This fuzzy is going to write out the story of his life here for you to read if you like. He hopes you will find it interesting!
The story will be about this fuzzy and the six girls in this fuzzy's life who now share a home with him:
- Cow - a cow
- Venturi - a vixen
- Phoebe - a doggie
- Taiga - a foxy
- Tanga - another foxy
- Heathus - a elfy
And, this fuzzy should introduce himself! This fuzzy's full name is Chandrashekar Zarathustra Pranhabinmahonran. It is a mouthful, this fuzzy knows, and so it is why this fuzzy generally refers to himself as fuzzy, and many others do, or they call this fuzzy Chandra, which he rather likes, actually.
This fuzzy is what is called a gashta. He is almost a meter tall standing upright, and he is covered with golden fur from head to feet-tops. The fur is darker on his arms and legs, brown like his pawfingerpads and the bottoms of his feet, and lighter yellow in the center of his chest, under his chin and on the top of his head. This fuzzy's ears are atop his head, like a cat's, and he can point them to hear better. His eyes are big and green and friendly and can see in the dark very well.
This fuzzy is larger almost by half than most gashta. Most gashta are about 60 centimeters tall standing up.
The gashta are a space-faring race of people, going back as long as gashta can remember. Some gashta think we had a planet or planets at one time, which makes sense to this fuzzy as the gashta had to come from somewhere. But these homes are either gone or abandoned fuzzy guesses. This fuzzy never met anyone who knew for sure either way, so he does not think about it so much.
What this fuzzy does remember is the ship that he was born on and grew up in.
It was a very big ship! Like most gashta family ships, it was made by hollowing out an asteroid. This fuzzy's family ship was shaped like a potato, about six kilometers long. Looking at it from a distance, you would not really know if it was a ship or not. When you get closer, though, you notice the engines sticking out from the surface here and there, and the airlocks that let people and smaller ships in and out. Inside the asteroid is a three dimensional maze of tunnels and chambers which contain everything needed to keep more than ten thousand gashta alive and happy. All family ships are designed to be self-supporting, and have survived journeys as long as a thousand years travelling between planets in deep space.
This fuzzy understands that his family ship is average size as far as gashta family ships are measured. There are many ships that are smaller, and some that are much larger. When this fuzzy would ask how many ships there were, he would be told "many many" which is a gashta way of saying more than can be counted. This fuzzy saw hundreds of other family ships while he was growing up on his family ship, and visited some, too. This fuzzy can safely say that all gashta family ships are very different from one another. The only thing they have in common is that they are full of gashta.
There is great discussion among gashta about where our engines came from, whether they were found or invented, but the success of gashta deep space travel technology is almost completely due to the very efficient engines we have that run for very long times on very little fuel and can be controlled in very special ways. These engines can convert elements from one to another, hollow out the asteroids that the gashta use for ships, and then power those ships through space.
The gashta make very clever use of these engines and produce amazing things with them, things that they surround themselves with to live comfortably as they travel. They also make things, from special raw materials to precise machine parts, to trade with other people they meet in their travels.
Gashta family ship travel fits in very well with the merchant outpost trade system that exists in the galaxy. As the gashta meet with other species at merchant outposts to exhange their metals and machines for goods and foodstuffs, they also make deals to move bulk items from one outpost to another. The routes connecting these outposts are well known to the gashta, and it is common among gashta family ships to follow the trading routes in endless loops. Now there are so many outposts that a visit to all of them might not be possible. This fuzzy's family ship follows a well established loop of outposts that takes almost 375 years to complete.
Most gathering places for traders are on planets, so the gashta must go to the planets to trade. But because of the size of most family ships, even though the gashta have very efficient engines, it is very expensive, and disruptive to ship life, to decelerate a family ship to orbit a planet. So normally, the family ship passes by at a somewhat slower than normal speed outside the planet system, and smaller ships are sent in to the trading planet, full of things to trade.
The smaller ships only have a certain amount of time to stay and trade on the planet before the family ship passes out of the range of their return, so it is important that the gashta finish up their trading in a few short days and leave, otherwise they may be left behind. That is a situation a gashta does not ever want to be in. It is almost impossible to try and catch up with a family ship!Unfortunately, when he was 33 years old, this was a situation that this fuzzy found himself in.
Now at that time, this fuzzy was apprentice engine manipulator in engine cluster 23, a cluster which was towards the rear end of the ship and was used mostly for propulsion. This fuzzy was learning proper engine manipulation from his great-great-grandmother, who was the engine master for cluster 23. As such, this fuzzy lived and worked in the engine cluster area and normally spent most of his time there.
