[Kitty]

  She paid very close attention to the creatures now.

  Pup should know better than to bother Moose with whatever she was doing with the other creatures. Moose had told her to find a person to trade. Not to find a person and then bother Moose. The page that Moose had given to Pup should have been more than enough instruction. There were enough words there to do anything!

  ‘Moose knew how to use small words after all. They must be worth nothing to ignore them all this time.’

  “Look, I can make a contract with all of these, but I need amounts and purities. No one wants to buy an ‘unknown’ amount of something. Not to mention the fees and other costs associated with it. I need more information than what’s here.”

  She narrowed her eyes. The blue creature seemed to be after something. If it tried to bother Moose again, she would have to step in. Again.

  ‘Why are these small creatures so bothersome? Is this why Moose only kept water creatures before?’

  “It’s already unloaded, I think. The station should have all of that.”

  ‘At least Pup seems to have understood.’

  “I can’t access it from here. I don’t have a data pad or permissions or anything of that sort. I would need authorization to access this ship’s records. We at least need to go to the security office for that.”

  She didn’t know why Pup seemed to be at a disadvantage. The blue thing didn’t seem to be trying very hard. She might not understand what they were talking about, but it sounded like they needed to go back into the loud place.

  She had been wary of the long magic tunnel. It seemed to be like the magic room that appeared in different places. They might have found Pup the first time, but if the tunnel could appear anywhere, then it might appear near monsters. Fortunately, the tunnel was too small for any worrisome monsters. She had been happy enough to follow Pup like Moose had told her until they got to the end of the tunnel.

  The end hadn’t gone to a small place like last time. This place was big. Very big. She had been worried there would be dangerous monsters about, but there were small things scattered around. She had followed Pup, more to keep an eye out than anything, until they got to a loud place where there were many small things. The creatures were again making so much noise she could barely hear and were grouped tightly together. A perfect meal for a large monster.

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  She wisely stayed away.

  Let the small creatures foolishly group up. She had flitted around the edges, sometimes jumping or climbing up the small boxes the creatures went in and out of. Following Pup more with her eyes than in body. She had watched as Pup walked up to the blue thing and had gotten close enough to hear. Not that it mattered. Pup and the blue thing didn’t talk about anything important. Silly small thing games.

  Pup had remembered to bring the blue thing back to the tunnel for trade eventually, though the other small thing that looked like Pup came as well. She wasn’t sure why.

  It did seem more active than Pup and the blue thing.

  ‘Maybe it was protecting the blue thing?’

  When the other creature had turned around to look at her it had acted funny. Grabbing and moving the blue thing, though not very far.

  “Um, if you just go how can we know you won’t cause a problem?”

  She rolled her eyes.

  ‘More silly small thing games.’

  “Follow blue thing. No problem. Silly Pup.”

  “Wha-. Kitty, we can’t just leave him here!”

  She followed Pups pointing to the squirmy creature.

  It had been strange watching it run slowly up to her. Though she didn’t know ‘run’ was the right word. It had used its hands and wasn’t moving at the speed Moose called a run. Since its body was already facing the floor and she didn’t have time to indulge the small thing games, she had just reached forward and pushed it down from the top. Similar to what Moose had done to her, though Moose had been better at it, probably using magic. It had made her not want to move.

  For her, she didn’t know that magic yet, so she just sat on the creature. It tried to move, but it didn’t try very hard.

  ‘Maybe I used a little bit of that magic?’

  She got up and lifted the small creature. She could drop it with Moose while Pup and the blue thing played their silly games. It was much nicer carrying the creature now. Before, as she brought it in for Moose to figure out, it had wiggled and squirmed. She very nearly dropped it a few times, the creature much heavier than Pup. She was glad that Moose had been close, she didn’t like moving the creature around.

  Even now, without the moving, it was still heavy.

  “There. No problem. No more silly.”

  Once she had dropped off the creature and returned to the bright room with Pup and the blue thing, she made sure they would focus. There had already been too much time spent on silly games.

  “I trust I will get him back unharmed when I am finished doing as you ask?”

  She cocked her head to the side.

  ‘What does that even mean?’

  “Um, I don’t know what she did with your friend. But I already told you that everything up to this point has been your fault. If he gets hurt, he did it to himself.”

  ‘Why do small things play games if they hurt themselves?'

  The blue thing wasn’t as easy to read as Pup was, but it seemed tired. When it stood up and moved to leave, she looked at Pup.

  ‘Strange, why does Pup seem tired too? Do small things really get tired that easily?’

  She followed the two back down the magic tunnel. She very much didn’t want to be in the loud place any longer, but if Moose wanted her to follow Pup, there was a good reason.

  She just wished she could figure out what it was.