Sarat pointed to Phila. “You go first.”

  “Why her?” Ed folded his arms.

  “Damn it, Ed. Are you going to second guess my every command? If so, you need to get off my ship.” Sarat stepped into Ed. “She is my science officer. She can tell us if the airlock is safe to open. And frankly, her opinion is way more important than yours.”

  Ed frowned, then turned away.

  Phila studied Sarat, smiled, and started to climb. One of the rungs failed, but the rest held. She hauled herself over the mezzanine railing and disappeared. There was a scraping sound then nothing for a few minutes. Phila’s voice filled the comm, “Come on up. This airlock is in much better condition, but it’s tight in here.”

  Ed rushed the ladder and scrambled onto the mezzanine. Sarat followed. There was a door and beyond what looked like a control room. Most of the equipment was destroyed or missing. Ed looked over the controls but didn’t seem impressed with the find.

  Phila was at the back of the room. She pointed at the door. “Looks like the door kept the moisture off the airlock. That’s why it’s in such good shape.” Phila rapt on the door and it thudded in response. “Problem is we need Poxoti’s strength to open it.”

  They walked through the disarray and out the door and from the mezzanine, they watched Poxoti climb the ladder. The huge Velox moved only one hand or foot at a time to keep her weight spread over as many points as possible. After a few harrowing moments, she climbed onto the mezzanine. Poxoti moved through the door and pushed aside consoles and unknown equipment to get to the airlock. Her breathing sounded strained. With determination she gripped the round handle and twisted. The metal screamed in protest before coming loose. The airlock door opened to reveal an equally preserved airlock on the other side.

  “You understand what to do?” Sarat looked at everyone on the bridge.

  Tonopex’s mandibles snapped at the air. “If my calculations are off by any amount…”

  “I have full confidence in your navigation skill.” Sarat looked from Tonopex to Poxoti. “Besides, your mate will be here to help.”

  “Poxoti and I spent a lot of time to make this docking coupling. It will work.” Phila and Poxoti bumped fists.

  “Plus, there’s a chance I could lose the game.” San’s pod-like head bobbed.

  “You can’t lose,” Phila said. “Ed would be devastated.”

  “Where is Ed? I haven’t seen him since we got back.” Sarat frowned. “I’m sure that man is up to no good.”

  “If I were to guess,” Tonopex suggested. “Ed is in his spacesuit exploring the derelict, hoping to find treasure.” The Velox made a grating noise. Poxoti joined in his laughter.

  “Come on, San, you’ve got an appointment with a chieftain.” Sarat lifted the zaxottix game and walked out of the bridge.

  “Mind if I come along?” Phila asked, trotting to his side.

  A feeling of festivity filled the hut. Wooden drums were brought out and played. The Wayward people bounced on the ground and swung in the hut’s rafters in time to the music.

  San sat by Low’s side. Both Elowan were out of their spacesuits, enjoying the taste of the air.

  “I don’t like that you’re not in a suit.” Sarat shot a glance at Low and San.

  “Didn’t seem necessary. Zaxottix is a fast game, and I wanted to enjoy the moment.” San looked around as sudden silence filled the hut.

  Kuaha snapped his fingers and pointed to the ground. A group of people brought a wooden box and two seats, setting them where their chieftain indicated. Taking his cue, Sarat placed the game on the box. Kuaha looked at it like it was a precious object. His fingers touched the game pieces and caressed the levels of transparent game surface. “How is it played?”

  San and Low explained the game in detail, giving the chieftain time to think of a strategy. After a few minutes, Kuaha made a loud howl, gaining everyone’s attention. The Wayward people crowded closer to the chieftain and the game.

  Kuaha sat on his seat. All six of his arms were held wide, not touching the board or pieces. San sat opposite. His five arms held ready.

  Low shouted, “Go!”

  Hands and arms, fingers, and vine-like appendages flew and swam across the board. Game pieces were transported and placed in the proper places. Time seemed to stand still as the frenzy of movement caused excitement in the onlookers. Shouts and clapping filled the hut.

