by Troy Osgood
I found the timestamp I wanted and slowed the video.
We watched a shadowed figure enter the lounge from the open door to the hold. They moved slowly, the head turning to indicate they were looking around as they walked. The way the shadows around the head moved, it looked like a being with long hair. A woman? The frame was a little more slight then the male Storwos. The figure disappeared from the camera’s view, getting close to the airlock door.
The figure stepped back into view, just barely, before moving back to the door. Moving away to get a wider look or thinking of leaving and changing their mind?
Whoever it was had made a decision, as a couple seconds later we saw a small flash. Only visible because of the darkness in the lounge.
Another minute or so of thought and the figure stepped away from the door. As the figure started to move away I hoped they would turn their head just the right way. But they didn’t and I was worried that we wouldn’t get a look. But then they paused and turned towards the galley as if hearing something.
Still not the best picture but the person was recognizable. We both knew who it was.
Mostly because there were so few Storwo on board that we actually knew by name.
The late night creeper was Dresla.
*****
My instincts told me that I could trust Dresla.
They were rarely wrong.
But they were wrong sometimes.
Could she be the stowaway?
Out of all the refugees, she was the most forward, the only one interacting with Kaylia and myself. I thought it was because she had been appointed, or appointed herself, the leader of the group and the liason.
Normally, if you were keeping a low profile you’d do just that but maybe she thought by being more open and connecting that I’d think her less likely to be the stowaway?
Back in my Special Operations days, I hated the complicated missions. I wanted things to be straightforward. There’s the enemy. Go shoot them. Nice and simple. But sadly too many of them involved politics and that always made things more complicated. I made a pretty decent intelligence operative when I needed to be but it was something I had thought I’d left behind. Too often though, things kept creeping up.
I had hoped this trip wouldn’t be like that.
There wasn’t enough information to really come to a decision, one way or the other.
Did I really need to?
Normally I would have said no. It was something that I could leave alone.
And I would have left alone but she had been doing something to the airlock. If she had just laid back and enjoyed the trip, could have left it alone. But the airlock thing showed there was more going on beyond just hitching a ride off a dying planet.
That could mean danger to me, Kaylia and my ship.
No way could I leave it alone now.
*****
Ship’s morning and we had just hopped back into wildspace. Kaylia was asleep.
Now anyways.
It had been a struggle. She had wanted to be there when I talked with Dresla. She’d done her best to try to convince me but in the end I had ordered her to bed. For a teenager, or the Thesan equivalent of one, she listened to me pretty good.
The kid was smart. She knew when to listen and when she could push it.
I found Dresla in the galley, helping make breakfast for the refugees. It was mostly the same women as before and like before they pretty much ignored me. Except for Dresla. Again, she looked up and smiled.
“Can I talk to you a minute?” I asked her as I stood at the bottom of the stairs.
She nodded and leaned towards another woman that was at the counter behind her, saying something in Storwoi. The other replied and moved over to replace Dresla. She walked towards me, wiping her hands on her pants. I motioned towards the stairs and she followed me up.
“Need to show you something,” I said as she stepped onto the upper corridor.
Very quickly I saw worry pass across her face. There and gone. She knew I was on to her but was still playing the part. Wonder what she was thinking?
In the bridge I motioned her towards my station and pointed at the security feed screen. It was paused, showing the empty lounge.
“Watch.”
I hit a button and played the footage at normal speed. We watched the shadowy figure walk slowly through the lounge, disappear at the door, the flash, the figure reappear and turn to leave. I paused it at the image showing Dresla clearly.
She stepped back, only a couple steps, not enough to put real distance between us. Standing straight, she calmly looked up at me. No panic, no worry. Just acceptance.
I would have expected at least some panic from a stowaway. Maybe a quick explanation. Something. But instead she just looked at me, waiting on me to make the first move.
Studying her I sorted through all the information I had on her, the few and brief conversations. One thing stuck out to me. A comment from the first time she was on the bridge. She had pegged me as military or law enforcement. I thought she was the same. But now?
Now it was time to trust the instincts.
“You’re a cop aren’t you?” I asked.
It took a minute for her to respond, studying me the whole time. Finally she nodded.
“What gave it away?”
“Same reasons you had me pegged as a soldier,” I replied. “So want to explain that?” I pointed at the paused screen.
She looked out the viewwindow at the cloudy white of wildspace, collecting her thoughts. I leaned against the bridge’s rear wall, arms crossed, and waited.
“When the asteroid was first sighted, our scientists realized what it meant and informed the planet. There was rioting and looting as to be expected,” she began and sat down in the co-pilot's chair, still looking out the window. “That died down as the evacuation plans were made public. That happened rapidly, surprisingly.”
“I’ve never understood the idea of looting during an apocalypse event,” I interjected. “You’re not going to be able to take it with you and what is the point of having it for a few days or weeks?”
