Ch 33[A]She watched as Pup frantically worked the new covering pulled from a wall space.

  ‘Why does Pup bother with such pointless things. That seems like such a hassle.’

  She had been annoyed at first when Pup seemed to be able to do whatever Moose had wanted her to do at the talking lights. She still didn’t know what that had all been about. Pup’s conversation with the lights had made no sense. Even if she knew most of the words that were spoken, it was almost like they were speaking in a way to deliberately confuse her.

  As she watched Pup grow more and more fidgety and seem less and less sure, she had changed her mind. She might not know what Moose had wanted, but it was clear that whatever it was wasn’t easy.

  ‘Probably why Moose wanted more creatures in the first pce.’

  It made sense why she hadn’t been able to understand Pup’s purpose at first. Clearly, talking to the lights was difficult. Having Pup do it made perfect sense for the zy Moose and talking wasn’t something that was easy to see. She should have known something was strange when Moose didn’t even bother to speak to change the battle between the light and darkness. He almost never forced things like that, much preferring to use his mind and cunning.

  This was put on full dispy when Pup started to make things clean. Moose had just ignored her for a bit and all of a sudden Pup was doing a great many things. All the orders had come from her. Moose only told her to follow Pup and make sure she knew where everything was. He had otherwise treated Pup as if she wasn’t there.

  She had taken far too long to realize that.

  Taken too long to realize that, if anything, the training had been for her. She needed to learn how to treat the new creatures. She needed to learn how to see their purpose or get them to function. All of her annoyance at Moose coddling Pup had been her inability to see a greater pn. She had been so focused on the small things Pup had that she did not, that she had failed to see the reason Pup was there to begin with.

  Moose would not have had to order her around had she tried to learn from the start.

  That understanding brought her even more annoyance. Annoyance at who, she didn’t know. At herself maybe, for being annoyed by her own short sightedness? Whoever she was annoyed with, it was clear that Pup hadn’t changed things, she had with her pettiness.

  ‘Maybe I am more irritated because things can still affect me. I’m not moose enough yet.’

  Watching the new creatures come closer, pause, then continue towards them, she decided that learning should be the first thing she did.

  ‘Best to be quiet and out of the way. Then I can watch and learn.’

  “Um, Hello?”

  “I am Security Officer Krikra. I assume you are the voice on the radio?”

  That resolve was quickly tested as the new creature spoke about things she couldn’t follow. What was the point in watching to learn if she couldn’t even follow the words that were being said? A clearly more active approach was needed.

  ‘Unlike Moose, they can speak the small words. I just need them to make sense.’

  As she moved up behind Pup and prepared to find out why they didn’t make sense, the new creature looked up at her.

  Then it fell over and stopped moving.

  ‘Why are all the small creatures so strange?’

  The other small creature standing farther back came forward and started poking at the creature that had fallen.

  ‘It must be fragile to need help after a small fall like that.’

  She looked at Pup, who seemed to be at a loss as to what she should do. Shivering, likely from the coolness of this area despite the covering, and looking at the two creatures before them, Pup didn’t look very useful right then.

  “Um, is she ok?”

  Pup finally did something. Though how useful it was she didn’t know. If she had to go all the way back to fetch Moose because these creatures got hurt trying to do whatever strange things they did, she really would be annoyed and would have good reason this time. When she focused back on what was happening before her, it did seem like the other small creature wasn’t useless though.

  “Here are the sample vials. Take a sample from one of the surviving crew, at least one from a water source, a fabric sample from each active crew bunk and a few air samples from around the ship. Bring them back to the docking colr. We will return to collect them after we get the captain to a medical wing.”

  “Um, and we can go to the station after that?”

  “Yes, the station won’t let you dock until we transmit the ok, but you can start the administrative work while we do the analysis.”

  “Uh, ok. Thank you.”

  ‘Are we a ship? Why are we going to a dock? We should have plenty of water for Moose to use without going on nd.’

  As always, the words were understandable but made no sense to her.

  She followed Pup around as she used whatever it was that was given to her. She watched very closely when Pup entered the ir, making sure that nothing weird was being done. The creatures could py whatever they wanted, but they weren’t allowed to mess with Moose’s things. She wouldn’t lose the ir because the creatures were doing weird things for themselves.

  Not a thing that Pup did in her journey made sense, but water seemed to be involved so maybe the creatures were trying to copy Moose’s magic.

  She followed Pup as she pced the strange box near a wall and returned back to Moose.

  “Kitty. Please say we are ready and can go.”

  Taken aback, she gave Pup several looks.

  ‘Pup has never tried to give me an order before. Does a moose take orders?’

  It took a bit to think it through, but she concluded that a moose would do whatever was zier. She wasn’t sure what the zier option here was, but not doing it seemed to be going nowhere, so she turned to Moose. As he seemed to be watching the two of them, she didn’t even need to waste magic to get his attention.

  “Pup, ready. Say go.”

  He rumbled a bit and turned back to the lights.

  ‘How does he always know how to do the least amount of anything?’