  And then it was over.

  Kuaha’s hands were still on the board, while San held his off the board in the same stance as at the beginning. The chieftain laughed and laughed. “This game is fabulous. I didn’t even mind losing.”

  Sarat approached Kuaha. “You did very well. I will give you a few hours to gather what you need.”

  Kuaha smiled. “Will we have access to this game while on your ship?”

  “Yes.” Sarat turned to leave, then stopped. “Do you regret losing your ship to us?”

  “It was never our ship.” The chieftain laughed as if he played a great joke on Sarat. Then, he dropped from his seat and walked toward a large gathering of Wayward as if he had just won the game and brought home a grand prize.

  “Sir,” Low requested. “San and I’d like to stay with them and help. The air here tastes wonderful.”

  Sarat nodded. “Please keep your communicator on and your suits nearby. You and San will need to put them on before we attempt to couple with the dome airlock.” He walked to Phila. “I think I just had another joke played on me.”

  “How do you figure?” Phila asked.

  “Kuaha said he never owned the ship, and he seemed happy so long as he could play zaxottix.” He shook his head. “I feel like I got taken.”

  “Taken?” Poxoti asked, listening from the bridge of the Hindsight. “I don’t understand.”

  “It’s Arth slang. It means tricked.” Ed’s voice entered the conversation from his helmet’s communicator. “I was taken too. I’ve scoured all these decks, and there isn’t any tech on board. It looks like everything has been scavenged.”

  “You were never promised anything,” Sarat stated. “However, you promised me a fortune, or we wouldn’t be out here.”

  Ed’s communicator clicked off.

  Peacestone

  By Brisco Woods

  Starport

  Seven Sisters Pub/Grub house

  11-7-4620

  J Titus Peacestone looked around the crowded pub and sighed. This wasn’t going as well as he had hoped. He had come here because it was known as the hot spot for recruitment, but he was beginning to think ‘not-so-much’. Then there was the heavy smell of garlic that permeated the place. He hated garlic.

  It didn’t help that Tomlis kept sending him reminders of the remaining time he was allowed to have his ship in dock. He knew the date he had to vacate the slip by, he didn’t need that stylus pusher to send him vaguely threatening messages every morning and every evening reminding him. This should also be the last mission to take for the ‘company’, then the ship would be his outright. Then he would tell Tomlis and Interstel to kiss his ass!

  “Another beer, Hon?” He hadn’t even noticed the wait-bot come up. He thought it looked ridiculous with the long hair of the blonde wig hanging down it’s back, but they did seem well programmed. He had just taken the last chug of stale, warm, back-wash from the bottom of the glass and was ready for a refill.

  “Sure, same thing,” he said as the bot glided off with the empty. He glanced at the pad in his hand and looked at the faces around the room for the hundredth time. This time though, there was a face looking back at him. He smiled as the tall Velox met his eye and nodded as she walked in his direction.

  As the serving bot placed his beer on the coaster in front of J, he said “Could I get a crème martini for my friend?” J gestured toward the Velox moving up to the table. The bot nodded its mechanical head once and quietly glided back toward the bar.

  When the insectoid had ambled across the room to his table, he smiled and offered her the seat opposite his. “It is good to see you my friend,” he said as she adjusted the seat to her frame.

  She nodded and clicked the series of sounds that he recognized as pleasure. “You too, J. How is your search for a new crew progressing?”

  A large smile crossed his face as he answered, “I had hoped you were here to sign on as my navigator, SSlinks.”

  She clicked a negative while shaking her insectoid head slowly from side to side. “I have not, although I know of one who is seeking a captain and a ship.”

  J sat up a little and looked into the huge compound eyes of his long-time friend. He knew without a doubt that she would not intentionally steer him wrong. But she tended to see the best in Humans, and thus occasionally missed the layers of personality beneath. He was curious however, to see if this was one of those times or if she had indeed found someone he could hire.

