"Yeah my Grandpa Balthazar he lives with Uncle Andrew and sometimes he would watch me when my Dad was away at work for a long time," Sam replied. 

He looked at Candillice, she seemed to not like hearing this. She was having trouble processing what it meant to her. He decided it was time for him to ask Candillice a question. 

"Sis? What's it been like living with Mom all these years?" Her face lit up and to Sam's surprise she talked for hours about her Mother and the Tigris and their history until she reached the point when the good times had ended. 

"The years after Father left weighed heavily on Mother and soon I was not able to leave the palace. I spent most of my time in the Courtyard, visits with Mother became less often," She explained. 

Candillice also explained to Sam that her mother was very sad but it was only when Sam arrived that she had become so angry. 

"I think Adimniss put her under a spell. . . . She was controlling the Queen, umm Mom!" Sam told Candillice. 

But he noticed she was beginning to cry. 

"Do you think they are still alive?" Candillice asked. 

"Sure do! Dad is really strong I bet he's putting up quite a fight right now!" He replied without hesitation, Candillice smiled. 

"Mother is strong too!" She said with hope in her eyes. Sam and Candillice were finished speaking for the night, they both laid down to relax and watch the starry night sky. 

Underneath the Dark Spire within the Largest Merkabolisk, a dark ritual was taking place. Adimniss had commanded the Grotesques to drag in several Tigris slaves bound by chains before the shadows in the mirrors. 

These Tigris were filled with much fear, this seemed to entice the shadows. The Grotesques poked and prodded them while several Virillian underlings gathered the negative energy that was produced by the suffering of the Tigris. This energy was refined and converted to Leech before it was offered up to the Illinliu. 

But to Adimniss dismay it did not please them. 

She turned her anger towards the Virillians and the Grotesques wrapping them tightly with her shadow vines until they too screamed out in great pain. 

When Adimniss saw that this too did not satiate the Illinliu's desires she became filled with dread. 

As their shadows left the mirrors without a word Adimniss knew that only the Quartanitz would please them. 

"Andrew bring me the Glass!" Adimniss commanded. 

She felt that a bit of comedy would lift her spirits. 

"It's been days since I checked in on the little Prince. Show me!" She asked.

Andrew lifted the Glass of LyrAndal up as high as he could while bowing his head as low as possible. 

This was when Kenneth still dressed as white knight walked into the room hoping to get a bite to eat. 

He stopped in the doorway, he saw that Adimniss had a fearsome look on her face. The Grotesques and Virillians on the floor mixed with the Tigris in chains twisting about and groaning in pain was no welcoming sight either. 

Kenneth watched the sadistic grin on Adimniss face turn to a look of fear. 

The Glass of LyrAndal showed her a confident and well prepared team. She watched images of young Prince Siamisha enjoying Droneflag practice with no worry in his eyes. 

The more the Glass showed her his face the more visible the scratch he had given her became until it began to irritate her. She looked down at Andrew and dug her heels into his head. 

"I'm going to kill Siamisha tonight!" She shouted down to Andrew. 

"You can't Adimniss, remember he is the other teams leader, if he doesn't play the stealth drone will never reappear, Kenneth has to win. . . It's the only way!" Andrew whimpered. 

"The Quartanitz will be mine who so ever wins I swear it!" She proclaimed with wickedness as she pressed her boots harder down on Andrew's head. This caused him a great deal of pain, he screamed and began to cry. 

Kenneth was unshaken by the sight of the suffering of the Tigris, the pain of the Virillians and Grotesques did not bother him either. 

But the sight of Adimniss hurting his father filled him with rage. 

"White Knight does this not bother you?" Nabine who had followed Kenneth asked. 

Kenneth turned to see the freedom fighters standing behind him, they must have been looking for food as well. They too were very shocked at the sight of what had occurred in this room although they did not know Adimniss or witness the entirety of what had just occured they did suspect the wretched pale woman was the cause of the suffering some how. 

"I never think I feel sorry for Grotesques!" Malush stated pointing at them on the floor. 

"Let's just get out of here before she sees us!" Kenneth said and they quickly left the room. But Adimniss did see them, she detected the contempt that Kenneth and the freedom fighters had for her. She knew that she was going to have to do something about them. 

When the freedom fighters left  there were two guards that entered the room with three smaller Virillians that Adimniss wanted to speak with. 

"You are Ravik's scientists? You helped him to engineer these Grotesques? Did you not?"Adimniss asked.

The three little Virillians in red suits fearfully nodded. 

"It's time we perfected the formula," She explained to the scientist.