  She had so much to learn before she could really call herself a moose.

  ‘Maybe that’s why he always uses his mind. So much training to do.’

  [?]His fingers fidgeted as he moved the data card casing around his hand.

  The card itself was safe elsewhere on his person, he would never have it out where it might get stolen. Even if he wanted the right people to think he would make a mistake like that. Moving his fingers helped to release some of his nervous energy as well.

  “Stop glowering like that. It just makes us look suspicious.”

  He looked over and raised an eyebrow at the beautiful woman beside him. Her blue and white feathers were far more likely to draw attention than anything he did. Her race noticeably uncommon out here away from the trade hubs.

  “I knew we should have covered you up. People have been gncing at you all morning. They are going to easily remember someone like you. Your far too pretty and put together for a frontier station like this.”

  Her eyeshes fluttered and her cheek feathers puffed up a bit, clearly flustered. He knew they needed to y low, but she wasn’t the rough living sort. Coming out here had been a mistake, even if it had bought them a bit of time.

  “You brute, tossing out lines like that.”

  She had been quiet with that one, he would have probably missed it if his ear wasn’t swiveled towards her.

  “You know as well as I do that a weirdo covered in clothing would stand out just as much. That’s why you agreed to let me do the talking. The benefits of a pretty face outweighed the downsides, even if it was close.”

  He grunted. They both knew she was right, that was why she did the negotiations. He hated using her like that, but reality demanded compromise. All he could do was protect her.

  It still stung though.

  “And yet here we still are. There had to be something we could catch a ride on before now?”

  She looked down as he returned to people watching. He had clearly struck a nerve. Things were starting to go out of control it seemed.

  “Yea, plenty of rides back. All you have to do is cough up enough credits to buy a small ship or find a captain sleazy enough to buy me. No long hauler wants freeloaders taking up valuable thrust ratio. Not to mention food and water supplies. I could put you on a ship crew tomorrow if you would let me, plenty of sailors looking for work around here, but no one is going to take both of us.

  There's no use in having a Crova on board a ship that is just moving cargo. Not negotiating and not giving out ‘favors’? I’m basically poison to the contract.”

  Ah, that expined the nerve. He truly didn’t want to leave her behind, but if they got caught out here, they would both have a quick trip out of a ‘malfunctioning’ airlock. If it was safer for him to draw attention elsewhere, he would do what he had to.

  “Wasn’t this supposed to be near human space? Why is everything a hauler? Where is their vaunted ‘tourism’ or whatever other crazy things they get up to?”

  That had been the whole pn in the first pce. They had needed to disappear, and the frontier was the best pce to do it. Of course, the only crews on the frontier were either industrial or military. For any sane race at least. He didn’t think a mining or construction barge was a great way to ‘get away’, seeing as how they barely had drives to begin with. And the military?

  He shivered just thinking of it.

  There were good people in the gactic military, but they wouldn’t be the ones who got to decide anything. The ones that did?

  Well, there were reasons they were out here and not rexing in some trade hub.

  All that left them with was those ‘not great ideas’. The first and foremost of which were human ships. No one else would shoot themselves into deep space just to look at exploding stars. Even the races that did enjoy explosions either just found one in controlled territory or trusted a human crew to do all the hard, and therefor dangerous, work.

  It was probably why humans were so crazy. It was their races sole export.

  It was just the thing they needed to disappear though.

  A few trips out into deep space were the fastest way to lose just about anyone. So long as they weren’t human at least. Once the trail had gone cold, they could think of the next step. Hell, they might even find that next step on the ship. Human ‘tourists’ were notorious for having more money than sense and the individuals they attracted from other races were exactly the same.

  Except this frontier station they had come to hadn’t seen a human anything in years.

  ‘The whole reason we came to this heap of trash was because it was advertised as near human space. Such a waste’

  “How much do we have left? It might be time to buy a ship after all.”

  Buying ships left a massive trail. No one wanted unknowns doing whatever caught their fancy in a potentially massive bomb. There were ways to get them discreetly and ways to erase the trail, but those ways were far beyond anything they would be capable of. The humans were also rumored to simply build their own, which was even more absurd than it sounded, but the rest of the gactic counsel had thrown up their hands at that point. So long as they stayed in human territory or deep space, no one said anything.

  Not much help to them here.

  “Maybe. We have enough to buy a very small ship. We might even be able to get captain shares on something bigger, given our specialties, but either way we would be broke. It would mean actually using whatever we bought to make money. We would just starve to death otherwise.”

  He sighed. That meant having a target on their backs when they had no way to quickly uproot and leave. Selling a ship took a long time when you were being chased.

  He tensed up. It seemed like their time here might just be shorter than he thought. He had been worried for a while, so when he noticed someone pointing in their direction it stood out. The only reason he hadn’t bolted the moment he noticed was that the ‘asker’ seemed to be too young to be the ones after him. He still got up and moved his companion towards the door though.

  He wasn’t about to be caught underestimating the forces against him.

  ‘I hope it hasn’t gotten to the point of fearing every child that looks at me funny.’