  “So, if you aren’t joining my crew, tell me something about this potential crewmember you’ve found. I assume they’ve been fired from their crew or just released from an asylum or some such.” He knew that he would have to push the conversation. It was something of a game between them and he knew she enjoyed making him squirm for information.

  It irked him to be here looking for a new crew after four relatively successful missions with the crew he had come to know. A crew he had paid to have trained, just to have them stolen away because he had missed his launch date. In their defense, he couldn’t really blame them that the ship’s repairs had taken longer than planned. Much longer in fact, it had seemed that the repairs were set back over and over for vague reasons that couldn’t quite be run down. They hadn’t really had a choice if they wanted to keep earning MUs.

  J leaned forward and motioned for her to continue. The Velox clicked in humor and resumed. “She is an exceptional navigator for a Human, and I can make introductions if you are interested. I know you are in dire need my friend, but I assure you I would not bring someone to you whom I did not trust. She is also experienced at locating and riding the continuum fluxes.” She tilted her head back in a manner that he knew to mean seriousness with the Velox. “She served with another friend for several missions and has had many training updates in the time she has been a crew member.

  The serving droid glided up to the table and deposited the thick steamy drink in front of the Velox. SSlinks nodded to the droid and lifted the drink with her right mid-arm to clink glasses with J. “To your successes my friend,” she said as she took a long pull from the supplied straw. The two antenna that extended from just below the top of her head, quivered in pleasant enjoyment as she placed the glass on the table.

  He had taken a similar pull from his own fresh beer and placed it back on the table at nearly the same time. As she leaned back in the chair he leaned forward and looked directly into the large compound eyes of his friend. “Spill it, bug. Tell me about her.”

  The Velox chuckle/clicked at the derogatory term. “Goodness. You must be more impatient than usual. For a Human, that is saying much.”

  “Yeah, yeah. Come on, just tell me.”

  “Okay. I will do better than that.” The left, middle arm reached into one of the many pockets on the vest, the only clothing the Velox wore, and clicked a PTT button on a small comm device twice. SSlinks took another drink and smiled as J sat back in his chair with an audible sigh.

  SSlinks was still clicking humor when a petite woman walked up to their table and nodded to the Velox then to J. Both Human and Velox gestured for her to join them. The small woman smiled and sat next to SSlinks.

  The Velox clicked happiness and welcome and nodded to each Human in turn. “Reese, this is Captain JT Peacestone of whom we have spoken. And friend J, this is the Human female, Reese, navigator supreme and all-round good person.”

  The petite woman snorted and extended her hand across the table to J. “I don’t know about all of that, but I am a navigator.” A hesitant, lop-sided grin played at her mouth as J shook her hand. He found the small grin contagious as one spread across his own face.

  The serving bot appeared again and took the newcomers order, then glided away.

  “Well, why don’t you tell me something about your career, Reese. How many missions, what sorts, what ships, etc.”

  The grin disappeared as she looked at SSlinks. The Velox nodded in a Human fashion and Reese looked back at J. “I have been on four missions and had three Skills Upgrade opportunities. All as a navigator. The first two missions were exploratory and mineral harvesting. Both were successful in the harvesting, but not so much in the exploration. We stumbled on a continuum flux on the third mission and nearly ran out of supplies before I found where we were and got us back home. We did encounter some alien machines and fought our way through a mess before re-entering the flux. That trip earned us a bonus for finding a potential world worth settling. It is a long way outward on the upspin however, and still needs some exploration.”

  J was impressed and nodded to Reese to continue. “The last mission?”

  She looked at her hand for a moment as the small group huddled at the table in silence, and the room hummed with activity around them. He looked at SSlinks and she just shook her head slowly. Her antenna moved in a slow circular motion that indicated patience.

  Reese looked up at J then at SSlinks. As the serving bot returned with Reese’s drink, J placed his extended fingertips together and touched them to his lips as he waited for her to speak and gave her a slight nod that he hoped was reassuring. She gazed back at him for a moment then nodded as well.

