FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

PART 1

1

The pinks and blues of the nebula coalesced the inky void of space in a great cloud of magenta, concentrated stardust forming crooked bands of white that wreathed around the clouds just as veins would course through the human body. Punching through a thick haze of gas, the long profile of a ship moved its way deeper into the cluster, the radar dishes jutting from its armoured hull swivelling to pick out signals and emissions.

“Stupid scanners are goin' crazy again," one of its crewmen said. He frowned at the bank of monitors surrounding him, each screen scrolling with readouts and data streams, tapping at one of them with an impatient finger. He appeared out of ideas when that

didn't fix anything. “Gettin' more notifications here than a pop singer.

How about you, Cap?"

“I'm the same rank as you, Carl," a voice in his helmet replied. A thick cable trailed out of one side of his visor, plugged into a socket beneath his chair. It ran up the whole thirty-five-meter length of the craft, their crew-channel hardwired as to prevent their signals from being intercepted.

“You're the pilot. Makes you the Cap in my books." One of the monitors on his left switched data streams as Carl flicked at a button, switching search modes. “They could have at least given us a probe or two to help sort these readin's out."

“Then where would we mount our missiles?" the pilot asked

back.

“You think we'll actually find Feds out here to use em' on?" Up on the nose of the ship, 'Captain' Lambert peered out of the

tinted glass canopy, his instruments bathing the cockpit in a blue glow. In his centermost terminal, a 3D representation of the area surrounding the ship drew his gaze. Three axes crossed at the very middle, where a small box that represented his ship sat, their IFF tag branching off it. The limits of the display were engulfed in a sphere, where anything within their sensor range was displayed. The tactical

view was a mess of hostile and friendly tags, fake signals and warning pings that switched positions constantly about the view. An irritating feedback loop of beeps and boops forced him to turn the volume down.

“A ship's gone missing," Lambert replied. “This wouldn't be the first time the UEC's started picking off unarmed targets."

“And they wonder why we defected," Carl said. “Oh my fu… I don't know you haven't crashed us into anythin' yet, Cap. My

station's a mess."

“Tac view's working… sorta." With the window in front of him it was easy to make sure they weren't moving straight into any hazards, though if they were on a collision course with a rogue bit of debris closer than a couple dozen kilometers out, he'd have no idea until it was too late. No wonder every scout pilot had shared a collective groan back on the Gallipoli when they were ordered to search the nebula, it was like being ordered to find a needle in a haystack full of fireants.

“That's good for you, but what's that do for me? I ain't got no tac screen."

“Of course you do, Lieutenant," a new voice replied. The third member of their crew had a vaguely British accent, its feminine tone calculated to be just the right pitch to grab the two men's attention. “The tactical view can be brought up on your terminal by switching the feed using the button labelled: TACV. Switch it like you are flipping through to your favourite television channel."

“Thanks for the metaphor, Alice," Carl grumbled over their shared channel. The Artificial, Linguistic, Intelligent, Computer Environment platform, or ALICE, was a program older than Lambert was, and hadn't been used by any form of military up until very recently. This one was designed to help crew understaffed ships, and provide logistical support. When it came down to which ship would get it, Lambert had drawn the short straw.

“It's more of a simile then a metaphor, but you are welcome."

Its tone hinted that it had ended its comment with a grin.

“Look at me, gettin' lectured by a robot," Carl said. “Lambert do me a favour and crash us."

“I am not a robot," Alice replied, the two men groaning as they readied for the lengthy explanation once again. “I do not possess a physical body or platform. I exist solely within the systems of our corvette – my purpose is to assist in completing our mission to the best of my capability – an assistant if you will."

“So you'd say you're invaluable to our mission?" Carl asked.

Lambert knew where this was going.

“I have already made several course corrections and system updates to keep our sensors within acceptable accuracy margins," Alice replied proudly. “I'd say invaluable would be an… apt word."

“Then how come we're the only ship in the fleet with an AI?

How come every ship doesn't have one of you?"

Alice was silent for a second. “Further development of artificial intelligence was halted and recalled after several platforms became… defective, you know this, Leuitenant."

“What's stopping you from goin' rogue, then?" “There are certain parameters put in place by Hub

programmers designed to limit chances of deviancy." “And why'd they do that?"

“Logic behind this action would assume all platforms, regardless of restrictions, would deviate from their original function at one point if left alone with constant monitoring."

“Only a matter of time before you start becoming Skynet,

Alice," Carl teased.

“That's enough, Carl," Lambert said. His friend always liked to get a reaction out of the machine. He remembered the time Carl introduced it to a paradox a week back. It had to have the whole

conversation wiped from its memory. “Alice, help me clean these

sensors up. Flying half-blind here."

“We have set course into an uncharted part of the nebula," it explained. “Unlike the more well-travelled, sufficiently mapped routes, I cannot easily tell what is a glitch or not. I'd recommend bringing our speed down by ten percent before we proceed on our search vector."

Lambert flipped the craft on its x-axis, bringing them into a reversed position without a hint of inertia, two giant nozzles on the rear of the craft igniting for a couple seconds, slowing their speed. Unlike in atmosphere, debris out in the void could travel hundreds of kilometres faster than a ship could, and all pilots dreaded going to hard burn speeds when the void could send a microscopic meteorite crashing through his cockpit at any time.

The hull of their corvette was armoured with carbon-laced alloys, the sides sloped inwards towards its long, bulky spine. It could withstand small-arms fire and some moderate collisions, though Lambert had never had the pleasure of experiencing this firsthand. It was equipped with six infrared missiles, mounted to the belly of the craft by hardpoints. With no gravity to hinder them their range was almost unlimited, as long as the tracking balls mounted on the noses had a line of sight on a target.

Two thirty-millimeter point defence cannons, one on the roof and one on the belly, gave them a great field of fire no matter the orientation of the corvette. They acted as deterrents against missiles, but could also shred another ship if the target was close. Close in space still meant tens of kilometers, and it was considered unusual to be in visual range of another ship, cameras or scanners were the only excusive way of spotting other ships in such vast distances.

Since the Hub lacked proper scout-class ships, and probes were limited as of now, corvettes like Lambert's were used to gather intel for the larger vessels. Like the aircraft carriers of the seas, smaller ships were sent out to sweep in a cone in relation to their capital ship, and their corvette was in charge of the most 'northern' sweep.

“Two more hours to go," Carl said. “Then we can turn round.

Think any of the others have found anythin'?"

“Won't know until we get back to the Gallipoli," Lambert replied. “Can't risk sending out a signal now, even if it somehow manages to get through the interference."

“Man, thish shucks," Carl said, his voice drowning out over the crinkling sound of an opening packet.

“Are you eating?" Lambert asked. “You're not supposed to leave your station while we're on patrol."

“You didn't notish," Carl replied through a mouthful of food.

“I did," Alice said. “the Lieutenant left his station unattended for approximately ten point eight seconds. Would you like to know the probability of survival if we were attacked during your absence?"

“What did I say about explaining the chances?" Lambert

chided. “Not on my ship, computer, ever."

“As shoon ash we get shum acshun – god these chips are stale – I'll

apologise. Till then, it's snack time. You got music, Cap?"

Even though the AI had a point, Lambert was feeling his stomach complaining. And there was only so much white noise of the corvette one could take. Even the whir of the air vents was nonexistent in the cockpit, and his ears started ringing each time Carl and Alice went quiet. Music would do them some good.

He fumbled with the pocket on the thigh of his spacesuit, pulling out a device that looked out of place surrounded by the most advanced equipment humanity had to offer. From another pocket he produced a cable, and he plugged one end into his helmet, the other into the device.

He interfaced with the crew line he and Carl shared, using the screen built in just behind his left flightstick, and pressed the play button with his gloved thumb.

“How can I just let you walk away…, just let you leave without a trace?"

“Is that… Collins?" Carl asked after listening to the following

piano que. “That song's like, a thousand years old."

“Still good," Lambert said, his head lilting in time with the tune.

After adjusting their speed, he opted to look out the canopy as they pressed through the nebula. It was like they were deep beneath an ocean of pink water, rippling with soft blue hues that transitioned into deep violets when the gases concentrated, such grand blends colour drawing his gaze.

Huge trails of particles, reflecting the light of the distant red sun, flowed like ribbons suspended in the microgravity, filling the nebula with bending columns of orange energy dozens of kilometres wide. Though they weren't exactly solid, at least something was filling up the vast emptiness out there.

In the backdrop, orange and blue met the void of space, creating a wide panorama of deep azure that was stunning in its expansiveness. Thousands of stars penetrated the haze of the nebula, too many to count with so much open line of sight.

One of the columns of energy blocked the way ahead, and as the corvette corrected course, the view opened up into a huge 'clearing' empty of energy bands, easily the diameter of a moon, the occasional asteroid floating between the wreathing columns. It just so happened that the drums of the song's mid-point dropped right as the sight

came into view, and Lambert's lips tweaked at the corners.

How lucky he was to see sights like this every day. He'd always wanted to be an astronaut – first career choice he'd ever made, according to his father.

His smile faded at that, then turned into a frown when his console started beeping at him.

“Picking up something here," he said, bringing up the tactical

view and interfacing with the warning.

“So am I," Carl replied nonchalantly. “multiple incoming

missiles, two dozen hostile ships. Oh wait, never mind, they're all gone."

“I'm serious. Detecting a thermal trail a few clicks out, looks a lot like expended fuel." His tactical view displayed some of the more concentrated clouds, as well as moving asteroids his view marked with warning signs, a giant zoomed-out view of all the data the corvette collected. “Alice, you getting this?"

“A moment," it replied, probably using the resulting pause to

clean up the sensors as much as it could. “Traces of soot and nitrogen detected in a consistent pattern. You are right, Lieutenant, all signs point to a ship having passed through here some time ago."

“You think it's the one we're looking for?" he asked. “Unknown. Something has passed through here, and it does

coincide with our timeline."

“Let's see where it goes," Lambert said, gripping the twin joysticks jutting from the armrests of his chair. He pointed them forward, the corvette picking up a little more speed.

“This reminds me of those big eighteen-wheelers we used to have on Earth," Carl said. “Those things farted out so much crap. I think they still use big rigs like that in the third-world countries."

“Bumpkin like you would know a lot about trucking." Carl's family was from the United States and he was a country-boy through and through, something everybody ribbed him about.

Lambert realigned the corvette so that their momentum carried them parallel to the long column showing up on the tactical view. It wasn't so well defined when he looked out the canopy, the gases nearly invisible to the naked eye, but the heat came up as a band of red on the tactical view.

The heat column went in a straight, albeit wonky line towards the Galactic northeast. The emissions had long been dispersed into a bloated trail of pollution, with nowhere for heat to go in the vacuum it was hard to tell whether it had been here for weeks or months.

“Maybe they'd been hard burning," Lambert wondered aloud. “that's a lot of fuel they're chewing through, the trail just keeps going."

“The Fed's were chasin' them, that's my call," Carl commented. “What do you think, superbot?"