“Agreed. I had expected the looting to start with the announced evacuations, not before. Steal some items of value and sell them off planet. That did happen, but not to the extent we feared it might. Especially when it was announced that anyone that was caught would not be permitted off planet.”
“That would put a stop to it.”
“It did. For the small stuff. It allowed us to concentrate on the bigger stuff.” She laughed. “That was hard. For years our job was to worry about a thief stealing credits from some rich tiuk. And now, in the end days of our world, we could care less about that.”
I’ve always found it interesting that Tradelan does such a poor job translating curses.
“We started worrying about important cultural artifacts and documents.”
That made sense. Destroyed planet relics go for big money on the black market. And those things would be important to the survivors. Some crooks would buy ‘em from desperate survivors on the cheap and sell them at huge markups to the other survivors that wanted their relics back. Shady business. But profitable.
“Most were recovered before the moon cracked,” Dresla continued. “I was assigned to track down one of the last. We tracked it to Touryon as that city was lower down the list of evacuations. It was the most likely place the thief would find a way off Storw.”
“What’s so important about whatever was taken?”
“It’s called the Daelot,” she explained, pulling her legs up and sitting cross-legged in the chair. ‘It’s…,” she started and paused, shrugging. “It’s hard to explain. Do you have anything on Terra that is considered vitally important but to an outsider would seem strange?”
I nodded. There was a lot of things that I could think of.
Really didn’t matter what this Daelot thing was. Not to me. Just mattered that it was on the Wind.
“I assume that you suspect the person that s
tole Clerty’s ID is the thief?”
It was her turn to nod.
“I’ve been searching for the Daelot since we left Storw. I thought that maybe the thief had hid it in the airlock, one of the few places that might be accessible and others would not go.”
Made sense.
“The pad was alarmed?” she asked.
“Yeah, most of the doors are. Tied into cameras,” I explained. “The Wind has had unwanted passengers too many times so I wanted to control access as much as possible.”
Dresla looked up at me with an odd look. Surprised? Confused? Wondering what I meant about unwanted passengers.
I shrugged. It would take too long to explain.
Turning the pilot’s chair, I sat down and leaned back. I tapped my fingers on the console randomly, thinking. Dresla sat quietly and watched me. I could hear noises coming up from the galley below. Sounds of people talking, chatting, trying to forget they were refugees from a dying planet.
I glanced at the door and the sounds.
“The Wind is a small ship. All is good now but that probably won’t last. It’s a long trip and tight quarters. I want you to find your Daetot,” I said struggling with the word.
“Daelot,” Dresla supplied, smiling.
“Thank you. I want you to find it but not at the expense of making life difficult on the ship.” I sighed, answering my own internal question. Finding the stowaway wasn’t worth disrupting the lives of the Storwo even more. “Does that make sense?”
“I won’t stop looking,” she said, a hint of steel to her voice. “But I understand and agree.”
She stood up and headed for the door, pausing to look back at me.
“I will try to not set off anymore alarms,” she said with a chuckle walking out the door. I heard her step back in and turned. “His name is not Clerty. Storwo do not have two names.”
Dresla stepped back out into the hall and I heard her small footsteps descend the spiral stairs.
Learn something new everyday.
*****
The next day went smoothly. I was able to sleep. No alarms.
Things were proceeding smoothly.
Dresla had gotten to me and now I watched all the Storwo on the Wind, looking for suspicious behavior. Honestly, I really didn’t have a problem with someone stealing credits or something to set themselves up when relocating from a dying planet. I really wasn’t sure how I felt about stealing artifacts. That felt different. Wrong.
Weird. I know.
“Captain.”
I paused as I was about to go up the stairs to the upper level. The galley was somewhat empty of people. They had just finished up the afternoon meal and there were five Storwo cleaning up the many dishes and putting food away. The stores were looking a little thin and I was starting to worry there wouldn’t be enough to make it all the way to Hoin.
A Storwo woman was approaching. She was a little shorter than average with bright purple hair and eyes that matched. Short hair cut and kind of plain. I thought I recognized her. Maybe one of the ones that had spoken to me the first day? Aside from Dresla, Clerty and her husband and that Administrator guy that spent most of the time sulking in a corner of the hold, I didn’t know any of the others on board.
As she got closer, I realized that it was her. The one that had come up and personally thanked me.
“Yes, what can I do for you?”
“I was wondering if you could give us access to the view screen in the lounge?” she asked pointing behind her into the other room. Through the door I could see some kids scattered around and playing or reading. The lounge had turned into the daycare. “It would be nice to show some videos for the children.”
“Of course,” I replied stepping back to the floor. Why hadn’t I thought of that? “We’re still in wildspace so you’ll only have access to what is stored in the system.”
“Why is that,” she asked.