  “May as well rip the Sticky Bandage off I suppose. My most recent mission was onboard the ISS Muncey.”

  Well, that explains the hesitation, J thought to himself. The Muncey had been gone for nearly a year and a half on a mission that was supposed to last six months at most. She had been assumed lost and then when she did show back up, there were only two surviving crew members, neither of them had been the captain. The entire ordeal had been locked up tight by Interstel, so there had been little actually released to the public about what had transpired on board that ship.

  All kinds of conspiracy theorists made noise about their ideas of the facts, but none had been released officially. Theories of mutiny, alien abduction and heroic escape, another Intrepid-like incident. He had decided he would never know, and not to waste more time wondering.

  She was still looking at him and obviously waiting for the judgement and questions. He decided to hold off on either, for the moment. After all, he didn’t know the facts and he suspected that wouldn’t change while they sat at this table, in this pub.

  He lowered his eyes for a moment, then looked back into hers. “I won’t ask you the questions I’m sure everyone does when they find out who you are. I will just ask you this, are you fit to serve? Are you capable and ready to be a team asset and part of a crew?”

  J held up an extended forefinger to stop any immediate reply. “Before you answer, has SSlinks told you anything about me and my current situation?”

  Human and Velox nodded once simultaneously. Reese accompanied the nod with, “She has told me some of your misfortunes.”

  J chuckled and looked at the Velox. “Misfortunes, is it? I suppose you could call them misfortunes, although some were my own doing. I have learned lessons the hard way, but been financially successful while doing so. Although I seem to have found myself at a place where few experienced crewmembers want to risk finding out if I have really and truly learned from the experiences.”

  He gazed directly into her eyes for a moment and then smiled again. “I truly believe that I have, but most men would tell you the same thing. Now what about you?”

  Reese nodded slowly and a small smile formed on her lips. “To answer your earlier questions, yes. I am prepared and capable to be a member of a starship crew. I am a hard worker, a team player, and I probably feel like I have more to prove than most. I have had experiences that will be of great benefit, some I can tell you about and some I cannot. The only thing I will not do is work with Thrynn. I won’t, can’t work with Thrynn and it is something I can’t discuss right now, nor maybe ever.”

  J thought for a moment about other potential crew members and how her inability to work with Thrynn, might affect his crew. They continued talking about similar experiences and the missions they had been on. He made sure not to discuss his last one. She didn’t need to know about all of that just yet.

  After the three of them had finished the drinks they had, he decided it was time to make his final decision. He looked into her eyes as she looked steadily back, somehow knowing he was at the decision-making point. What he saw was honesty and a need to belong. He knew one of his faults had always been jumping to conclusions, but he also knew that he had to make a decision and felt this was a solid one.

  “Okay, Miss Reece. I believe you are ready. I am still in need of some crew members, but you can head out to the port and find the Assurance. That’s our ship. I hope to have a full complement soon. I’ve been informed that Interstel also wishes this. Grab a cabin and start making yourself useful.” The last statement he said with a smile and held his hand out again to the small woman.

  She smiled as well and shook the offered hand with a much firmer handshake than when they had been introduced just a little while before. “Thanks, Captain. You won’t regret hiring me.” She paused, “and it’s just ‘Reese’. Nothing else needed.”

  She tapped a few commands on her tablet, then stood and bowed to SSlinks. “Thank you, SSlinks. I appreciate your faith and friendship. I really wish SSlyy was with us.”

  The Velox clicked a series of quick sounds that sounded like grief, happiness, and pride all at once. J knew there was a story there and hoped to hear it someday. Reese turned to him and nodded.

  “I will fetch my gear and be at the port within the hour, Captain Peacestone.”

  J nodded back and smiled. “Just ‘J’, nothing else needed.” She snorted a laugh again and strode toward the door with a spring in her step. He continued to smile as she disappeared through the crowd. He thought he was going to like this ‘Reese’. He turned back to the Velox as she stood and offered an upper, right hand across the table. J smiled recognizing the sign of friendship with the offer, instead of the usual social offer of the lower.