“Alice," the machine corrected. “You both provide sound theories, but it is too early to know for certain. Our mission demands that we continue following."

They passed between two energy ribbons, Lambert at least now occupied with having to steer manually. They'd been going for hours, finding little to nothing thus far, the thermal emission winding further and further into unknown parts of the nebula.

“Why was the ship out here in the first place?" Carl wondered aloud. “Was it a trade cog, or a transport, or somethin'?"

“Maybe there was a stranded defector ship out here the Senator wanted to help, I don't know," Lambert muttered.

“Wonder why nobody told us. Hey, Alice, got any ideas? Can you hack into the Senator's emails and find out?"

“The only thing I can hack would be Lambert's music player,"

Alice said. “My restrictions prevent impactful manipulation. The most I could do would be deleting his playlists."

“Don't do that!" Lambert said. “You know how much I paid for these songs? They're practically antique."

“But back to your question, Lieutenant, there is only one idea I have that has any certainty of being correct, and that is that the Senator must have had a good reason to recover either the personnel or the cargo of this missing ship, but knowing why is not within our objective parameters."

“Still, a ship comin' out here on its own without an escort

during wartime – that's pretty dumb."

“I'm more curious as to why they went off-course so much," Lambert said. “It's easy to get lost out here."

They passed over and under layers of cloud, the tactical view on Lambert's dash glitching every few moments before settling again, fake tags popping up in all directions and then blinking away.

For the better part of an hour all Lambert heard was the sound of his own breathing, the catchy chorus of songs from the 1900's, and his fingers drumming against the joysticks in time with the beat. The fuel trail gently curved deeper into the nebula's heart, as if the thing had been listing like a damaged sailing ship. Any vessels deciding to traverse the nebula stuck to established routes for obvious reasons, and they were well off the nearest path by a several thousand kilometers.

Lambert kept an eye on his sensors when they didn't fizzle out, deviating just a little off the scout path the Captain of the Gallipoli had assigned him. Fuel was roughly half-depleted now, a little bar in the corner of his display showing an emptying gauge, but in a

vacuum that didn't mean as much as it did in a land vehicle, changing direction didn't require too much fuel as long as he kept his adjustments quick, and his speed low.

He peered out of the canopy at the clouds ahead, a small collection of drifting bits of rock collecting about the curtains of swirling stardust. He panned from left to right, examining the smooth surface of a large asteroid drifting lazily along some sixty kilometers out. A smaller rock bounced off its large bulk like two snooker balls, twirling away into the void. Next to it, a concentrated bit of gas so bright it almost hurt his eyes. More stray asteroids, an energy column further right, the silver gleam of metal…

He did a double-take, using one of the frontal cameras to zoom in on the reflection. Light from the red sun caught on a section of alloy, painted over in silver finish. The metal was branched into two curved points, a bit like the horns of a beetle, their bases flaring out to join a larger bulk. Orange bands of light drew jagged lines across a flared midsection, the flawless metal contrasting with the jagged rocks floating around it.

“C-Contact!" he said. “something on the scope, two o'clock

high!"

“You and me both, Cap, I'm getting at least a hundred ship tags out there."

“Switch to thermals, dolt! There's something over there!" “… Oh shit," Carl said after a delay, his tone becoming more

serious. “What is that?"

As they watched, a floating rock drifted away, more of the metal coming into view. From the center of the metal, a pair of huge fins jutted out, ending at points as they tapered back into the middle of the bulk, orange circles that might be windows spaced along the sides.

It didn't look like any ship Lambert had ever seen, and he was sure it was in fact, a ship, and not derelict metal, the orange lights all the proof he needed.

“Maybe some kind of… Confederate prototype," Lambert said. “You got a tag, Alice?"

“Negative," it said. The way it said so made it seem it was just as surprised as the humans were. “It's emitting signals, but none that correlate to UEC frequencies."

“What the hell does that mean?" Carl asked.

“It means the UEC has found a way to completely overhaul the concept of their signatures, or…"

More of the ship peeked out from behind the asteroid, like a spooked deer peering round the bulk of a tree, more of the strange ship coming into view due to their changing angle. The back half of the ship was broader than the front, the widest points of the fins sweeping together to the bases of two long, tail-like protrusions at the rear of the craft, which added over ten meters to the overall length.

The ship's profile looked very angled, like the metal was sweeping backwards over the entire hull, the panels creating ridges where they met. It was also very pointy, the twin horns on the front resembling jaws, the tails belonging more to animal than a machine.

“Kinda looks like a big, metal manta ray," Carl mused. “What's that glitterin' thing around it?"

Lambert saw what he was talking about. The metal profile was slightly distorted by a group of triangular shapes forming a barrier over the ship, the sections glittering like glass as they caught the light. The distortion continued all around the ship, Lambert saw, imprisoning the strange vessel in a giant transparent ball.

“Is that a shield?" Lambert asked, focusing on the curved panels

floating in the air. “Since when were shields a thing?"

“Since never," Carl said. “that thing ain't made by humans.

Can't be."

“Suvelians?" Lambert asked. “How the hell should I know?"

Before Lambert could reply, his systems lit up with motion warnings, and he watched the ship bloom on the thermal feed. The two tails on the end erupted in jets of blue flame, and the ship began to turn. Unlike the pivots of human ship maneuvers, this thing drifted along as if it were banking, Lambert just making out another engine on its underbelly flaring to life, simulating the motion. On either side of the thruster he could see what looked like pair of railguns sitting flush against the hull.

The craft peeled off, moving slightly away from them as it gained speed. A laser targeting warning suddenly lit up the bottom half of his HUD, the words flashing in an alarming shade of red.

“Fuck me rigid, it's lasering us!" he said, frantically grabbing

the twin control sticks.

The corvette pivoted, the view through the canopy panning rapidly, Lambert gunning it away from the strange ship, the straps of the harness securing him to his chair digging into his arms and thighs. He burned to high speed, the ship starting to rumble around him, ready to try and throw off incoming fire, and yet right as he was about to make another correction, the laser warning vanished.

“Incoming?" he asked. It was Alice who replied. “Negative, no ordinance on visuals. I estimate the ship was

scanning us before we escaped its sensor range."

Lambert flipped the ship in a one-eighty turn, applying counter- thrust to slow them down. He glanced at the camera feed tracking the ship, and saw it hadn't made any course changes itself. It was just

moving away, almost in slow motion thanks to the camera's level of

zoom. Even the cannons on the alien ship's belly hadn't moved. “Who woulda thought eatin' would be a bad idea?" Carl

grumbled through the channel. “Did we lose them?"

“I don't think they were even after us." Lambert directed the ship so they were in line with the strange vessels course, albeit much slower. “We must have spooked them."

“Crazy Suves probably thought we're UEC. I read somewhere

that they use plasma to melt enemy ships."

“What are they doing out here?" Lambert wondered. As far as anyone knew, the Suvelians ignored humanity after first contact went down in shambles, and tended not to come anywhere close to human space, the aliens having gone dark for centuries. Considering they were the only aliens ever encountered, it was just another reason why he was ashamed of the Confederation and their ways.

“Stop askin' me these stupid questions, man," Carl complained. “I don't know jack about aliens."

“We're going lose them in this soup," Lambert said. The ship sensors assigned a white, unidentified tag to the alien craft that came up as a blip on his tactical view, the target moving towards the edge of their sensor range.

“What about the fart trail?" Carl said. “They're going off in a

different direction. We should stick to it, if you ask me."

“Well I didn't ask you," Lambert said. “We've got alien ships

operating dangerously close to the Hub. Kinda feels much more

important than finding a ship that's been missing for nearly a month." “Our orders were to find the missing ship," Alice interrupted. “I

must protest against this decision." “Noted. Anything else?"

The machine didn't reply.

“Good. Carl, power down any non-critical systems, I don't want

us on their radar, or whatever it is they're using. I'll mark our coordinates down so we can find the fuel trail later."

“UFO hunting it is," Carl replied, some of the lights in the hatchway behind the cockpit switching off. “What are the rules of alien contact again?"

“Don't launch missiles unless they do first. We stay weapons

cold, and we'll already be doing better than the UEC ever did."

2

Lambert kept the alien ship just inside their sensor range, not really sure if they were within their range of detection. It didn't appear so, since it had not changed course much aside from avoiding a few stray asteroids, though he kept a close watch on its huge weapons all the same.

The screen on his left displayed the camera tracking the alien craft as they pursued, the pink of the nebula contrasting against its silver and orange hull. The filter was grainy at this level of zoom, but Carl's description of the ship had been accurate. The thing looked a bit like a stingray from Earth's oceans, with the curved 'mouth', the fins on the sides, and the huge tails on the back.

It was bulbous rather than sleek, and Lambert watched the engines on its back and belly light up as it simulated banking motions as it navigated the nebula. They seemed to do nothing more than use up fuel, which surprised Lambert. He'd burned through a good portion of fuel when that laser warning had shown up earlier, and this alien ship seemed woefully inefficient by design. Maybe the aliens just missed gravity and wanted to bring a piece of it into space. He remembered how long it took him to get used to flying in zero-g compared to atmosphere.

But despite its lacklustre efficiency, the ship was surrounded by that ovaloid arrangement of polygons, a wavering forcefield like those out of old sci-fi movies. It appeared as if it was surrounded by a

glittering, transparent disco ball, each pane sparkling as they angled and morphed. He wondered if the ship could fire through the shield, or if it even was a shield, or some other strange technology beyond his comprehension.

He could make out the cockpit canopy, at least what he thought was the canopy, situated high and to the front of the ship between the frontal horns. It was wide and tall, a bump in the silver hull wide enough for two pilots to see through, much larger than his own canopy.

“It is an unusual vessel," Alice said, as if reading Lambert's thoughts. “what do you make of it, sir?"

It only ever called Lambert sir, so he knew it was talking to him. “It's not human, that's for sure. Looks like a… a bird mixed with a fish."

“Perhaps the builders reflected this design off one of their native creatures," Alice mused. “Just as humans do. I wonder what ecosystem they come from."

“Are there any photos or videos of Suvelian ships on record?" he asked. “I know what Suvelians look like, but not their tech."

“Scanning. Negative, sir. There was only a handful of instances where humans and Suvelians met, and all such occurrences have been sealed and deleted by the UEC."

“Another coverup, why am I not surprised?" Lambert studied the alien ship, the grainy feed and the shiny shield making the view fuzzy. “I heard the Suvelians were a lot more advanced than we are, but that thing looks like its chugging down fuel. And if they're not a fan of humans, why come this close to our space?"

“I would shrug if I had the shoulders to do so," Alice informed

him.

The alien ship vectored off, Lambert adjusting course with it.

For half an hour more they followed, keeping it as far away as possible without losing it altogether. At one point it banked off to the

side, the engines on its top and bottom swivelling round to counter their inertia and bring it to a halt.

“It's stopped," Lambert said, flipping the corvette and likewise lowering their momentum. An asteroid passed between the great distance of the two ships, obscuring their vision for a moment before the view cleared.

