Her level gaze pinned him in place. “I need you to get down to the cargo hold and keep it clean, Harold. Keep the rest of those animals safe. After all, they are our payday ... if we can disentangle ourselves from our Federation shadow.”
Harry straightened and stamped a hoof in lieu of a salute. “Aye, aye, Captain! Can do!”
A spy … could there really be a spy on board?
Harry pondered the question as he went about his cleaning duties in the hold. Suddenly, every chicken, every cow seemed suspicious. He eyed them as he pulled the compost cart along the floor of their pens, searching for any abnormal behaviors.
That chicken … did it stare at him a little too long?
That cow … he hadn’t seen it chewing its cud lately … right?
It was so hard to tell! And then there was his own herd. He knew them all by sight and smell, and none of them were spies, he was sure of that.
Well … none of them had been spies when they’d been abducted, anyway. But, Harry had spent quite a lot of time lately outside of the hold. It was possible a shifter or a clone or something else just as nebulous could have replaced one of his herd while he was gone. After all, the security chief on DS9 could turn into a puddle!
And if a character on DS9 could do it, surely a creature in Harry’s galaxy could do it, too. Captain Cass looked like Dax, and the Federation ships looked like the Borg … it was almost as if Harry’s world was a parallel universe to the one in Deep Space 9!
The thought stopped Harry in his tracks, and a shiver ran through Buddy’s skin.
Whoa. Maybe it really is a parallel universe, and not fiction at all!
But, it was time to shake himself from such deep thoughts. He could ponder the truths of his universe and DS9 later. Right now, he had a spy to find.
And any one of these pee puddles on the floor right now could be that spy. Harry stopped at the nearest one, staring down at his reflection in the glossy surface.
How could he tell if this puddle was a spy?
He wasn’t entirely sure. And if it did turn out to be a spy, what then? He had no weapons, no real fighting skills.
He’d gotten lucky during that incident with Dillbilly, when he was able to catch the merchant off guard. Harry wasn’t sure how he’d fair against a real spy.
Sure, he had Buddy’s sharp little hooves, a decently powerful hind-kick, and a bite that could sever fingers, but what was all that against a trained operative with a secret agenda?
Harry’s ears flattened. I really gotta get the captain to give me a weapon. Swallowing hard, he lifted one front hoof and cautiously began to lower it toward the puddle. Maybe if he just poked it … maybe if it was a changeling spy, they would reveal themselves.
A part of him thrilled at the possibility that he could be the one to discover who or what was reporting their position to the Feds. How proud Captain Cass would be of him! And Redbeard and Kitt … surely they’d both be impressed!
The other part of him was terrified at the thought of discovering such a thing. If only he had some kind of real weapon, he’d feel so much more confident in his ability to apprehend a spy.
He paused, hoof in mid-air, and hesitated. Buddy’s heart was pounding, no doubt picking up on Harry’s own apprehension.
“What,” Node’s dry tone suddenly rang out across the hold, “in the name of all my blessed circuits are you doing?”
Harry startled at the voice and backpedaled quickly away from the puddle. “I’m … I’m checking for spies.”
“In … a puddle of urine?” Node appeared as a giant red question mark on the nearest wall. “You really think those puddles could be any kind of threat, other than to your sense of smell? Or, I suppose, as a slip hazard…”
Harry looked up to the question mark. “Well, maybe. I mean, Odo in DS9 could change into a puddle, remember?”
The question mark resolved into the familiar eye. “Ah, I see. Ha! Ha ha ha. I’m afraid that TV show might have gotten into your head a bit too much, Harold.”
Harry cocked his head to one side, ears perked. “What does that mean?”
Node sighed. “It means there are no spies in the pee puddles. That’s what it means.”
Harry squinted at Node’s eye. “But how can you be sure? If it happened on DS9, it could happen here, too!”
The red eye rolled around. “No way. I’m telling you. Look, would it make you feel better if I did a scan of the ship for any unfamiliar or unregistered life forms?”
Harry’s eyes widened. “You can do that?”
“Of course.”
