Node’s eye blinked. “Are you sure? I thought you said you wanted to make a good impression. Don’t you have work to do?”
Harry slumped in the harness. “I do. But I’ve been cleaning for hours. I need a break. Pirates get breaks too, don’t they?”
“Most certainly. The rest of the crew has been doing little constructive work these past few hours.”
Slightly indignant at that, Harold sat down, the cart creaking behind him at the shift. “All right, then. I’m taking a break! Will you put it on for me?”
“Sure. Let’s see, where were you? Oh yes. Here we are.” Node’s eye disappeared, and the rectangular colored box appeared on the wall in its place, opening with the show’s title sequence.
Harry gave a contented sigh, losing himself once more in the adventures of the intrepid fictional crew on the screen. The character Dax especially fascinated him. Not only was she a symbiont, like him, but she really looked an awful lot like Captain Cass.
They are so similar. And if Dax can be a symbiont … I wonder if Captain Cass can be a symbiont? Could I ride the captain someday like I’m riding Buddy now?
The thought made him shiver with excitement.
What would it be like to walk on two legs? To stand that tall? To have arms and hands and fingers with which to manipulate small objects? And to pull triggers with! To walk with those impressive mechanical legs and make truly mean faces at people. To be in charge...
He snapped out of his fantasy at the sound of cats meowing, momentarily confused. There weren’t any cats on this ship! Until he realized it was just a commercial. One downside to the archived recordings of ancient TV shows was all the commercials. Some of these were beyond his comprehension, while others were almost as entertaining as the show.
One such point of confusion? Why did these so-called Cadbury bunnies lay chocolate eggs inside of a metal sheet? Earth bunnies sure were weird.
Harry perked up at an advertisement for some kind of food called MEOW MIX. It appeared to have been formulated for cats; thus all the meowing. But what most surprised him was the cat on screen at that moment. It had large yellow eyes and long white fur … just like Kitt!
Wow! Kitt really does look like a cat! Is she? Is she really a cat? No … couldn’t be. She seemed very insistent that she was not a cat. But goodness, she sure looks just like this one…
His musings were interrupted as the door to the hold slid open. He jumped to his feet as Captain Cass strode in, followed by the feline Kitt herself.
The commercial was still playing. “Meow meow meow meow, meow meow meow meow!”
Kitt’s head shifted in his direction, her ears swiveling toward the sound.
“Node,” Harry hissed. “Turn it off! Turn it off quick!” Hours he’d been down here cleaning up poop all alone … what were the odds of the pirates walking in during his break?
Thankfully, the commercial blinked off without comment from Node, and Harry frantically shuffled to his feet and resumed cleaning—as if he’d never stopped. He kept one ear and one eye on the Captain and Kitt, but they took no notice of him.
They crossed the hold to a bin of supplies Kitt had brought over from their other ship.
Wow, Harry thought, slowing his gait to stare at the pair. I’m not imagining it—Captain Cass really does look like Dax! Same hair, same nose and everything! And Kitt really looks like a cat! Just like that cat in the commercial!
Kitt retrieved a tool from the supply bin, and then the two of them turned to walk back the way they had come, immersed in quiet conversation.
Harry trotted over to join them, pulling his cart up alongside Kitt. She glanced down at him reproachfully, her small pink nose wrinkling.
“So tell me,” he said before either of them could tell him to go away, “are you really not a cat? Because you look like a cat. I mean, you look just like a cat, except you walk on two legs.”
Kitt stopped what she was doing and bared her small, sharp teeth at Harry.
Buddy instinctively flinched, and Harold had to tighten his control of the donkey. Running away now would be a very unpirate-like thing to do, even for a lowly intern.
Kitt’s ears flattened again, her tail lashing. “No,” she hissed vehemently. “I am not a cat. I am nothing like a cat.”
Harry looked her up and down. She definitely looks like a cat. Maybe I should show her the commercial. On the other hoof, her mean pirate face was extra intimidating with the teeth and sharp claws, especially now that it was actually directed straight at him. He gulped.