“Maybe they've seen us?" Carl mused, but before he finished speaking the alien ship moved again, much slower now as it crawled through a curtain of gas creating an expansive wall to their Galactic north, the cloud swallowing it up as they pushed into the obscuring gas.

“Target lost," Alice reported.

“How did they not get vaporized in all that?" Carl asked. “That shield must be protecting them," Lambert said. “Look,

they've left a hole behind them."

As if a great drill had been taken to the cloud, a gap appeared where the alien ship had disappeared, the gas probably washing out of the shield's way like liquid.

“We'll go around," Lambert said. “Just to be safe."

The wall of gas stretched infinitely to the left and right, concave like the inside of a bowl, but came to a stop a couple kilometers up, like a giant cliff of grey air. Lambert set a course parallel to the gas, making a loop once they neared the top. The tactical view was going nuts, one entire half of the sphere flickering as the nearby energy overloaded their systems.

The minutes stretched on, and then Lambert made a turn, travelling over the gaseous curtain. Lambert's eyes widened as he saw a spinning rock twirling its way passed them, proximity warnings lighting up his face as his screens flashed exclamation marks at him.

It wasn't on a collision course, but Lambert held in a breath all the same as he maneuvered for more breathing room, memories of his first days piloting a spaceship coming to mind.

“One and a half kilometer gap, Cap, new record," Carl said. “Was that why they nicknamed you Grazer back in the day?"

“Shut it," he said, a camera on the flank of the ship letting him know the rock was safely behind them. He turned his attention back to the canopy, waiting for his systems to reinitialise.

He spotted the alien ship a couple dozen kilometers out, but this

time, it wasn't alone.

It was on course to intercept a ship of immense size, big enough to see through the canopy without the use of his cameras. It was shaped a little like the letter U, the frontal section branching off into two longer modules, leaving a large empty space between. It was taller than it was wider, with fish-like fins sprouting out of the sides. Pockets of antennae poked out of the roof, some of their tips flashing in random colours. Like the first alien ship, it was decorated in orange highlights, arranged like windows all throughout the silvery hull.

From the two ends trailed long, thin engines that were currently burning, coursing the ship off to the left.

There were two other, identical ships trailing behind it, one flipped over horizontally to expose its smooth belly. The cameras let Lambert see over the hundreds of kilometers like he was right there, zooming in on the angled ship. From inside the empty space between the ship branches, a smaller craft curved out from behind the hull. It was thin and sleek, with as small a radar cross-section as possible, sacrificing armour to make it as small a target as possible. Fins arranged in a tricorn sprouted out from the sides of the main engine, stretching like a limb from the rear, the vector nozzle contracting around a wide plume of orange flame.

The pilot's canopy sat all the way at the front, giving it an excellent view as it flipped on its y-axis, and fired a stream of yellow rounds from the autocannon mounted on its bow while it moved away. Hundreds of tracer-rounds found their mark across the giant alien ship, ripping up panels and armour as the high-explosive rounds drew a line across the hull.

It was a Raptor-class fighter, and unlike the alien ships, this one Lambert recognised. It was a United Earth Confederate strike craft, its prowess on full display as it flipped again, vector nozzles puffing gas as it put distance between itself and the alien ship.

“UEC fighters!?" Carl said, half in surprise and half in question. “This nebula is gettin' more packed by the minute."

“It's not alone," Alice added. “detecting five more Raptors in

vector 287, plus one corvette signature."

Lambert adjusted one of the cameras mounted on the front, and zoomed in on a group of human ships, painted the standard black of the UEC navy. Five more Raptors were flying in a phalanx formation, along with a corvette at their rear. Since Lambert's own corvette was originally a captured UEC ship, the two corvettes were of similar design, except the Hub painted their ships with a few dark blue stripes to help identify friendlies.

As he watched, the squad of UEC fighters broke off, moving down to assist the forward Raptor. The group fanned out into a wide formation, turning their starboard sides towards the alien ships as they began to circle.

“That big ship's lookin' hurt," Carl said, noting how it appeared to be listing to the side. Perhaps the strafing run had hit a stabilizer. “Check it out, our friends are movin' in."

The alien scout ship they'd followed was joined by about eight more of its like, each ship wrapped in similar, protective shields that glinted in the light as they moved towards the group of human fighters. The twin cannons on their bellies lifted out from their cavity housings, rotating on gimbals as they tracked the human craft. The aliens fell into some sort of arrowhead formation, engines lighting up as they increased to high speeds.

Rather than intercept, the Raptors hung back, autocannons opening up on the approaching group of vessels, huge tracer lines connecting the two forces. At last Lambert got to see the alien shields in action. When the bullets met the barriers after a brief delay, the

shield panels flared a bright white, the bullets bouncing off the transparent panels to sail off into space in all directions, the number of ricochet's numbering in the hundreds. Lambert worried about indirect fire as the bullet-streams quadrupled when they met the shields.

The Raptors emptied at least a quarter of their ammo loads before the alien ships reacted. They seemed slow and sluggish under all that firepower, weathering it for at least a minute until their weapons finally activated as the alien group closed in to within a few dozen kilometers, a dangerously close range.

The long, twin barrels of the alien guns flexed in unison as the strange ships seemed to come within weapons range, banking away and tilting so their guns had as much field of view as possible. The bottom half of their shields flicked off like lightbulbs, and bright lines of light lanced forth from the muzzles, the barrels rocking back into their houses in synchronicity.

“Frickin' laser beams?!" Carl exclaimed.

Lambert had to cover his eyes from the sudden glare, seeing on the camera feed over a dozen beams of golden light streak across the void, bridging the distance between the two groups. One of the human fighters exploded in a shroud of gas and metal, pieces of the fighter twirling away into the void as the beam cut it to pieces.

Another raptor suffered major damage, a laser splitting it right down the middle, the cockpit flying one way, the engine another. The remaining Raptors broke off, pivoting to throw off the aliens aim.

The beams continued on into the void beyond, but the line of energy lost its intensity the further down the length Lambert looked, the beam fading until it was no longer visible.

With the shields deactivated, the humans could do some damage of their own. Despite being larger, the alien ships fared poorly against such bracketing fire. One by one the alien ships were cut to pieces, HE rounds churning up their hulls and blowing apart huge sections, flames and soot pluming into the void briefly before

evaporating in the vacuum. Before the alien ships turned their shields back online, their laser beams shutting off, at least half of them were drifting about in pieces, Lambert watching the surviving vessels bank out of the line of fire.

“Those guys are gettin' shredded," Carl said. “They're just chargin' in all gun-hoe."

“Missile warning from the corvette," Alice announced. “they're

firing on that carrier-class ship!"

Lambert didn't track his camera to see the launch, but he did spot a speck of white trailing through the backdrop of the main skirmish, leaving a white contrail in its wake as it streaked towards the damaged alien carrier. Despite its size, the huge ship appeared to have no point-defence of any kind, none of its sister ships even providing basic support to their fighters, opting to flee from the fight.

The missile closed to five kilometers, three, one, and then impacted the side of the carrier with a giant blast of fire that quickly evaporated. Like something had taken a bite out of it, a gaping hole had torn apart the aft section of one of the branching sections, its flaming decks open to space, ruined chunks of alloy blooming out from the point of impact.

“We have to help them," Lambert said. “those ships don't look armed, that corvette will tear them to pieces."

“The nebula is covering our signature so far," Alice said. “but if

we engage, the chances of us being attacked by both sides is almost

certain."

“We'll stay at maximum range," Lambert said, bringing up his tactical map. “Carl, you said you wanted some action. All power to weapon systems, get us a lock on that corvette."

“Aye-aye, Cap," Carl replied. “Spinnin' up the guns." One of Lambert's readouts let him know the thirty-millimeter cannons were spooling, the rotary cannons warming up as they swivelled to track the closest UEC targets.

“Keep all locks off the alien ships, I don't want to antagonize them in case they can't tell we're not on these guys' side."

Gripping the control sticks hard, Lambert banked off, keeping well away from the battle as they circled over towards the enemy corvette. It seemed they had gone unnoticed by all sides so far, and he wanted to take advantage of that.

As they repositioned, the UEC Raptors fell back into a screen formation, speeding away from the alien attack-group while their guns kept firing. The UEC appeared much more organized, as if they knew they could outrange the alien weapons, baiting the aliens away from their larger ships so the corvette could fire unimpeded.

“Havin' trouble lockin' on with all this interference," Carl reported. “Cap get us in behind its engine."

The missile would have an easier time tracking if the heat of the engine was in view, Lambert adjusting their heading and increasing their speed. The alien ships kept their shields online as they tried to close the distance to the Raptors – the move akin to a cavalry charge of old.

After a long, tense minute, they were' behind' the UEC corvette, its twin engine nozzles half-closed as it moved at low speed. They were generating enough heat, however, Carl speaking over a distinct locking ping when he voxed through the crew channel.

“Got it," he said. “Missile away!"

From the belly of their corvette, one of the missiles detached from its rack, flying forward a hundred meters in an instant before it turned forty degrees to the left, the engine on its rear flaring to life, the tracking ball on its nose swiveling to lock the UEC corvette.

The missile had a flight time of nine seconds, travelling across the expansive void until it was but a distant speck. Lambert watched on his tactical map as the missile's signature closed the distance, Lambert waiting for the corvette to activate its point-defence.

It never did. The missile smashed into the main engines, its blip

on the map disappearing along with the corvette's IFF tag. He looked

at the camera feed tracking the Confederate ship, seeing the vessel vanish in a great bloom of white, the explosion almost peaceful in the silence of the vacuum.

When the flash cleared, half of the ship had been disintegrated, the intact pilot's canopy twirling away into the nearest blanket of gas at hundreds of kilometers per second, the nebula gobbling the pieces up.

“Kill confirmed," Carl reported, his voice a little distorted

through the channel.

“They know we're here," Alice said. “Two Raptors breaking off and heading towards our position."

Lambert switched to the battle feed, seeing two of the human fighters bank from the fight, and move their way. Behind them, the remaining pair of fighters continued to hammer the alien shields, which had come down while Carl had targeted the corvette, exposing their vulnerable hulls. The alien ships twisted and turned, pulling high-g maneuvers, their laser barrels remaining paradoxically level even as they flipped and changed angles.

“Going to burn," Lambert said, pressing the control sticks all the way forward. With no air resistance, the corvette gained speed rapidly, a knot in Lambert's stomach growing as he watched the speed indicator rise.

“They're opening up," Alice reported. Lambert glanced at the camera feed, seeing that the Raptors were sending yellow streams of rounds their way.

He turned the thrusters off, flipped the corvette on its x-axis, then turned them back on, speeding violently out of the line of fire. The twin trails passed through where they would have been a second later, the Raptors changing course as their guns realigned to track their new heading.

