[Pup]

  Her emotions were always mixed, ever since she had started working with the newcomers.

  She couldn’t call them intruders as she had chosen to work with them. But she still very much disliked them for coming into her place, even if that work would benefit Moose.

  She worked diligently at her data pad, recreating everything she had seen.

  She was proud of her memory. It might have saved her pain before, but that wasn’t nearly as important as now. Now, it let her anticipate what Moose wanted. Let her get started early so that she could present whatever it was as soon as Moose bothered to ask.

  As she came up to the newcomer’s room, she started to pay attention to her surroundings. She didn’t know this part of the ship all that well, the intense light chasing her away from the area after a short time.

  ‘Maybe I should ask for something to cover my eyes. The stations are very bright as well. Would Kitty even bother to relay that to Moose?’

  She opened the door, contemplating the best way to get the question to Moose, and looked towards the newcomers. She guessed they weren’t expecting her, because they had been very close and the Crova seemed ruffled.

  “We need to teach you how to knock young lady.”

  Her eyes snapped to the male, the near constant urge to growl when he was nearby returning.

  “Then do that weird hugging stuff when I’m busy. I don’t have time to wait for you to finish playing.”

  “Wha--. That’s not wh--. You can’t sa—”

  Her eyes flicked back to the Crova, but the male shushed her. She might hate him, but at least he understood when it was time to work.

  “That’s still no reason to be rude. You might not be a slave anymore, but would you have gotten away with it if you still had that collar?”

  She huffed. She never figured out why non-slaves always tried to sound smart about things they didn’t know.

  “Don’t try and sound smart to me. It wouldn’t matter what I did, the collar still worked fine. Not doing the work was more likely to be punished than waiting anyways. Besides, I am a slave. I belong to Moose and Moose doesn’t need a collar.”

  She would like one though.

  She had worried about it several times when she didn’t have enough work to do. When she ran out of things to busy her mind. What happens if someone asked? Could she bring them back to Moose? Would Kitty know what to say when Moose was asked? She might know that she belonged to Moose, but without a collar, how would anyone else? Those collars might bring her more nightmares than she cared to admit, but they also stopped her from being stolen. No one would steal a slave, the collar made sure of it. You needed both the new and old owner there to change anything. She had felt freed from a massive weight when Moose had broken it, but as time went by and she realized how little its functions meant to him, she had begun to have second thoughts.

  If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

  Begun to crave the security she had never really been aware of.

  The collar marked her. Made her property. Without it?

  She might just be forgotten.

  She pulled her hand down from her neck, breaking out of the thoughts that had ambushed her at the unexpected mention. Though it seemed the other two were uncomfortable for some reason.

  “Now stop pretending and tell me what this means.”

  She fiddled with her data pad and turned it around so they could see what she had made. She hoped it was a word and she had made the letters correctly. If it was some kind of magic her plans might be in trouble.

  “That’s… not really a--. Uh, I suppose that says quartermaster, if you squint and try really hard to make it say that. Are you trying to learn to write? I can teach you better penmanship, but I would need help in return.”

  She squinted hard at the Crova, hard enough she started to squirm. At least until the male coughed.

  “Teaching and all that can wait until we are out of the system. We should save things like that for the long periods in transit. Why don’t you let me help you figure out where to go?”

  She could tell his smile was fake. She nearly laughed at him. She did let out a slight chuckle at the presumption.

  “You’re fake. I don’t believe you can do any of the things to go to a different system. I don’t think you know even a little magic.”

  She puffed up her chest, proud at how much magic Moose could do. She had yet to see anyone outside the ship that could match Moose at anything!

  ‘Well, that’s not really true. Moose can’t really beat anybody at being small.’

  “That’s…. FTL isn’t magic young lady. It is a very difficult use of numbers. I may not be a navigator, but I can at least get us to a new system. It would be much safer if we did find a navigator though.”

  “I don’t believe you. Kitty said that Moose said it was magic. Or maybe Kitty just said it was magic? … It doesn’t matter. Moose can do magic and you can’t. You just said so. Besides, Moose already picked where to go. I wouldn’t have time for this if Moose wasn’t missing.”

  She wanted to bristle at the utter ridiculousness of what she had just heard. Moose not having magic? It was impossible, she had seen it herself. Kitty had said so.

  ‘Wait, did the Crova just say Mooses’ writing was bad?’

  “Ah! Don’t try to distract me with that, Moose doesn’t have bad words! He is good at writing! If you can’t read it then you’re bad at reading.”

  It had seemed like the male was about to speak, but she ignored him and glared at the Crova. She wouldn’t ignore an insult like that.

  “Didn’t you ask us to read it because you couldn’t?”

  “Of course I did, I can’t read. I didn’t pretend to be good at it. Since I can’t learn from Kitty that leaves you two.”

  The Crova had seemed amused until she had given her reasoning. The amusement seemed to dry up after that.

  “Why not just ask this Moose to teach you then? You said it came from him, right?”

  She wasn’t sure what to call the look she gave to the male, but it clearly had a name as the male had to look away and the Crova covered her beak.

  “Right, well, it has the letters for quartermaster. If you can’t read and no one has taught you, where did you get those letters?”

  She ignored the male for now and focused back on the Crova.

  “I watched Moose. Now what does this one say?”

  She had taken the first step.

  Now she just had to memorize every word.