Cosmic Captain: Chapter 18

“Who the drek is Derrick?” Talisaar griped at us, spinning his chair away from the control board.

“Gray’s friend. They were abducted together.” Lovath said it without a hint of jealousy, and it made me question if he’d meant all he said last night. I’d been worried he’d react badly about Derrick, maybe assume we’d been together, but he just took it in his stride.

Was he not jealous because he didn’t really care?

I knew that wasn’t fair. Did I want him to be upset or not? But he hadn’t even asked if Derrick was a lover or ex-lover. It felt like maybe he didn’t care either way, and just after saying he might love me.

“And how do we plan to do that between now and dropping Gray on Pretia?” Zenkara was the one who spoke. While Talisaar sat in the middle chair of the flight deck where most of the screens and control boards were accessible, there were two other chairs welded in to his left and right that had their own panel and large glass screen. Zenkara often sat at one, monitoring communication channels and reaching out to contacts.

“We’re not.” When I spoke, Talisaar raised a brow at me, questioning that I had any authority to say anything. He wasn’t even the one who fucking asked, and I didn’t let it waver my confidence. “After Pretia, we’ll look. I’m staying on board the Horizon with you guys.”

There was a long pause, before Talisaar simply said. “Okay.”

“You’re not…mad?”

“You fixed the cargo bay door. For a piece of contraband, you aren’t so bad.” The smallest hint of a smile played on Talisaar’s face, and I sagged in relief. That was the first time he’d said something teasing to me ever.

Maybe he didn’t hate me as much as I’d thought.

“I think it’s a great idea.” Zenkara beamed at me. As nu’jaro, all her teeth were razor sharp and serrated; unsurprisingly, nu’jaro weren’t much for kissing, or so I’d been informed. “Any info on this Derrick? What’s he look like?”

“We were abducted at the same time, and brought to Krida Q-5 Station. He’s taller than me and very muscular. He’s got kind of a crooked nose and facial hair if they didn’t laser it off like me. And he’s African Amer—” yeah, aliens had no clue what that fucking meant, “—he’s Black.” Except I’d been told the shukasi had black skin, but true black like space. “Well, humans put it that way. He has dark brown skin.”

I really hoped racism wasn’t a thing in space considering the people around me were green, purple, and orange.

“Humans come in colors other than pasty beige?”

I spluttered at Talisaar’s comment while Zenkara burst into giggles. “Pasty beige?” When I looked over to Lovath for some sort of defense, he just shrugged unhelpfully. Did he think I was pasty beige too?

My distress must have been apparent, because Lovath assured. “I like your skin color, ksiva.”

But he didn’t counteract Talisaar’s descriptor. “I’m not even that pale! We can’t all be fucking blue and purple, Tal.” I complained. There were tons of humans paler than me. I hadn’t seen the sun—or any sun—in ages though, so…that wasn’t doing me any favors.

Still snickering, Zenkara provided, “I’ll see if I can track him with just that. Hey, actually Gray, Kryn has a request for you.”

My stomach went all funny. I really liked Kryn, but the krexxian thing still got to me. “Yeah?”

“Said something about his medical equipment? Can you go see him in the med bay? I’ll start digging for some information on your friend. I’ll poke around at some of my contacts.” If she was trying to bribe me into going to see Kryn, it was working.

I knew where the med bay was, but I’d never been inside. Hospital environments had always made me panicky since I’d been in them so often as a kid. Even if I didn’t really remember much of my childhood at all, the hospital fear had lingered. Add to that two abduction experiences where I’d been just short of tortured in a clinical setting, and I was downright terrified to step foot anywhere that looked lab-like or like a doctor might be there.

“Sure, I’ll go see what he needs.” Did my voice sound hoarse? I supposed it was good practice for getting a new chip on Pretia, because I was certain some sort of sterile environment was necessary to be knocked out for the swap.

Lovath insisted on staying on the flight deck with Talisaar and Zenkara, because he was interested in how Zen was going to find the krexxians that sold me. That left me to tackle my fear alone. He knew I was wary of the med bay, and even knew part of why, but I’d never let on just how bad it was. If he understood, I was sure he’d go with me. I didn’t want to seem weak, though. Not when he’d just allowed me to stay on his ship.