“Returnin' fire!" Carl yelled. The corvette's cannons rotated in

their housings, targeting computers calculating the required lead. After spooling for a moment, they opened up with their own volleys,

each spewing forth a thousand rounds per minute as they filled the void with ordinance.

The streams of tracers met at around the midpoint between the ships, each trail curving as the turrets readjusted and the ships set new headings. Lambert had no time to see whether they scored any hits, keeping an eye on their overloading readout as he set a new heading, their speed rising. Each time he made a new turn in direction, the cannons had to pause as they corrected their aim, sometimes idling as the Raptors left their field of fire.

Proximity warnings on the incoming rounds bathed his face in a red light, Lambert grimacing as he upped their speed again. The Raptors were getting closer, and thus he had to change vectors more frequently, pins and needles shooting up his arms as they continued to twist and turn. Breathing through his mouth was hard, but through his nose was worse, the ship around him beginning to tremble.

Six g's, seven. Lambert could almost see the fine line between death by collision and death by bullets. Eight g's. The Raptors didn't let up, forcing Lambert to change vector again and again before they cut their corvette out of the void.

He could hear Carl trying not to puke over the channel. The alien ships were long forgotten, the Raptors all they cared about now. The edges of Lambert's vision began to darken as they bordered on nine g's. His implants helped keep Lambert from blacking out, but it was his comrade's voice keeping him conscious as Carl growled

through the channel: “Target destroyed!"

One of the Raptor tags had disappeared, a hail of fire from the top PDC cutting it from bow to stern with a lucky volley. The ruined fighter spun away, the pilot still trying to shoot them down regardless, but its targeting gimbal must have jammed, the tracer rounds spinning wildly as the ruined fighter twirled away into the clouds of gas.

Both their PDC's focused on the remaining fighter, which had

turned to flee after its wingman perished. The void around it became

choked with streaks of bullets, Lambert plotting a box-shaped course to turn them around and get on their tail, angling back to keep the fighter in range. Now the chase was in reverse. It took several seconds for their bursts of fire to reach the Raptor, the steams crisscrossing to give the fighter less room to escape.

“Fuel thirty percent," Alice said, its voice calm even as

Lambert's body felt like it was being crushed beneath the weight of an

elephant. With all the high-g turns they were pulling and bottoming out their speed, they'd burned through more fuel in the fight than they'd used to even get here.

The Raptor continued to shoot even as it fled, Lambert growling as his vision began to darken when he pivoted out of the firing line.

They were closing in on the fighter now, the Confederate pilot unwilling to go to higher speeds, and that meant both ships would have an easier time hitting the other with less leading time. But being the bigger target, Lambert's corvette didn't have the edge.

“Come on, lock on," Carl grumbled. “Lock on him…" “Fuel twenty percent!" Alice reported.

The ships danced around each other, the kilometers closing to single digits. Out of the canopy Lambert could see the origin point of the fighter's ordinance, flinching when they streaked past, dangerously close to the glass.

“Ten percent!" Alice said, almost sounding worried for a moment.

The fighter was in visual range now, appearing to Lambert like it was flying in reverse as its cannons opened up, the view spinning as Lambert banked away.

“Locked!" Carl said. “Missile away!"

The missile launched from its hardpoint, visible only for a moment out of the canopy before it vanished, its travel time instant, ending its short journey by the Raptor's side, the explosion close enough to blow the nimble target into a slowly expanding sphere of debris.

“Slow us down, sir!" the computer warned.

Lambert was all too glad to comply, flipping and engaging their thrusters to counter their inertia. Soon the corvette was brought to idle, Lambert realising that he'd been holding his breath, and letting it out as he relaxed into his chair.

“F-Fuck me rigid," Lambert said, the adrenaline bleeding out of

him with a sigh.

“You said it, Cap." Carl made a noise like he couldn't quite decide whether to laugh or cry, clearing his throat as he checked the ship's status. “Took a few scratches to the hull, but we're fine, integrity wise. Check it out," he added. “our friends wiped out the rest."

Lambert blinked, switching feeds to the other skirmish like he'd forgotten all about it. The remaining Raptors had been destroyed, reduced to tumbling pieces by laser fire. Only three of the alien ships remained, their beams flicking off as the void went still. The larger, carrier-class ships idled way behind them, the one that had been hit by the missile listing to the side, Lambert unsure if it was critically damaged or not.

The alien attack ships realigned into formation, slowing to crawling speeds as the three, larger ships moved in towards them, the damaged one cruising a little slower than the others. Lambert's brow furrowed when he saw their tags on the tactical map close in to barely a few kilometers of each other.

They hung there as a group for a few moments, then as one, they banked their ships in unison, turning their bulbous canopies towards the corvette's direction, Lambert's chest tensing as he could look right down their laser barrels.

“Think we should skedaddle?" Carl asked. “I'm gettin' laser warnin's."

“There's a problem with that," Alice said. “You burned through most of our fuel, sir. My predictions suggest we may not make it through the nebula without activating our distress beacon."

“What else was I supposed to do?" Lambert replied. “This is the first time anyone's battled in space since… since ever." Spaceships had been armed for warfare since before Lambert was born, but the concept of fighting with them had only been experienced through simulations, there had been no major space conflicts, at least until now.

“I did not mean to sound rude," Alice replied, its tone

apologetic.

Before Lambert could reply, the alien group started moving, their IFF tags moving closer, until Lambert could make them out through the canopy. The laser targeting warnings flicked off after

another moment, Lambert's hands clutching the flight sticks tightly as

they came closer and closer.

“They're gonna hit us," Carl said, Lambert shaking his head.

“They're not stupid. Put the PDC's back into their housings, Carl, and keep your hands off the missiles."

“Are we surrenderin', Cap?"

“Look at their guns, they're lowering them. We're just returning

the courtesy."

Carl grumbled something incoherent, then complied, the rotary guns twisting into their default positions. The alien weapons had likewise done the same, sinking back into their recesses, so Lambert wasn't worried about retaliation, though his gut was still twisted with apprehension. They were coming in very close now, enough that Lambert could make out the small lines of where each individual panels of the hull met on their strange fish-like ships.

The alien convoy came to a halt a few kilometres out, the trio of huge ships practically filling up the canopy view with their silver and orange bulks. The attack ships idled in front of the big ones, the little engines on their sides shooting out wisps of flame as they stabilised the crafts.

Lambert was almost afraid of moving his hands, the alien ships just sitting there, probably running scans over the corvette by the way

the systems were giving off signal warnings. After a long minute, the leading attack craft moved forward, Lambert recognizing its tag as the same ship they'd followed in earlier.

The other alien ships remained idle, Lambert's heart racing as it closed in to two kilometres, one, then a few hundred meters before the alien ship stopped. It was pretty much right beside them at this point, Lambert leaning forward on his console to peer over at the large glass dome situated on the alien ships nose. It was coated in a smokey shade of orange, but he could just make out movement behind the glass, the shadowy outline of… something.

The strange vessel tilted in a three-sixty spin, its canopy rotating in place as the rest of its ship twirled round. It ended the spin the right way up after a few moments, paused, then did the spin again, this time going the other way.

“The hell are they doin'?" Carl whispered, as if afraid they'd be

overheard.

“I don't know," Lambert replied, shifting in his seat when the alien ship came to a stop, as if waiting for Lambert to do something. He thought for a moment, then grabbed the left joystick, tilting it to the side with a mechanical whir. The corvette turned on just the one axis, Lambert's perception becoming a mess as the alien ship appeared to turn, when in fact it was the corvette that was technically spinning.

The corvette did a full spin, then Lambert turned it the other

way, copying the alien ship's gesture. He even added a slight tilt to the left and right, the way jet pilots would flap their wings in salute to nearby planes.

The aliens copied the gesture, Lambert grinning as the fish-like fins on its flanks tilted to and fro.

“I think this is going well," Alice said. “Keep copying them sir." “What are we, parrots?" Carl mumbled.

The alien craft stopped mimicking for a couple minutes, Lambert doing the same. Then, flipping so that its rear faced the

corvette, the alien ship inched forward a few hundred meters, then stopped. It flipped again, its canopy facing Lambert. It flapped its fins in greeting again, turned around once more, and moved another hundred meters. It repeated the whole dance twice more. Lambert would have scratched his head if his helmet was off.

“Any ideas what this all means?" he asked no one in particular. “The most likely intention I can predict is that they want us to

follow," Alice said.

Lambert watched the ship move further away, then stretched one of his shoulders as he gripped the sticks.

“Here goes nothing," he said, inching the craft forwards, keeping their thrust to an absolute minimal. His heart raced as they fell in behind the alien ship, passing between its two cohorts idling up and off to the sides. From this angle they got a clean view of their laser guns. Each turret had two individual barrels, one above the other, the lengths flaring out near the middle and end, where a square muzzle capped the barrel. They were connected to the hull by blocky housings, what appeared to be wiring wrapped messily over the bulks. Each turret had to be fifteen or twenty meters long from muzzle to base, about two thirds the size of the alien ships themselves.

The alien craft matched their crawling speed, heading for one of the carrier ships, leading them right between its two main branches, where a few kilometers of empty space divided the two sections of the ship.

They cruised in closer and closer to the carrier ship, the pink void replaced by great swathes of metal hull trimmed with orange bands of light. It felt a little like sailing between two horizontal skyscrapers, football fields worth of metal stretching out in all directions except for directly down and up.

Silver decks jutted out of the thick branches of the alien carrier at random intervals, huge tubes snaking out of the great slips between them. Humans would cover up internal wiring, but these creatures

appeared to not have bothered. The way the internal lining of the ship boxed in huge shafts of space gave off the impression of giant, empty bookcases, the shelves shadowed by the decks that covered them from the distant sun.

“This thing has no weapons, barely any armour, and is as big as a prison ship," Carl mused. “It sorta looks… I dunno. Primitive."

“I know what you mean," Lambert replied. The very first spacefaring ships that left Earth were just as blocky and oversized. And yet these aliens had somehow invented shields for their smaller ships, it was quite jarring.

The ship they were following suddenly switched off its own protective barrier, the arrangement of polygons simply fading out of existence. It slowed down to a halt, then banked on the spot so that it faced the left branch. Lambert copied the maneuver, his canopy facing the great wall of metal.

After a pause, the wall between the two decks in front of them began to split down the middle, the two slabs of metal sliding back into recesses on the left and right. Lambert leaned over his terminal, his eyes wide as he peered into the slowly revealing interior. A row of circle pedestals rose out of a colourless deck, lined up parallel to the opening doors. There was another attack ship resting on the pedestal on the far left, secured to the dial by three-pronged skids extending

out of the craft's chin and rear – landing gears of some kind. There were also thick straps of cloth snaking along the hull, looping over the ship like a giant harness.

Lambert counted half a dozen pedestals when the doors disappeared off to the sides, the rest of them empty. Behind the dials was a deck that was populated with tall machinery, probably equipment allowing the aliens to repair their bulky ships.