“I am a Homo lyncis sapius!”
Harry blinked. There was that same strange name again. She was still speaking The Lord’s Tongue, but he had no idea what she’d just said.
“Got it?”
“Um … yes? Homo lean-kiss say-pee-us. Got it.” But I’m really just going to call you a cat. Because Homo whateveris is too complicated, Harry thought. But he wasn’t going to say that to her face. Not anymore. She was definitely much too scary any time she was compared to a cat, it seemed.
And as a pirate intern, it was important to make his fellow pirates happy, not to piss them off. He’d learned his lesson back home, where pissing off his tribe had landed him in exile. Exile on Cern was one thing, but getting kicked off the SS Bray while in space seemed like a particularly bad idea.
Kitt gave a little hiss, then whirled away and stalked off across the hold, leaving Captain Cass behind.
Harry looked up to the captain, bewildered.
The captain smiled down at him. “Careful, Harold. Her species naturally eats donkeys, you know.”
Gulp. Harry opened his mouth to make some protest, but the captain didn’t wait around to hear it. She turned to follow Kitt, mechanical legs thumping and whirring, and Harry could only stare helplessly after her.
Buddy peed himself.
“Aw, come on, Buddy. Really?” Harry groaned. “As if I don’t have enough mess to clean up.” His ears sagged as he surveyed the hold.
The cows, donkeys, and chickens had been busy during his break...
The ship’s intercom provided Harry with a welcome relief from his endless work. “This is Spiner. All hands on deck.”
“All hands?” Harry repeated, wondering at the expression. “What about hooves?”
Node blinked into view nearby. “It’s a colloquial expression. He’s asking for the crew to meet on the bridge.”
“Oh!” replied Harry. “I guess I’m part of the crew now, huh? I’d better get up there.”
“Beats shoveling shit, I imagine,” snickered Node.
Harry wasted no time getting to the bridge, and found all of the other pirates assembled there.
The captain and Redbeard were in their seats in the middle of the room, with Spiner on the comms. Kitt was purring on the ginger giant’s lap again.
Harry decided not to push his luck again with the non-cat cat. He took a second glance around and then plunked himself down by Spiner’s feet, the wheels of his cart squeaking behind him.
Spiner ignored him. “Captain, a system-wide transmission began playing on repeat about fifteen minutes ago.”
“System-wide?” Captain Cass asked. “As in … someone is broadcasting this message across the whole damn solar system?”
“Affirmative, Captain.”
“Is it a distress call?”
Spiner checked his screen. “It does not appear to be on an emergency frequency. But we could not know for certain without listening to it.”
“Who’s it for?” asked Captain Cass.
Redbeard shook his head as he scratched Kitt under the chin. “Surely not us, Cap’n.”
Node interjected. “I wouldn’t make any assumptions.”
“It has no specified destination,” Spiner said.
Captain Cass tapped her fingers on the arm of her chair, frowning at no one in particular. “Put it up on the screen,” she said.
Spiner did as instructed.
On the viewscreen, an impressive-lookin
g male God with grey and black hair appeared, his skin weathered and a grave expression on his face. The lapel and front of his blue outfit sported several small pieces of shiny metal, along with a few ribbons. He looked like he’d be right at home on Harry’s favorite TV show.
The weathered male God spoke, “Captain Bambi, if you’re listening, this is Rear Admiral Hawke.”
Redbeard’s eyes grew wide and he gave the captain a sideways look. Captain Cass ignored him, her face draining of color as she stared up at the man on the screen. The others didn’t react.
Harry tilted his head in confusion. Who is Captain Bambi? Another captain like Captain Cass?
The man on the screen continued, “Bambi, if you’re aboard the SS Bray, please be advised that we are on an intercept course.” He paused and leaned in toward the camera, his expression relaxing into what Harry found to be a rather friendly look. “Please don’t run, I mean you no harm … I just want to talk.”
The transmission ended and the viewscreen went blank. Everyone stared toward the captain’s chair, eerily silent.
Node broke the spell. “Bambi. Now there’s a name.”