The med bay was near the back of the ship where it widened out. From what I understood, it doubled as a gym of sorts, but I’d never wanted to watch Lovath work out enough to go in there with him. I stood in front of the door for far too long before swiping my hand over the control. The little, palm sized shelf that jutted out from the wall flashed green at me, and the door slid to the side.

The metal interior of the ship continued inside the med bay, but instead of metal grates the floor was solid like the personal quarters and flight deck. Nothing was white and sterile looking, so I allowed myself to take a deep breath at that. All sorts of machinery took up most of the room, and off in a smaller section was what looked like the equivalent of workout equipment.

Kryn’s back was to me, but he turned and smiled as he heard me come in. “Gray, perfect.” Walking up to me, he plopped a tablet in my hands. “Think you can figure out why my medical scanner isn’t working? Screen keeps glitching out.” In the next breath he presented me a hand held device that had a large screen on the front.

The screen was, in fact, flashing all sorts of errors. “You think I can? I can’t even read what the errors say.” Even as I said it, I was already sliding myself into the metal booth and table I spotted in the corner and connecting the tablet to the device. “Can you read the errors to me?”

“I can teach you to read Common in general if you like.” Kryn slid into the opposite side of the booth.

“Is that what this is?” I motioned to the squarish symbols flashing on the screen. The coding language I’d been learning used some of the same symbols, but I hadn’t needed to learn what they actually meant to learn how they were relevant to the code. Plus, Lovath had set up an English translator on my tablet.

“It is. You are not accustomed to unspoken languages, are you?” Kryn, when he spoke at all, tended to speak very formally. Or at least, that was how many translator seemed to interpret his words. I was also a little offended.

“Humans write words, Kryn.”

He laughed, all four of his solid black eyes crinkling at the corners. “I am aware. But do you have languages that are not spoken at all?”

“Like a sign language.”

Kryn considered that. “Yes and no. We do have hand languages too, but this is not the same. Common is a writing system that has no spoken language attached at all. It can be very difficult to learn as an adult.”

I glanced back at the strange symbols flashing on Kryn’s medical scanner’s screen. He was right, that was a new concept to me. “Okay, you’ve got me there. Why is it not spoken?”

With a shrug of his pale gray shoulders, Kryn provided, “As you can see, translators work for spoken word but not written. Common needed to be legible to all, not spoken by all. Of late, you could probably implant some corneal readers to translate writing for you, but those are costly and not provided to Shukasi citizens for free.”

That made a nonsensical kind of sense. I was still wrapping my mind around the whole legal versus illegal microchip thing that Lovath had explained to me the night before. Despite how wasted I’d been, I had remembered what he’d said.

“Fine then. Teach me to read Common and I’ll work on this scanner.”

“You’re sure? You’ll have to be in here every day for months, if not longer.” Kryn waved around to the med bay that I had totally forgotten I was sitting in. I found that I wasn’t nervous at all; it didn’t smell like a hospital, and while I was certain that all the equipment was sterile—Kryn was a meticulous bastard—it didn’t have that detached, clinical vibe.

Kryn being krexxian didn’t scare me either. I had a natural wariness around him but I knew he was a good dude—as good as a smuggler could be—and had the most bleeding heart of the crew. Plus, he was jacked, not like all the willowy krexxians I’d been around before, and it wasn’t like they all looked the same. His features were unique from the aliens that had abducted me.

“I have no problem with—wait, how did you know I’m not going to be staying on Pretia?” I questioned. Had Lovath told him over their communicators? That’s what those things on their arms did, I’d learned; it was a wrist implant that created a holographic display circling the forearm when activated, and was mainly a communication device. Like a cell phone but embedded in your skin. They called it a ‘jabber’ in casual conversation.

I was going to ask for one of those, too.

Kryn snorted in disbelief. “Lovath is the greediest, most possessive bastard I know. It’s why he turns such a high profit on jobs. If he wants something, it’s his. I am surprised to learn he gave you an option to leave the ship at all.”

“And…you’re saying Lovath views me as his?”

With solid black eyes—no irises or sclerae to speak of—Kryn couldn’t exactly roll them. But the slight tilt of his head and squint of his eyes got the point across. “Aren’t you?” The blandness of his tone was an eyeroll in and of itself.

Okay, rude.

“Just read me what the error on this thing says.”