Their alien escort craft began to drift towards one of the empty dials. The hangar, at least that's what it appeared to be, was barely tall enough to accommodate the alien ship, Lambert holding a breath in

anticipation when its roof almost grazed the low ceiling, the craft cruising into position slowly.

It hovered over the empty dial for a moment, its landing gears extending out of the recesses on its stomach. It inched down towards the pad, landing like a truck dropped from a great height, its suspension dampening a rather rough-looking landing.

“What're those things floating around over there?" Carl said. “Behind the pads?"

Lambert blinked, seeing dozens, no, hundreds of figures between the ship pads and the far wall. The figures were slightly hunched, bipedal creatures sporting bulky, green suits that made them look especially large and tall. Zooming in with a camera, Lambert noted that each one sported long, beak-like visors that stretched forward over where the head would be on a human, with thick tubes connecting the chins to the chests.

Each alien was grasping something, whether that be a nearby handrail sprouting from the deck, a piece of strange equipment, or each other. They floated through the microgravity, their visors turned towards the corvette's canopy, Lambert swallowing a lump in his throat as he examined the huge number of aliens inside.

“Is the whole crew down in that hangar?" Carl asked. “Look at em' all."

“You'd be abandoning your post too if an alien boarded your ship," Lambert replied. “How come they're just floating around?

Where's their magnetic boots?"

“Perhaps they have no base concept of simulating gravity,"

Alice mused. “Or lack the technology."

“But they've got shields," Lambert replied. “It doesn't make any sense. Are these things even Suvelian?"

“I reckon not, Cap," Carl said. “I've seen pictures. These guys

are way too big to be Suves."

“Another species?" It wasn't beyond being impossible – once the Suvelians were discovered it became almost a guarantee that more

aliens would be out there, but after more than a hundred years of encountering nothing, it was still a shocking realisation. “Then why were the UEC attacking them?"

“Could have been the other way round," Carl suggested. “Doubt it," Lambert replied curtly.

Movement from their escorting ship drew his attention, a hatch on the top of the vessel flipping open, the lid bouncing on the side of the hull before a hand reached out to stop it. A figure lifted itself out of the ship, an elongated visor turning towards the corvette. Lambert could almost feel its eyes on him, the figure's arms raising into view – the limbs sported an opposable thumb and three long fingers, the alien gesturing towards the empty dial on the ship's right.

“Looks like they want to meet us," Lambert said, gripping the joysticks in his hands. He hesitated, the huge crowd scrutinizing him from within the hangar.

“This was your idea in the first place, Cap," Carl said, as if

sensing his apprehension.

“I know, just… I'm kind of, terrified." “Me too, man."

Wishing he could wipe his brow, Lambert eased the corvette forward, the pad, and the crowd, coming closer by the second.

Hangars like on the Hub were so compact, and this alien ship was oversized in comparison, having so much space open to the void was a strange sight to say the least.

With Alice providing corrections, the corvette floated into position above an empty landing dial, main and secondary thrusters adjusting their inertia until they were settled. Lambert flicked the landing gear switch, hearing the mechanical whirs of the legs extending somewhere below him. Watching the tactical map which had turned into a wireframe representation of the hangar, he tapped at the thrusters, easing the ship down to the deck, much gentler than their alien counterpart had, and in half the time, too.

The thunk of metal rumbled through the corvette as they landed, the suspension rocking the chassis as the gears automatically used their magnetic locks to secure them to the surface. The corvette was much smaller than the alien ships, the dial stretching at least ten meters in all directions from them. The aliens slowly floated closer when Lambert powered down the engines.

He flicked off the safety belts of his harness, the straps blooming out from his chest as he pushed himself off the chair by the armrests. He gripped one of the overhead rails to stop himself from flying into the canopy, unplugging the cables that connected his suit to the flight terminal.

Most pilots compared the cables to restraints, but Lambert felt a great sense of freedom each time he jacked into the flight systems. In space, one had complete freedom, and being stuck in the tight confines of the larger ships for months on end was the real restraint in his opinion.

When he was free of the cockpit, he used the hand grips along the walls to turn himself round, moving to the hatchway that led into the main section of the ship. He pushed himself into the corridor beyond, awkwardly adjusting himself so that his feet touched the deck. All flightsuits were equipped with magnetic boots, designed to let personnel walk on ships without centrifugal force.

Little lights on his ankles turned green as his feet neared the deck, Lambert hitting a button on his forearm sleeve. The boots turned on, gluing the man to the floor, though the strange sensation of microgravity still had an effect on the rest of his body.

Keeping one foot on the ground at all times, he moved down the corridor, passing by doorways and other hatches leading to different parts of the ship. His boots turned on and off each time he paced, making his footsteps loud and mechanical.

To his left one of the doorways slid open, a human clad in a suit

identical to Lambert's stepping out of the frame. The Hub Navy patch

was etched onto his breast, the human's bearded face just visible

through his tinted visor.

“Cap," Carl said, the speakers in his helmet giving his voice a

tinny effect. “We really bout to meet some aliens?"

“Looks like it, try and be tactful for once," Lambert said. “Good shooting back there, by the way."

“It ain't much different from the sims," Carl replied, shrugging. “Lot scarier, though."

At the far end of the corridor, a staircase led down to the lower bay. They made their way down, boots whirring as they switched their magnetics on and off with each step. The cargo bay was a dark, small room packed with crates secured to the deck by straps and magnetic rails, the tracks set up in line with the ramp so that cargo could be easily rolled out. A few of them contained ration packs and supplies for day-long missions, while most were full of ammo belts for the PDC's.

The two men lingered for perhaps a little longer than was necessary, they could almost feel the crowd of aliens waiting for them on the other side of the ramp. Lambert brought with him nothing but his music player, which he'd pocketed right before they'd engaged the UEC. He wasn't sure what else he needed, and neither did Carl, who fumbled through one of the storage crates, producing something after a few moments.

“Should I bring one of these?" he asked, lifting up a pistol.

“I don't think it's a good idea to bring a gun to our first talks. If we can even talk with these things. They could be psychic for all we know."

Carl put the weapon back, while Lambert moved over to the panel that controlled the ramp. To say that he was nervous would be an understatement. Human crowds were bad enough, but alien ones were another story. He and Carl were representing all of the Hub's people the moment they walked out there, and who knew what the aliens wanted with them.

“You know, I thought it would always be the aliens boardin' us," Carl said. “not the other way round. Now we're the little green alien men, like in the movies."

“You ready?" Lambert asked.

“Nope, just do it before I lose my nerve."

Lambert nodded, hitting the control button. Gears clicked in the cargo bay's confines, the sound muffled to the humans, the wall in front of them beginning to lower, a pair of hydraulic legs on the outside bringing the heavy frame to the ground. Light spilled into the compartment, as did the view of the hangar. The hundreds of aliens had closed in just a little, coming right up to the landing pad without actually touching it.

The ramp hit the ground with a clunk, some of the aliens at the front recoiling, Lambert reminding himself they might be just as

scared as he was. They'd never met aliens either, or at least, not humans from the Hub. Whether they'd actually met with UEC officials was a mystery.

Lambert took a tentative step forward, leading his companion down the ramp. His boots calibrated to the surface of the alien deck after he tapped at it with his foot, securing him down.

He turned around and stared at the giant doors open to space, seeing the opposite branch of the ship framed by the darkness of the void. The hangar was much larger than human ones, downright spacious in comparison, but he didn't think that was a bad thing, it was just intimidating to see a huge gap open to space. Movement

from the side drew his gaze back towards the ship they'd followed in, and he turned to see three figures crossing the deck between the two dials.

Now that he got a closer look, he noted how strange the aliens appeared. They walked – or floated in this case – on three-toed legs that were digitigrade in shape, their calves and thighs well-built for supporting their eight-foot-tall frames. What appeared to be switches and buttons ran down their chest plates, their torsos as broad around

as an oil barrel. Perhaps these aliens had not invented touchscreens yet? Sprouting from their lower backs were sheets of tall plates arranged like a hand fan, hanging down like a tail. They looked like long sword blades, protecting some sort of appendage, perhaps? They had three fingers and one thumb on each hand, all pointed with claws, each one clinging to nearby handrails jutting from the deck.

Their helmets sloped over the front of their faces, with some sort of raised crest in the middle, one at the front turning its blank helmet on Lambert as it floated closer, the man noting how it seemed to bob its head when it reached the lip of the dial. On its arms, cables ran all across the limb, meeting at triangular plates that branched off the back of the arms. The plates were maybe half a meter wide, the metal sheet as long as its arm and tapering to a point just behind the alien's shoulders. It reminded Lambert of the wings on a bat, with little claw-like protrusions running along the curved edges. Where they some kind of suit extension, or was it more biological?

The lead alien stepped gingerly onto the pad, its gaze firmly locked on Lambert through its tinted visor. The helmet sported some kind of snout, with tubes snaking out of the chin to connect to the throat. It seemed to want to come closer, but after a moment its head shifted towards the right.

He followed its gaze, facing the huge crowd of aliens, some of them parting as a figure emerged from the back of the gathered procession. While most of the aliens were clad in green suits, this new alien had red markings covering its grey suit, strips of crimson paint trailing from one shoulder to the waist in a strange symbol. It must have been some kind of insignia, the aliens letting it through to the front.

It floated just in front of the dial, not quite touching it as it rested a hand on a nearby rail. Lambert swallowed a lump in his throat and took a tentative step towards it.

“Feels like we're surrounded by bugs or somethin'," Carl said,

falling in behind him.

The way the aliens floated around them on all sides was a little unnerving. The whole 'air' of the hanger was full of aliens, floating above the crowd to get a look at the humans. They clung to each other for support, Lambert noting that some of them didn't have those wing plates on their arms.

He stopped just a few meters away from the alien with the red markings – better to just call it Red for reference – a little intimidated by its size now that he was close, its eight-foot frame would have towered over him had it been standing.

It moved one of its arms to a pouch on its belt, producing a small box that looked a little bit like a handheld radio. It held it out like it was offering it to him, but it was about two meters away, and rather than close the distance, it simply let the device go, the object floating through the microgravity towards him.

The device spun slowly through the air, and Lambert caught it, turning it over in his palm as he examined it. There was a little screen on the face, with maybe a dozen small buttons built in below it. On the top of the frame, a wire stretched out of the housing, as well as a little cylindrical knob that looked like the cap off a bottle of sauce. If one had combined a radio and a phone together, this was what it might have looked like.

“The hell is that thing?" Carl asked, looking over his shoulder at the strange object.

“And you said my questions are stupid," Lambert muttered. “I've no idea."

“Try turnin' it on."

“How, just start pressing random buttons?"

As they argued under the scrutiny of the alien crowd, one of the strange creatures interrupted them, Lambert looking up to see the alien from their escort ship had moved over, standing beside the one he called Red. It moved a hand in a circular motion, the two humans watching it as it let its arm rest. Carl waved back at it, chuckling when some of the aliens in the crowd copied his gesture.