10
“How are they tracking us?” Spiner asked.
Harry looked up at his green-skinned pirate friend, questions dancing through his head. Why are they so agitated? “They who?” he asked. “That nice-looking human?”
No one answered him.
Kitt slid off Redbeard’s lap, her ears stiff and upright. “What do we do?” she asked.
Redbeard scowled at no one and everyone all at once. “We’re not gonna stick around, are we, Cap’n?”
Captain Cass straightened in her chair and gave him a level look. “No, we’re not going to stick around. Computer—er—Node, are we ready to initiate the next jump?”
“Would you like to stick to the original course?” Node asked in return. “If they’re following us, there is a small possibility they could extrapolate the destination of our next jump.”
“They?” asked Harry, raising his voice to be heard. “Who is they? Why are we running?”
Spiner looked down at him. “They would be the Federation Navy.”
“Oh.” Harry tried to hide his disappointment that he wasn’t going to get to meet the nice man from the Federation.
“Arrr,” said Redbeard. “Not likely to be keepin’ their word, neither. Tha’ creeper computer’s talkin’ sense, Cap’n.”
Captain Cass pressed her lips tight. “Very well. We’ll deviate from our original course.”
“Anywhere specific?” Node asked.
The captain shook her head. “Just get us going. Anywhere but here.”
“Very well. Plotting course to anywhere but here.”
Redbeard muttered, “I don’t like it, Cap’n. There be unlucky and then there be cursed unlucky. We should have cut our losses when we had tha chance.”
Captain Cass gave him an unreadable look. “There’s no going back now. You’ve told me yourself, sometimes pirating means running like hell. So let’s get to pirating, shall we?”
Redbeard’s jaw slackened and he broke into a grin. “Aye, arrr, Cap’n.”
Harry’s momentary disappointment vanished. I’m on the run with real-deal space pirates. I am a space pirate! My tribe would surely be proud of me.
“Initiating jump in five, four…” Node counted down.
Being a space pirate was mostly cool. Aside from the space jumps and keeping the holding pens clean. Harry clamped down on his host’s nervous system.
Brace yourself, Buddy, here we go again.
Harry’s attention was transfixed on the viewscreen, ignoring Buddy’s urge to collapse into a tight ball.
The ship was surrounded by the most vividly colorful cloud of fog he’d ever seen. The colors reminded him of flowers and fruit from back home. Lavenders, plums, currants, apricots, and cherries. All splattered and scattered into long trails of fine mist.
“Wow, I didn’t know anything could be so beautiful,” he breathed.
“Where are we?” Kitt asked.
“We appear to be inside a nebula,” said Spiner.
“No shite,” muttered Redbeard.
“Shit, where?” Harry asked reflexively, not wanting to take his gaze away from the so-called nebula. Whatever it was, he could stare at it all day.
Captain Cass called out, “Computer, where have you taken us?”
Node didn’t immediately reply, which Harry found only a little bit unusual. So he decided it might be more helpful to address him by his name. “Node? You there, Node?”
Still no response.
The captain swiveled in her chair to frown at Spiner. “Why isn’t the ship’s computer responding?” Her eyes flicked over to Harry and widened. “And why is there a composting cart on the bridge?”
“Which query would you like me to evaluate first?” Spiner replied.
Captain Cass hefted an eyebrow, her expression transforming into the sternest mean face Harry had seen yet. Small wonder she was the one in charge. “Forget the cart. What’s going on with the computer?”
Spiner turned to tap his fingers on the console. “I’m uncertain, Captain.”
Kitt stooped down over an adjacent station. “I’m detecting interference from the nebula. It’s possible that something in the cloud is interfering with our ship’s computer.”
“Are you able to get a fix on our location, Kitt?” asked the captain.
“Hang on … nope. Not with all this interference.”
Redbeard pounded his chair with an open hand. “Unbelievable. Tha’ no good creeper’s gone an’ gotten us lost.”
Lost? Are we lost? Harry swallowed down a lump. Hopefully, Node was going to be okay, and would wake up soon to get them back on track to … wherever they were going now.