“Can’t receive transmissions well in Wildspace. We’ll be in the Yersk System in a couple hours and can get some new vids then. But we’ll only be in Yersk for maybe thirty minutes, if that. Then it’ll be about another eight hours until we’re in the Tuint System and the next available time to download. You’ll need to program the Feed to grab things for the kids at those points. We’ll be in Tuint for longer as we’ll need to stop at the station and refuel.”
“That will be fine,” she said. “Thank you Captain. I am Torsi,” she said extending her hand.
“Arek is fine, Captain just sounds weird with only a crew of two,” I told her shaking her much smaller hand.
Torsi followed me back into the lounge. I had to step around the kids and their toys as I walked to the viewscreen on the far wall. Mounted into the wall next to it was the control panel and I hit a couple buttons, unlocking the passcode.
“Do you need some instructions?”
“We should be able to figure it out,” Torsi replied as the kids started to gather around. “We do not want to take you from your duties.”
“There’s not much for me to do,” I replied stepping out of the way. Which was true, but the amount of kids and how close they were was starting to get a bit overwhelming.
I was not a kid person. Aside from Kaylia, I wanted nothing to do with them. Had a couple nieces and a nephew back on the Mars Colony, my sister’s kids, but I had seen them only a couple of times. Talked to them sometimes via vid but it was mostly passing messages back and forth. They were growing quick, I knew that. Played some sports.
Really did need to visit my sister at some point soon, but whenever I thought about taking the trip back to Sol things always came up. I bet Kaylia would love them and my sister would love the kid.
I moved behind the couch and watched Torsi play with the controls. The screen came to life showing the standard Galactic Feed image, an artistic rendering of the galaxy, and then the menu options appeared. Hadn’t taken long for her to figure it out. The kids starting talking, excited, and I smiled as I walked away.
That didn’t last long.
*****
Yersk is a small system. Four planets, each with two to four moons. Only Yersk Prime is inhabited by the Yers, a race of mottled gray skinned amphibious humanoids with webbed feet and hands and four long tentacles growing out of their backs. Not the friendliest beings in the galaxy. They’re grounders, planetlocked, meaning that they don’t have the technology to starhop from system to system. Still see them out and about, not that common, but they hitch rides with ships coming out of the Yerbig colony on the planet as they end up working for the green skinned and big headed Yerbigs.
Yerbig’s are somewhat amphibious so it’s no surprise that they established a colony on Yersk. Their home system, Uin, is only a six hour hop away.
There’s no reason for anyone else to care about Yersk Prime so the system is just a hop point. Lots of traffic at the edges as ship’s hop in and out again.
My co-pilot and I were awake at the same time as we hopped in. One of her tasks was downloading the Feed for the latest updates. There was some automatic stuff, vidmail and the such, but the rest had to be grabbed manually.
I was checking the navorders, making sure all was in order when Kaylia tapped on the console. I turned to look and saw she was almost in tears.
“What?”
The planet.
She had to be talking about Storw and from her expression I knew it was going to be bad.
Hitting a couple buttons on one of my screens I brought up the latest news. It didn’t matter the channel, this wouldn’t be an unbiased report. The problem with such a large galaxy is that there is so much news out there and it’s all biased in some way. It’s hard to get an unfiltered view.
But for this it didn’t matter. Everyone would be saying the same thing the same way.
“Tragic news for the last remaining people on the planet Storw in the Wils System,” the newscaster was saying, a Kry. “The rogue asteroid’s close proximity has cracked the planet’s moon even more, sending l
arger shards to the planet’s surface. Striking the surface has caused massive earthquakes over the entire planet, increased storm activity and other natural disasters. Because of this, no more ships can land and the evacuation has been called off. Nearly five million Storwi remain on the planet.”
That was it then. The planet itself had days before the asteroid struck but for the people remaining, it was over. No ship would land in those conditions.
“Well damn,” I said shutting off the video.
I turned to Kaylia, tears running down her cheeks, crying silently.
All those people.
“I know kiddo.”
Walking over to her, I leaned down and pulled her tight. Her arms wrapped around me and she buried her head into my chest. I could feel her body shaking with silent sobs.
If we had never stopped to help, if she’d never met any of the Storwo, would she still have felt this bad about the planet’s doom? Probably. I knew that Kaylia was a smart kid, but I was also finding out how empathic she was as well. Wasn’t getting it from me. Empathy was not one of my strong points.
*****
The news spread quickly. We didn’t tell anyone but they got it through the Feed access that Torsi had set up. Didn’t know if it was her or one of the others that had caught the news segment, but it spread throughout the Wind.
Somber atmosphere, lots of crying. No anger, just more of the resignation. I was afraid of someone taking that anger out on the ship or other Storwo. Didn’t happen. It takes a long time for someone to stop looking at other races through the cultural filter of their race. All of us travelers through the galaxy based our reactions around our culture and judged others by those same guidelines. It wasn’t fair, but it was what it was. That was the baseline and sometimes, more often than not, people were able to change and start being more understanding of the cultural differences. Not expecting other races to react the same as theirs.