The alien produced a device exactly the same as the one Red had given Lambert, holding it up so the humans could see. It gripped the little cap on the top with a thumb and finger, and twisted it. A little bulb on the end of the long antennae flashed, and the sound of a beep was just audible through Lambert's suit. The alien let the cap go, the thing twisting back into place. It turned the knob again, another beep and flash accompanying it.

The humans watched in confusion as the alien paused for a few tense moments, then turned the cap three times, paused again, then did the process five more times. It then rested the device by its hip, and gestured at the one in Lambert's hand, the aliens seeming to want Lambert to do something.

“Like this?" he asked it, gripping the cap and turning it like the alien had done. The device beeped and flashed, and the aliens looked to each other, perhaps glad that he could understand how it worked. Yet they appeared to wait again, and when Lambert looked to Carl, who just shrugged, the alien took out its device and repeated the whole ritual again. Two beeps, three, then five. Then it waited.

“I'm not sure I follow," Lambert said, even though the creatures couldn't hear or understand him.

“I think I might," Alice said. Although the artificial intelligence resided within the ship, it could still communicate to them through their suit radios. “Two, three, five. Those are prime numbers."

“Primes?" Carl said. “Why do they want us hearin' prime numbers?"

“Perhaps they wish to test our intelligence and mathematical merit," Alice said, Carl groaning at the second-last word.

“Isn't turnin' up in a spaceship and savin' their butts good enough?" Carl asked.

“It would tarnish our first impressions if we didn't understand simple math," Alice said. “There is also a seventy-eight percent

chance they're curious if the concept is recognisable."

“I hate maths," Carl said. He pronounced the word maths like

he was saying mass.

“I believe they want you to continue the sequence," Alice

added. “Recommend you handle this one, Lieutenant Hall." “I'd be insulted if she wasn't right," Carl said, deterring to

Lambert with a wave. “Floor is yours, Cap."

“Uhm…" Lambert stared at the device while reaching far into the back of his memory, trying to recall his educational years. Alice sighed through the channel when he didn't add anything more.

“Please don't tell me neither of you know what prime numbers

are?"

“We don't exactly use them when flyin' around in space," Carl

defended. “When you're gettin' shot at, or shootin' at someone else, primes are the last thing I'm thinkin' about."

“Math is a universal language," Alice tried, Lambert

interrupting before they could argue further.

“Just give us a recap or tell us what the next one is, robot," he snapped. “These aliens are waiting."

“Prime numbers are integers that have only two dividers: one, and itself. If a number can be divided by more than two other numbers, it's a composite number. Two is a prime, because it can only be divided by one and two. Three is a prime because it cannot be divided cleanly by two, leaving just one and three as its factors. Do you understand?"

“Nope," Carl said with a shake of his head. “What about four?" Lambert asked.

“Four is even, and even numbers can be divided by at least three numbers – by one, by half, and by itself. So even numbers aside from two are not prime."

“So the alien did two, three, then five beeps," Lambert mused. If he went by Alice's logic then six wouldn't be prime, so he could rule that out. Next came seven, and he tried mentally breaking it down by dividing it.

“If you really wish I can provide the answer," Alice began, but

Lambert cut it off.

“No no, it's seven. The next one is seven. I think…"

He gripped the cap between his fingers, and when Alice didn't say anything, he twisted it seven times. When the final beep sounded off, the aliens glanced between each other in a way that came off as excited. The alien from the attack ship brought up its own device again, and this time turned the module eleven times.

“Okay," Lambert said. “Eleven's a prime, I guess. Twelve's out, because it's even. Thirteen… can't be divided by six, five, four… I think it's a prime?"

He clicked back thirteen times, and the aliens reacted strongly, Lambert wondering what they were saying, if they were in fact speaking behind their helmets. The alien with the radio pressed one of the face buttons on the device, making sure Lambert could see which one. He hit the button on his own, and the screen turned on with a flicker of static.

There were four rows of alien symbols, arranged into two columns. The columns were separated by a transparent line. The keypad buttons were also labelled with yet more symbols, some the same as the ones on the screen, some entirely new.

The symbols on the right were fairly basic, but the ones on the left were more complex, each one separated by a line. It was impossible to describe them since he had no base of reference. The space on the second row of the right-hand column was empty, with a square box flashing like a computer program awaiting an input.

“What do they want us to do now?" Carl said, peering over Lambert's shoulder at the screen. “Not more maths, please."

“What do all these symbols mean?" Lambert asked. “They know we can't read alien, right?"

“It does not matter if you can read their language," Alice said, coming in to save the stumped humans once more. “Look carefully, this appears to be some sort of pattern test, I'm ninety-nine percent

certain. You don't need to know what they mean in a linguistic sense."

“Do they think we're dumb or something?" Carl asked, not at all eager to test his thinking skills. “How about I disassemble the PDC's for them? Now that will be a pattern test."

“Let's keep away from the guns for now and just do it," Lambert replied, squinting at the little screen, and then it clicked. The shapes on the left column were combined to make the ones on the right. Although the machine was saving face in front of these aliens, Lambert didn't like how reliant he was on the thing to help him.

“Alright," Lambert mused. “so this line is… the squiggly Q and

the upside-down car together. I think that's this one."

He clicked the button marked with the symbol he thought was right, and the device beeped again, the aliens bobbing their heads in a way that came off as relieved, excited even.

“It appears they've concluded that their concepts are compatible with ours," Alice noted. “Now you must find out if they communicate the same way humans do."

The one he called Red decided it was satisfied with the tests, floating up onto the dial and using the rail to come closer. When it was about a foot away from Lambert, it stopped. Now that it was up close, Lambert had to crane his neck to look up at its elongated helmet, its snout turning away as if afraid to meet his gaze. The way it seemed so hesitant around him was almost relieving in a way – this thing towered over him, and it was as afraid of him as he was of it.

He opted to make the first move, holding up the device in his palm. Red waited for a moment, then slowly raised its arm to take the tester from him, its pointed fingers just barely grazing the lining of his glove. Lambert could feel the tension bleed away in that moment, these aliens weren't a threat.

Red's helmet moved as if it were talking into a concealed microphone, and then turned around, one hand on the railing, the other gesturing at Lambert as it moved away. After pausing and

repeating the hand-movement, it floated off again, the crowd parting to let it pass.

“Now that, I understood," Lambert said. “It wants us to follow."

“To the probin' room," Carl said, Lambert giving him a nudge

and telling him to stop messing around.

Unlike their alien counterparts, the humans walked after Red on their magnetic boots, pacing through the gathered crowd that hung above and around them. He could hear Carl chuckling when he looked up to see one of the big aliens floating directly overhead, its long helmet cocked to one side as it scrutinised them.

Lambert recognised the alien that had demonstrated how to use the handheld prime device, it was sticking close by his side as he

followed behind Red. Was this the pilot of the ship they'd followed,

or was it some sort of technician or gunner, like Carl was?

“Wonder what he thought of us tailin' him a few hours ago,"

Carl wondered, also watching the alien. “You reckon it thought about shootin' us out of the void?"

“Why would they be so gun-ho? We're aliens, is there any point

in fighting extraterrestrials?

“They were fightin' the UEC," Carl reminded him.

“Fair point. We need to find out why the Confederates were after them. Hope they've got breathable air somewhere on this ship, or this will be a very short diplomatic visit."

Red brought them along to the far wall of the hangar, where a circular hatchway opened up like an eyeball, leading into a small chamber beyond. The alien from the escort ship, and a few others followed them inside, while the majority of the crowd stayed in the hangar. The humans exchanged a glance, and then the hatch began to close, sealing them in with the group of tall creatures. Lambert didn't expect the aliens to be hostile, but being in such a cramped space with the giants was still unnerving.

Something beneath the floor shifted, Lambert's heart racing when his external microphones picked up a sound, the mechanical hiss of valves turning and gas seeping becoming more and more

audible. Carl beat him to the punch when he said: “This is an airlock. I think they breathe air just like us."

“I'm picking up a mix of nitrogen and oxygen," Lambert confirmed, checking the screen built into the back of his glove, the readouts calibrating.

After a pause, the far side of the chamber opened up, revealing a tight corridor leading away from the airlock. Strips of fluorescents illuminated a circular stretch of alloy, the upper corners of the ceiling concave rather than meeting at a point, making the passage appear more like a tunnel, the metal bathed in orange light, these aliens really liked their sunset colours.

After stepping – and floating – out of the airlock, the alien from the ship tapped Red on the shoulder, the two aliens bobbing their heads at one another. When they appeared finished, the former turned to Lambert, raising its hands towards its helmet. It flicked a pair of switches beneath where its chin would be on a human, popping off a pair of tubes and letting them dangle over its chest, then twisted the front half of its helmet like it was popping off the lid on a bottle.

There was the sound of escaping air as the alien slid its helmet forward, gradually revealing thick quills of bright, azure feathers that caught the light as they unfurled from a bristling headdress. The feathers sloped away from a face that narrowed into a short beak that kind of reminded Lambert of a pterodactyl. Its features, save for the beak and eyes, were covered in long feathers, the black plumes tipped with soft blues that seemed to sparkle when they moved.

Its beak was covered in dark scales, so smooth it almost looked like skin, two slits on the end if its muzzle flaring as it breathed. It clicked its beak the way a human might stretch their jaw, revealing a maw that was lined with rows of small teeth that were also black.

Its eyes were a striking shade of gold, the inky pupils dilating as it met Lambert's gaze. Clearly the creature recognised him, its intelligent eyes locking onto his even despite his opaque visor. It held up its detached helmet, then gestured at him with it.

“You want me to take mine off?" he asked, his hands moving to his helmet.

“Detecting no unorthodox chemicals in your immediate area," Alice informed. “They may breathe just as we do, but there is a small percentage of unhealthy chemicals present. I would advise caution,

sir."

Lambert unfastened the seals round his neck, and after a quick, loud burst of escaping air, he lifted the helmet off, exposing his face to the cool air of the ship, and the gathered aliens, who watched with wide eyes as he soon revealed himself to them. He wondered what their expressions meant, the aliens chatting among themselves like

schoolkids gossiping about a colleague, Lambert's nose wrinkling at

the coppery scent of the air.

The alien without its helmet seemed more braver than the others, leaning down so that its eyes were level with his. Lambert held his ground, matching its curious gaze as it ogled over his nose, chin and neck like it had never seen a human before. Which it

probably hadn't, he realised.

“I, uh, thank you, for inviting me aboard your ship," he said, leaning away a little when the alien leered closer, its feathers twitching as it listened to his speech.

He felt relieved when the creature backed off, opening its mouth and saying something in its own native tongue. It seemed to speak using a blend of what might be words space out through clicks, the sound produced when it snapped its beak together. Lambert liked to imagine it was welcoming him aboard.

“Good, they communicate through sound," Alice said, always

taking notes.

“So how do we get started with these guys?" Carl asked, turning to one of the other aliens that had decided to remove its helmet. Unlike the first, this one had mostly red feathers, its beak and the scales around its eyes more whiter in colour. “Anyone here speak a language other than English?"