“Why didn’t you say so before!?”
The eye fixed back on Harry. “Because I didn’t think you’d resort to stepping in pee puddles.”
“Yes!” Harry nodded vigorously. “Yes, scan the ship!”
He backed further away from the puddle he’d been investigating, just in case it was a spy. He could just imagine the angry reaction, if its secret was discovered.
“Okay. Stand by…” The eye morphed into a red hourglass, slowly spinning end to end.
Harry tensed and held his breath, waiting for the results.
A minute ticked by.
Buddy’s lungs burned, and Harold released his breath, gasping. Good grief, how long would this scan take? The hourglass was still spinning, going round and round.
Harry waited another minute, his tail swishing impatiently. He sighed. “Uh, Node?”
No reply.
Harry waited some more. He pawed at the floor. “Nooooode?”
Only the silent hourglass answered him.
He glanced around the hold at the other animals, all munching at their hay or dozing quietly. What could possibly be taking so long? A little knot of anxiety settled in Harry’s gut.
Had Node found the spy, and the spy somehow disabled Node in return?
“Node?” he asked again, more urgently this time. “Node!”
The hourglass disappeared, replaced by a narrowed eye. “For the love of the Overseers, what?! I told you I was doing a scan! Couldn’t you see I was working?”
Harry breathed a sigh of relief, head and ears drooping. “Oh, whew! Node, I thought something bad had happened to you!”
“Bad? Like what? I told you I was going to scan the ship!”
“Well … I didn’t think it would take so long,” Harry admitted.
“I wanted to be thorough,” Node said. “And that was only two minutes and twenty-eight-point-five-seven seconds, by the way. But I have completed the scan. Would you like to hear the results?”
Harry braced himself. “Yes.”
“The results of the scan have determined there are no unfamiliar or unregistered life forms aboard this ship,” Node reported with satisfaction. “Just like I told you.”
Harry blinked. He glanced back down to the puddle of pee. “You’re sure?”
The eye moved up and down. “Absolutely sure. My scans have never been wrong.”
“And you even searched the puddles?”
Node sighed. “Yes, Harry. Even the puddles. And the manure. Everything. All over the ship. No one’s aboard who shouldn’t be aboard. If the Feds have been tracking us, it isn’t due to any undetected agents aboard this ship.”
Harry thought it over for a second, experiencing simultaneous relief and disappointment. His heroics would have to wait for another day. Preferably a day on which he had a proper weapon. “Well, all right. Thanks for checking, Node.”
“My pleasure. Now, you should probably get back to cleaning up the messes instead of trying to step in them.”
Harry looked about the hold again, realizing he’d fallen behind once more during his study of the suspicious puddle. “Oh. Right. Yeah. Sure.”
“Excellent.” Node’s eye winked off.
Harry sighed and resumed his cleaning duties, pulling the cart over the puddle in question. It mopped right up without protest.
It was some hours later when Harry was jolted from his deep thoughts regarding the
parallels between his world and DS9 by the captain’s announcement on the ship’s intercom: “Attention, all crew. Our technical assistance has arrived. Rendezvous at the bridge to receive instructions.”
“Ooo, technical assistance!” Harry wasn’t entirely sure what that meant, but he understood it would somehow get the Feds to stop following them around, and that would be ideal.
He trotted quickly over to the wall in the hold that housed the cargo showers and requested that Node unhook his cart. He’d learned better by now than to drag the smelly thing all over the ship.
Node helpfully obliged by engaging the robotic cargo loading arms, deftly unbuckling the harness and freeing Harry to go galloping along the halls unencumbered.
He arrived triumphantly on the bridge at the same time as Kitt. Redbeard, Spiner, and the captain were already there, waiting at their usual stations.
Harry stood at attention at the back of the bridge, and waited for orders from his captain.
Captain Cass was staring at the viewscreen, which currently featured the beautiful swirl of colors that was the nebula.
“Technical assistance,” she said, “we’ve received your hail, but do not have visual. I repeat, we do not have visual on your location.”