This fuzzy has a great interest in plants, another thing he learned from his great-great-grandmother. His room was very crowded with interesting plants and flowers, and from time to time this fuzzy would go on the trading trips to find new plants to add to his collection.
It was on this fuzzy's 14th such trip that he traded a small pawful of gold and platinum to a merchant trader for a journey out into the rainforests. The trader had a small ship and agreed to drop fuzzy off on a particular forest mountain on his way to make a delivery, then pick him up on the way back. This gave fuzzy 2 days to explore the area and find plants that he would want.
Well everything went wrong for this fuzzy after that. He had taken the usual precautions for his trip, and had proper gear and a radio. But the weather was terrible. The trader's ship was rocked by wind and rain, and from the moment fuzzy was dropped off he was in a steady downpour. Which fuzzy did not mind too terribly, but it did make travel through the area slow and muddy, and sleep difficult. Over the next 2 days this fuzzy wandered over a few kilometers and found several species of flowering vines to his liking.
Towards the end of the second day this fuzzy huddled under a tree with his new plants next to the landing site looking up at the rain fall from the sky. When it started to get dark, this fuzzy used the radio to try and contact the trader's ship, but this fuzzy thinks the wet had gotten into the radio and made it not work correctly. So this fuzzy waited through the night in the rain, and then through the next day too. This fuzzy used the radio over and over to try and call the trader's ship or his own people's ship, but he never made any contact.
By the fourth day this fuzzy had run low on food and he was very upset, as this would be leaving day for his people's ship. He waited in the landing spot for one more day, hoping that the gashta ship would pass over the spot on it's way out. But this fuzzy saw nothing, only grey rain clouds above the treetops, and when it was dark again this fuzzy cried and knew he was left behind.
The next day the rain stopped, and this fuzzy started walking. He had no food left, but he had some tools and a water container, which was easy to fill up in streams. This fuzzy walked towards the direction the merchant ship had brought him from, which was roughly towards the setting sun, and walked in that direction for 22 days. Along the way this fuzzy put his survival training to good use, and was able to find various things to eat, such as fruits, nuts and roots. At night, he slept up in the trees in his hammock, even though he did not meet any creatures that would try and make a meal out of him. And for a time, this fuzzy kept trying the radio, but it just hissed at fuzzy and said nothing until the battery died one day.
At the end of the 22nd day this fuzzy made it to the top of a hill and through the trees saw a stone castle across the valley from where he was standing. He jumped and made a very happy noise, because he saw a light in the castle, and smoke coming from a chimney. This fuzzy ran quickly through the valley, not caring at all when he bashed his toes on a rock accidentally, and ended up limping and out of breath at the castle entrance.
It is in this way that fuzzy met the wizard Radhruin.
Now this fuzzy should say that the things he could do already when he met Radhruin pretty much made fuzzy what is considered in most parts of the universe a magic user.
Part of being an engine manipulator is laying pawfingers on the engine bell and looking inside the reaction, understanding it, and using the energy of the reaction to manipulate it and make it do desired things. The gashta have been looked at by some pretty good scientists (including some very good gashta scientists!), and they have observed that these manipulations happen on the atomic level, involving quantum mechanics. But it is difficult for gashta themselves to describe precisely how they do this. It is not something every gashta could do, although it is very simple to find out whether a gashta could do it by letting them lay their pawfingers on an engine bell. Some gashta see nothing, but some can see the reaction inside the engine, and shape it by moving their pawfingers.
This fuzzy was able to see the reaction. The best way he can describe it is that he could see the reaction, not with his eyes, but more like he was floating or flying around inside it. With practice this fuzzy could fly all the way in to where he could see the small pieces of the universe dancing in the center of the reaction. And with his paws, this fuzzy could make very precise changes to the pieces which would cascade through the reaction and cause different elements to be made, and energy to be released. It is a very intense experience that takes much concentration and can make you tired after a few hours.
This fuzzy had been at this sort of level of engine manipulation for almost a year when he was left behind. Fuzzy didn't think his skill was incredibly special, other than it was something that he could do, and it felt good to have a way to contribute to his family ship. And it sure did not prove too useful to this fuzzy when he was walking in the forest for 22 days! But it turned out to be something that made this fuzzy a very interesting person to Radhruin, and helped make this fuzzy a very good friend.
Now Radhruin was old, with the classic wizardy look, grey robes, long white beard, stupid pointy hat. He lived in this castle all by himself out in the forest, and was visited occasionally by merchant traders who brought him supplies. He was one of the wizards on the council of wizards, who are scattered all over the galaxy, and by all accounts, a very important fellow. But at the time this fuzzy met him, he seemed to be settling into some kind of retirement.
This fuzzy should also say that at this time he was only 52 centimeters tall.