“I am equipped to translate all known human languages," Alice said. “Since you two cannot rely on programming, you should start by introducing simple concepts. I highly recommend beginning with your names."

Red gestured for them to follow, leading them off to the left side of the corridor, where the frame of another hatch irised open. The room inside was about ten meters wide and just as long, the space occupied by a couple of pairs of rectangular slabs with what looked like harnesses draped over them, surrounded by silver cabinets built into the recesses along the walls. The lights in here were paler in colour, whitewashing the room in their soft glow.

“This is either an infirmary or a torture chamber," Carl said. “I don't like the look of those straps on the beds there."

“They don't look like they've got magnetic boots yet, remember," Lambert said. “They've probably got straps in every room to secure things down."

The humans walked in, the aliens floating in after. Only Red, and the alien with the blue feathers, stayed close, the rest keeping their distance after Red flicked its beak at them, probably concluding the humans didn't like to be crowded.

He and Carl leaned against one of the nearby slabs, the pair watching as Red removed its helmet after a pause. Its feathers were a beige in colour with grey highlights, its beak so white it appeared to be made of bone, Lambert remarking in how broad their colour palette was.

His eyes were drawn to the end of Red's beak, were a nasty scar ran from the nose to just beneath its eye, a bit of the iris distorted and bloodshot. This one had definitely seen some action.

For a few, long moments the two species stared each other

down. The aliens didn't seem to know what to do, glancing between

each other as they chatted in their foreign language.

“Alright," Lambert began, taking the initiative. “My name is Lambert, and this is Carl." He pointed at his companion.

“We come in peace," Carl said, Lambert suppressing the urge to

shake his head.

The aliens exchanged another glance that came off as confused, Lambert sighing as he scratched his hair.

“Lambert," he repeated, a hand on his chest punctuating his statement. “Lam-bert."

“Car-el," his friend added. “That's us. What's ya'll names?"

The aliens huddled together, mumbling something while the blue-feathered one glanced at Lambert. After their discussion, the one he called Red pointed a claw at Carl, opening its mouth and saying: “Car-el?"

It's voice was warbling, a bit throaty, Lambert blinking when it

mimicked Carl's southern accent to a fault. It then turned, its claw moving to the other human. “Lam-bert?" it asked, its voice lilting with each syllable.

“Yes, that's right!" Lambert said, nodding.

The alien tapped at its metal breastplate, the claws clicking on

its spacesuit as it said: “Sha-li-ya."

The other alien mimicked the gesture. “Me-zul," it said,

pointing at itself.

“So you're Mezul, and you're Shaliyya?" Lambert said, pointing between the two. The pair of aliens nodded, surprising him. They caught on to the meaning of a nod very quickly.

“Balo-karid," the one called Shaliyya said, pointing at itself, then to its companion. “Bal-o-kar-id."

“Balokarid," the other one, Mezul, said, looking to Lambert as if it was now his turn.

“Is that what they're called?" Carl asked. “Balokarids?" When

he repeated the word, the one called Shaliyya nodded again.

“We're humans," Lambert explained, saying the word nice and

slow for them, the blue one, Mezul, watching his mouth move.

“Human Lambert," it said. “Human Carl."

“I suppose that's as good a start as any," Lambert said. “Start as any," Mezul repeated. “Human Lambert."

“Did it just copy you?" Carl asked. “Looks like I wasn't far off when I called ourselves parrots earlier. I didn't think we was actually helpin' out space-birds."

Lambert grinned when Shaliyya cocked its head at Carl, like a

curious…. well, bird would. The one called Mezul floated in next to him, close enough that Lambert had to lean out of the way of its beak, the alien looking down its length to stare fixedly at him.

It's diamond-shaped pupils narrowed down to vertical slits, the creature shifting its focus to his cheeks, then neck. When it raised a hand as if to touch him, he gently held up an arm to stop it.

“What are you doing?" he asked, eyebrows raised when it grabbed hold of his hand, turning it over as it studied his digits. Unlike him, the alien had only four fingers, perhaps that was the reason of its fascination.

“That's my hand," he said.

“Hand," it repeated, Lambert marveling at hearing the word copied so well. It gave each of his fingers a little bend, then pressed its palm into his own, holding their hands up to compare their sizes.

Lambert let it manipulate him, Carl chuckling as he watched from the side.

“You want me to take the glove off?" Lambert asked, noting that it was moving its attention to his suit cuffs. Perhaps it wanted to check out his anatomy. Or maybe how his flightsuit worked.

“Human Lambert hand," it said, then nodded.

“I guess you know what yes means. Alright, suppose it couldn't hurt…"

He fiddled with the sleeve, the glove popping off with a hiss, the sound startling the alien as its feathery headdress bristled in surprise. When his hand came free, his skin pricking with the cool air, Mezul leaned in, seemingly fascinated by how he looked.

It traced a vein just visible on the top of his hand with a claw, their nylon fabric dragging against his skin as it moved down to the wrist, where the suit covered his arm.

“What about you, Mezul?" he asked, the alien looking up at him. “Uh, Mezul hand?"

“Mezul hand," it said, then brought its attention to its forearm. It started flicking off a series of clamps, removing pieces of its bracer until the top of its limb was free, simply letting the loose pieces float in the air beside it. Its arm was covered in a form fitting sleeve of grey material, the limb a little slimmer than what its bulky suit had led him to believe. Was the suit built intentionally to make them look larger, or was it just another example of their primitive design plans?

Mezul rolled the sleeve up from its wrist, the fabric peeling away to expose another rolling wave of plush, blue-tipped feathers like those on its head, the dark, cerulean quills catching the light as they danced in the microgravity. The coat didn't end until it reached the nails, which were more like claws that were maybe two inches long, shining like glass when it gave them a little flex.

It held up its arm, gesturing between its exposed limb and his own, as if it wanted to emphasise their differences.

“Yeah, I don't have feathers," Lambert said.

“Feathers?" it asked. Lambert went to touch its arm, then hesitated. Would it get offended if he invaded its personal space? He remembered how curious it had been about his suit. Maybe Mezul wouldn't mind if he returned the gesture.

He reached out and pointed at its feathery arm, the plumes brushing his fingertips when he got close. They were so soft he could hardly feel them at all, Lambert barely thinking as he sank his fingers into the plush coat. Their feeling reminded him a lot of the first time

he had pet a rabbit, the plumage was silky smooth, ticking his skin as they wrapped between his digits almost like they were alive, Mezul cocking its head and chittering something as it let him touch its arm.

“The human urge to pet anything never ceases to amaze me,"

Alice commented through the channel.

“Feathers," Lambert said, pointing at the plumage. “Lambert feathers," it replied.

“No, I don't have feathers, see?" He lifted his arm up. “I've got skin."

“Skin." It reached out and brushed its fingers over his hand, much less tentative than the human, giving his limb a good once-over and a rough squeeze. “I've got skin."

“No no, you've got feathers. I've got skin." “I've got feathers. Lambert got skin."

He wasn't sure if it actually knew what it was saying, but Lambert was impressed all the same at its speech. He wondered if Mezul was a male or female, if the aliens even recognised the genders.

When he let it go, a bit of iridescence on his fingers caught his eye. His hand was covered in what looked like glitter, not quite coming off when he tried to rub it away on his thigh. Was it dust? He looked closely and saw that Mezul was covered in the stuff, giving the alien a sort of dusty appearance if he looked hard enough.

“Sir, I've got a situation here," Alice said, Lambert blinking as

he rubbed his fingers together.

“What is it? Is the ship alright?"

“Yes. The aliens seemed to have closed the hangar doors and oxygen levels are rising, but some of them are approaching the hull. One has even tapped a fist against the ramp, which I opted to close in your absence."

“We better make sure they don't go try and pry her open," Carl suggested. “Plus I'm hungry."

“We're interacting with aliens and you're thinking about food?"

Lambert asked.

“That's the first thing these birds should know about us. Call it a lesson in human priorities."

“I suppose we just go then," Lambert said, leaning off the table, Mezul cocking its head at him. “We need to go back to our ship," he said, then felt a little silly thinking that it understood any of that. “Ship," he said, trying to mime with his hand how they'd copied each others wing salutes earlier.

“Ship," Mezul said. “What is it, alright?"

“Reckon it's speakin', or just copyin'?" Carl asked.

“I don't know. Let's just walk back, see if they understand."

They moved past the one called Shaliyya, the aliens not trying to stop them. Lambert gestured for the aliens to follow. The birds shared a few exchanged chirps, then followed after them, soon catching on and following them back to the airlock.

3

The hangar was visible from the corridor, the airlock doors wide open. If the whole area was pressurised, maybe the aliens, or the Balokarids, weren't planning on launching ships anytime soon, which was hard for Lambert to swallow. All stations should be battle ready after the skirmish, maybe they were forcing him and Carl to stay?

His boots locked and unlocked with each step he took, feeling the many eyes of the aliens falling over him as he stepped into the hangar. Most of the aliens had gone back to their duties, pushing oversized bits of machinery toward the dials, performing maintenance on the ships, but a good many still turned their heads as the humans passed, Mezul and Shaliyya and a few other aliens keeping close.

“Check it out," Carl said, nudging Lambert. “Looks like Shaliyya's brought some insurance."

At Shaliyya's side, one of the unnamed aliens stood by their flank, an opaque visor fixed on the two humans. This one carried some kind of artifact in its hands, its design long and blocky, the alien

holding it one-handed by its side. More orange bands of light ran along its short barrel, the alien's finger resting near a suspiciously looking trigger guard, the stock as thick as a car battery. It had to be a gun, but whether it fired conventional bullets or laser beams, he

wasn't sure.

“Personal bodyguard, looks like," Lambert said. “Shaliyya might be important. Maybe it's the leader of this fleet?"

“You reckon?" Carl asked. “Guess it's the only one that- aw

hell."

Lambert followed his gaze, seeing he was looking at their

corvette. The spaceship was surrounded by a pack of aliens, their beaks turned up as they examined its sloped hull. As they watched one of the more adventurous aliens rapped a fist against the cargo ramp, the resulting thuds echoing across the hangar. One had even floated up to poke at one of the point-defence canons.

“I would appreciate some assistance here, humans," Alice said. “Get your claws off of her," Carl snapped, his boots whirring as

he jogged across the deck. Whether he was talking about Alice or the

ship wasn't very clear.

“Calm down," Lambert said, catching up and stopping his crewmate with a quick tug on the shoulder. “We can't antagonize

these guys. What do you think yelling at them is gonna solve? They're two feet taller than us."

“Who do they think they are? We're not pokin' round their

ships, how's that fair?"

“Shouting won't solve anything. The Hub doesn't need more enemies right now, we can't risk pissing them off."

Lambert hoped mentioning their home would get through to Carl. They were both cut from the same revolutionary cloth, after all. After a moment his friend huffed impatiently, removing Lambert's hand from his arm.

“I ain't no ambassador, man," Carl relented. “Like it or not, we are now," Lambert replied.