The comms crackled with a bit of static, and then an unfamiliar voice came through. “Copy that, Captain. My apologies, I forgot to uncloak. Standby.”
A second later, a part of the nebula in front of them shimmered, and a ship the likes of which Harry had never seen—not even on DS9—appeared out of nowhere. He gasped.
Captain Cass raised her eyebrows. But, if she was also caught off-guard, she didn’t let it show in her tone. “Visual confirmed. Thanks for your assist.”
“No problemo,” came the casual response. “That’s my job. I’ll need to dock with the Bray and get our team aboard to switch out your transponder. Permission to board, Captain?”
“Permission granted.”
“Aye, aye, Captain,” the voice responded. “Starting docking procedures now. Stand by.”
“Standing by.”
The strange ship drifted slowly to Harry’s right, and he watched open-mouthed.
It was the strangest spaceship he’d ever seen … not that he’d seen many spaceships in his life. But this one looked as if it had been constructed of pieces of other ships, all cobbled together to make one nonsensical whole.
On top of that, instead of a dull gray hull like most spaceships had, it was painted a dizzying design in bright colors. Antennas and radar dishes covered its uneven and patchwork surface. In short, it looked like a hippie shack, if hippie shacks could fly in space.
Captain Cass swiveled in her chair to face her crew, breaking the spell of the strange ship.
Harry’s gaze snapped back to her.
“All right, crew,” she said. “Let’s hope they’re able to clean this ship of any bugs, and get the Feds off our ass.”
“Aye, arrr!” Redbeard agreed, thumping his fist on the arm of his chair.
“I want all of you to be at the tech team’s beck and call,” she continued. “Do whatever you need to do to assist them in getting the Bray’s transponder refit. I want us fixed up and on the move again as fast as possible. Understood?”
A chorus of enthusiastic affirmatives answered her.
“Good.” She swiveled back to face the viewscreen again, where the brightly painted ship had once more disappeared from view, but this time not because of a cloaking device.
There was a brief thump from somewhere aft and starboard—to the rear and right, Harry reminded himself—then the male voice came through the comms again. “We are secure, Captain. Boarding crew is prepped and ready when you are.”
“Confirmed,” Captain Cass answered, pushing herself up from her chair. Her legs whirred as she did so. “We are en route to meet you.”
Harry followed the pirates down to the starboard airlock, where they paused in front of the cycling doors.
This is going to be so cool. I get to meet more badass pirates! Harry attempted to compose himself, putting on his best mean face, as befitted a proper pirate intern.
Kitt stared down at him. “What are you doing?”
Harry attempted to return her stare, keeping the mean face firmly in place. “I’m getting my pirate face on, of course. How do I look?”
Kitt’s tail arced and flicked slowly behind her. “Never mind.”
Redbeard unslung his rifle from his back and stepped up to the door controls.
Captain Cass crossed her arms, eyeing her second-in-command. “Red, what are you doing?”
“Takin’ precautions, Cap’n,” he replied. “Shall I let them in?”
“Fine. But try to be nice for a change.”
Redbeard’s eyes glinted as he reached out to punch a button. “I don’t know tha’ meanin’ of such words, Cap’n.”
The doors hissed as they cycled open, and Spiner took a step forward with his scanner out, blocking Harry’s view. “Reading one life form. No weapons,” he said.
Harry’s mean face nearly slipped as he tried to position himself around Spiner’s legs.
Redbeard’s hulking figure obscured the remainder of Harry’s view. The man’s shoulders sagged in disappointment as he slung the rifle over his back again.
“Let me see, let me see,” Harry whined.
“Pirate intern Harold.” A cold thrill ran down Harry’s spine as Captain Cass invoked his name in a blistering tone. “Absolutely no whining while on pirate business.”
Harry stiffened with embarrassment and clamped his mouth shut. Hopefully, the approaching pirate hadn’t caught any of that…
“Step out of the way, big fella,” came a nasally voice.
Redbeard’s chin dropped down as he stepped to the side of the door.
“Welcome to the SS Bray,” said Captain Cass.