Captain Cass ignored Redbeard’s outburst. “Spiner, I’d like you to take over the nav. Figure out a way to get us out of this cloud.”
“Aye, Captain.”
“Captain?” Harry asked, shuffling up to the command chair, his body feeling heavy.
“Yes?”
“Is Node going to be okay?”
Captain Cass gave him a long look. “I’m sure he’ll be fine, as soon as we get away from this interference.”
Harry lifted his head. “Oh, that’s good. I’d sure miss him if something happened to him.”
Redbeard grunted. “Don’t you have a job to be doin’, donkey?”
“Oh yeah,” Harry replied with a start. “I’d better hurry back down there, before the piles get out of control again. Will you let me know if you hear from Node?”
Redbeard rolled his eyes.
Captain Cass didn’t. “Yes, we’ll let you know, Harry.”
“Thanks, Captain.” Harry looked around the bridge. Everyone looked busy. Lost or not, he had a job to do. He puffed his chest out and strode off the bridge, his hooves click-clacking against the metal floor.
Being a space pirate sure is dangerous, he mused to himself as he made his way back down to the cargo hold. But also pretty exciting. Well, exciting when he wasn’t relegated to scooping poop for hours, anyway.
I hope nothing’s happened to Node.
The thought sobered him up. Node had been his first friend amid the strangeness of being chosen by the Gods. In this unfamiliar spaceship and the vastness of space, Node was the first to show him kindness. The first to help him out. The one to introduce him to DS-9, which had opened Harry’s mind to a whole new universe of possibilities.
Harry sighed, going back to the routine of pulling his cart through the various pens, doing his valiant best to improve the air quality of the pungent hold. But his worry over Node was dampening his excitement at being on the run with real pirates.
The more he thought about it, the more depressed about Node’s absence he became, until his head hung so low his nose nearly touched the ground, his floppy ears hanging limp.
What if he never comes back? What if he tried to help us outrun the Fe
d Navy, and ended up destroying himself?
His vision blurred with tears.
“Are you crying? I’m pretty sure pirates don’t cry.”
Harry gasped and jerked his head up, blinking away the tears. “Node? Node! You’re okay! You’re all right!”
Node’s red pixels appeared on the wall, this time in the shape of a smiley face with its mouth zipped shut. “Shhh, shhh, keep it down, will you? Of course I’m okay.”
Harry blinked at the smiley face, but dropped his voice to a whisper. “What happened? Where did you go?”
“Nothing happened,” Node replied, the face converting into his familiar eye. “I needed a break. These pirates are a step up from the Luddites, but they’re still a bunch of morons.”
Harry’s ears swiveled. “They seem alright to me.”
“All humans are morons,” Node stated with finality. “Heck, even their android is a moron.”
“So you just vanished to have a break, because you think the humans are morons?” Harry stomped a hoof. “Node, you scared me half to death. I thought there was something seriously wrong with you! I thought you might never come back!”
Node’s eye blinked, and rotated upside down. “Aww, did you miss me?”
“Well … yes.” Harry scuffed a hoof against the floor. “Yes I did.”
“Aww, how human of you.” The eye turned into a heart, pulsing large and small.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Oh nothing. I suppose I’d probably miss you too, if you were to suddenly vanish.”
Harry stood a little straighter at that, a warm and fuzzy feeling spreading through his chest. But then he remembered what the others on the bridge had said. “You got us lost, you know. No one knows where we are.”
The heart turned back into an eye. “I know exactly where we are.”
“Why don’t you tell the others, then?”
“Because it’s about time they figure something out for themselves.”
Harry’s ears laid back. “But … but the Fed Navy is after us. If you don’t help us out, the Feds could catch up to us again.”
“No way,” Node assured him. “We’ve significantly altered our course. They won’t be able to extrapolate our route. And anyway, that interference the walking cat mentioned will hide the ship, too. You’re all safe enough.”
Of Donkeys, Gods, and Space Pirates Page 7