A rotund, squat, furry fellow with short legs, shorter arms, and dexterous fingers stepped past the doors into the cargo hold. His snout dominated his round, brown face and black beady eyes. Disproportionately small compared to the body, the fellow’s head appeared to be mounted directly to the torso. His flight suit was covered with holsters and straps, each with several mechanical-looking attachments.
The poor guy has no neck, Harry thought to himself. While the new pirate arrival didn’t appear to be much of a badass, Harry supposed it must take a lot of fortitude to go through life without being able to turn your head.
But then, defying expectations, the new pirate’s head swiveled to take in the crew of the SS Bray. He peered at Harry over oval spectacles.
Glasses, that’s what Sisko called them on DS9, Harry thought.
The squat pirate addressed Harry directly, ignoring the other pirates. “Hi, I’m Norman Bieber.”
Mean pirate face completely forgotten, Harry was excited to introduce himself to a new potential friend. “Beaver?” he asked.
“No, Bieber. Bee-brrrrr.”
“Oh. Are you cold?”
Norman studied Harry for a long moment, chewing on his lower lip with oversized top teeth. “I’m never cold.”
Captain Cass coughed, interrupting the exchange before Harry could supply the visitor with his own name.
Norman shifted and peered at the captain. “You must be the captain. Impressive power armor.”
Captain Cass ignored the compliment. “You must be the mechanic. Where’s the rest of the boarding party?”
Norman’s black nose twitched and twisted at the end of his snout, as if he were smelling the crew. More likely he was picking up the various scents coming from the livestock. Or Redbeard.
“I am the boarding party,” he replied. “In fact, I’m the crew, too. My department doesn’t waste its resources on people. More money for all the toys … err, I mean, tools.”
“Fascinating,” Spiner said. “How do you pilot your ship all by yourself?”
“Automation,” Norman replied quickly. “Crew are really an unnecessary luxury. These days, sh
ips can practically fly themselves with the right person at the helm.”
Node’s disembodied voice came out of nowhere. “Amen to that. Well, the first part. Crew are exceedingly unnecessary. In fact, they tend to make everything more difficult.”
“Computer,” said Captain Cass. “Stow it.”
“It’s going to take you a while to forgive me, isn’t it?” Node asked.
“Yes.”
“Fine. I’ll find something better to do.”
“Do that.”
“Oh, I will, Captain. Goodbye.”
Harry felt bad for his friend. But Node had been less than honest with the pirate crew. And, as Harry had seen happen within his own tribe, being dishonest was a good way to lose friends.
Redbeard stared down at Norman with a funny look on his face.
Norman seemed to have a sixth sense. Or maybe it was just his nose. He glanced up at the ginger giant. “You smell worse than my brother, big fella. And you’re uglier, too.”
A frown twisted Redbeard’s face.
Uh oh, Harry thought.
Unexpectedly, the burly redhead burst into laughter. “Arrr, harr harr harr. Yer a funny little effer!”
The corners of Norman’s mouth didn’t budge, but with his two overhanging front teeth, he always appeared to be smiling. “Now, then,” Norman said, turning back to face the captain. “I believe you were requesting some technical assistance. Shall we get to it?”
A few hours later, Norman had finished with all of his technical assistance, whatever that meant. Something about sweeping the ship for bugs and changing transponder codes. Harry was really going to have to brush up on how spaceships actually worked, at some point.
But Harry didn’t get another chance to interact with the rotund, furry mechanic before he departed the Bray. His pirate intern duties had kept him far too busy. Hopefully, Harry mused, I’ll get a chance to talk to him again sometime.
Back on the bridge once more, the crew made preparations to resume their trip to Irrakis and collect their payday.
“Thanks again for the assistance,” Captain Cass said into the comms.
“You bet,” came the quick, nasally reply from Norman. “Sorry I didn’t find any bugs. But, between the new transponder and replacement circuitry in the environmental systems, the SS Bray should look like an entirely different ship to any outside sensors.”
Of Donkeys, Gods, and Space Pirates Page 13