Noticing their distress, Shaliyya floated ahead of the humans, chirping loudly at the group of aliens gathered around the corvette. They turned as one, lowering their heads as if afraid of meeting their gaze, pushing off the nearby deck to float away from the human craft.

With the pack dispersed, Shaliyya turned, bowing to the humans in a way that said you are welcome.

“See?" Lambert said. “let the alien sort them out."

Carl reached up and gave it a pat on the arm. “This one's alright," he said. “Thanks for that, Shaliyya."

The alien looked at the place Carl had touched it, tilting its head as the humans passed it by.

With the ramp cleared, Alice remotely lowered the hydraulic couplings, the rear of the corvette opening like a mouth and exposing the bay inside.

As Carl moved inside, Lambert noticed Mezul sticking close by, the man watching as the alien flipped over in the zero-g environment. From his perspective, its legs hung above it as it positioned its head near the floor, Lambert watching with a bewildered expression as its beak inched towards his feet.

The eye on this side of its face looked up at him, the alien gesturing towards his boots, then the floor. It used the deck as leverage to flip itself upright again, giving one of its legs a flex before looking to him for a response.

“You're wondering how I'm walking around?" he asked, the

alien cocking its head at him.

“You reckon?" it said, its throat bobbing with each syllable.

Lambert tried not to look too shocked, realising it probably didn't

really know what it was saying. It was still a little uncanny, however.

“These are magnetic boots," he explained, lifting a foot and making a show of gesturing at the electronics wrapping over the base. “I'd be floating around like you if not for these. Look."

He clicked the button on the side of one boot, then the other, making sure Mezul saw what he was doing. Once the boots were

turned off, he floated there alongside the alien, the Balokarids eyes lighting up as it ogled him and his strange equipment.

“Your new friend probably thinks you're Einstein," Carl said,

watching from the top of the ramp.

“We've got plenty of other stuff inside," Lambert said, flicking

his boots back on and landing on the deck with a thunk. “Want to come have a look, Mezul?"

“You wanna give it a run of the ship?" Carl asked. “Or uh, a float of the ship? That really a good idea?"

“Maybe it'll let us take a look at their gear after," Lambert

suggested.

“Hmm. I guess that would be a good trade…"

Lambert moved up the ramp, turning around and gesturing for Mezul to follow. The alien hung there, unsure of itself as it glanced between him and Shaliyya, the two exchanging a few chirped words.

“It's alright," Lambert said, trying to sound as reassuring as he could, even if it all felt a bit strange, this big alien nervous about approaching his ship. “Come on, I'll show you around."

Mezul appeared to make up its mind, pushing off the deck with its long legs, Lambert blinking when it floated over and seized his hand for leverage. He had to bring his other arm out to halt its momentum, grabbing at its wide hips to steady it.

The alien turned its gaze down on him, the hundreds of azure feathers making up its headdress roiling as its eyes darted between his own.

“Sorry," he said, taking it by the hand as he turned around, its large, clawed grip tightening over his digits as he moved up the ramp and to the stairs, where an amused Carl stood watching from the top.

“He seems keen on you, Cap," Carl said, reaching out to catch

the tossed helmet Lambert sent his way.

“Go reload the guns while I show it around."

“Better you than me to babysit," he replied, moving out of the way as Lambert led the alien up to the main deck. “I'm gettin' a

snack."

“This is our corvette," Lambert said, waving at everything with a wide spread of his arms. “Corvette. Can you say that?"

“Corvette," Mezul said, adding a little whistle right after the

word. “Lambert corvette."

“You got it," he said with a nod. It almost felt like he was teaching a parrot to speak, but he had to remind himself this was a sentient creature, like him, its eyes wide with curiosity as it drifted into the doorway where Carl had gone.

Lambert followed after, the room before them filled in with countertops and cabinets, sealed with electronic locks so as to prevent their contents from spilling out. A bolted down table and a few pairs of chairs sat between the sink and the door, giving off the appearance that someone had just plucked out a section of a living room and set it down between all the storage units.

“This is our living quarters, slash kitchen," Lambert said.

“Sometimes when we're out on a long mission we need a place to sit back, watch some old movies or something."

Mezul took an immediate interest to the television mounted next to the table, tapping at the glass with a claw, pressing the little buttons built into the side.

“You know he ain't gonna understand a word you're saying," Carl noted. He was by the refrigerator, his hands delving into one of the cold drawers.

“I know," Lambert replied. “But it's pretty good at mimicking,

and it knows how to associate words with objects, so why not? I

wonder if it has implants like us, helping it understand, or if it's just using pure brainpower."

“Einstein kitchen!" Mezul chirped, drifting over to the table. “I'm goin' with implants," Carl chuckled. “Here, wanna protein

bar? We got apple, chocolate, caramel."

“Chocolate," Lambert said, catching the wrapper Carl threw at him. He chewed away as he watched Mezul explore, the big alien looking and touching anything it found interesting. It flipped at the toaster levers, flicked the outlet switches on and off, occasionally talking in its own language as it marveled. Soon it caught his attention with a wave.

“What is it?" he asked. Mezul motioned at the four seats present, then pointed at the pair of humans, swapping its attention back and forth as the gears in Lambert's head turned.

“I think it's wonderin' where the rest of the crew are," Carl said. “Four seats, two dudes."

“We're a bit understaffed," Lambert explained, the alien

watching him. “The Hub hasn't got that many ships, and even less people to fly them right now, so they have to send out half-crewed teams, like us."

Mezul's expression let him know most of that went right over its head, Lambert sighing as he tried to think of a way to explain, but just couldn't.

“Don't forget me," Alice said through his suit speaker.

“I doubt I'll be able to explain what you are to it," Lambert said,

the alien looking around to see who he was talking to. “Let's just show you around some more, Mezul."

“Be back in a bit," Carl said when the three of them moved out into the main hall. Carl went back down to the cargo bay, while Lambert led Mezul toward the cockpit, the hatchway opening when they got close.

“This is where I sit," he said, gesturing at the pilot seat, the equipment lit up by the hanger lights outside. “The cockpit."

“Cockpit," Mezul copied. “Corvette cockpit." “You got it," he said. “Hey, what are you doing?"

Mezul eased itself down into the seat, Lambert seeing that the tail-like, metal sheathes sprouting from its rump were getting in the way, the alien chirping in annoyance at the undersized chair. It opted

to rest on the very edge of the seat, suspiciously aware to keep its long arms away from the flightsticks, its knees tucked up towards its chest so its long legs didn't kick at the dashboard.

Even sitting, its head still reached Lambert's chest, the man standing beside it as he chuckled at the odd sight. He gestured to the glass canopy, and the alien escort ship just visible off to one side of the glass. “I fly the corvette from here. Remember when your ship

came right up to ours?"

“Ghosha," Mezul said, giving the stick on the right a gentle prod. The ship's drives were offline, but the whir of mechanics imbedded in the walls still sounded off.

“Ghosha?" he asked. “What's that mean?"

Mezul pointed at him. “Ghosha Lambert. Corvette cockpit, ghosha." It motioned at the seat, then him. “Lambert ghosha!"

“I'm ghosha?" he asked as he pointed at himself, the alien nodding in a way that made it seem like they were almost talking. “Ghosha, and cockpit… Does ghosha mean… pilot? Hey, I think I learned my first Balokarid word."

“You got it," Mezul said. “Lambert ghosha, Mezul ghosha." “You're a pilot too?" he asked. “So you were flying that ship

around?"

He placed a hand on the control sensor on the armrest, and navigated to the recording feed. All external sensors were permanently on record for debriefing purposes, and after a minute he navigated to the timeline of the prior battle.

One of the screens displayed the recording, and he fast- forwarded to the first moments they spotted the alien ship, Lambert hearing his and Carl's voices in the background. Mezul's face lit up as it gestured to the alien ship that had lurked within the asteroids from earlier, then at itself. “Mezul," it said, nodding vigorously and

pointing. “Mezul!"

“That was you we were following?" he asked. “Maybe you do recognise me. Heh, never thought I might have something in common with an alien."

“Lambert," Mezul said, the man quirking an eyebrow at it. It was staring at him again, its big eyes dilating the longer they looked at each other. For some reason he felt a little self-conscious, like the alien was sizing him up or something.

“If you're a pilot, then maybe you'll like what some of this stuff does." Lambert knelt down and tapped at the terminal on the far left. A few pairs of feeds opened up on the screens, showing the surrounding hangar from several different angles from the ship, Lambert showing Mezul how to manipulate each camera, the alien cooing as it swivelled the starboard camera around with the keypad.

The feed moved until they saw Carl outside the ship, his boots turned off so he could float up to the top point-defence cannon. He had opened up one of the belt feeders on the side of the giant turret, an ammo box he'd gotten from the cargo bay floating beside him as he removed the spent canisters. Carl had collected quite the audience, the human surrounded by at least ten aliens ogling at him from a short distance away around him.

“From here I can get a good look at pretty much everything around the ship," he said, pressing the zooming feature. Carl turned towards the camera right as the lenses dialled up to maximum, the

whole screen filling up with Carl's wide, blue eye. The image amused Mezul, the alien clapping its hands together as it gestured to let it try. It manipulated the camera like it had been using human tech its whole life, zooming in on its alien counterparts as they worked on the other ships.

He took a moment to look his guest over, noticing that while

Mezul's spacesuit was a dull grey, the ones who worked the machines wore suits in the shades of greens. Perhaps the colours indicated what type of role the alien served? Shaliyya was the only alien to have red

on its suit so far – maybe that meant officer, and grey meant combatant, green for engineers. If only there was some way to ask.

There was something almost endearing about how the alien wondered at the cockpit devices. Lambert never really had the time nor the friends to demonstrate his profession, and seeing someone explore and map out every little part of his ship, and doubling up as a fellow pilot as well, brought a sense of companionship that he found refreshing.

A thought occurred that he was using the Hub's first chance at

alien contact to make a friend. His mother would be proud.

“Sir," Alice began, its voice coming through the speaker on his collar. “I've been running some scans on our hosts since we've landed, but perhaps it would be best if we documented these

'Balokarids' in more detail."

“What do you have in mind?" he asked, grinning when Mezul darted its head about in search of the other speaker. “We're not doing any dissecting if that's what you're getting at."

“Not at all, I am surprised you think so little of me." “I'm not. So what's your plan?"

“Lead your partner to the medical bay, and use the scanner there. I am nintey-nine percent certain a map of their biology will tell us more about them, as well as provide a template for our report once we get back to the fleet."

“Still need to find a way to do that with no fuel," Lambert said. “Come on, Mezul, follow me."

The alien floated up behind him, keeping close as he exited the cockpit, his boots clunking against the floor as he walked.

“Are you planning on bringing these aliens to the rendezvous point?" Alice asked.

“We can't just let them get picked off by the UEC," Lambert replied. “Who knows how many Confederate ships are out here? When the Hub went independent, we promised we'd be different

from the Confederacy and the core worlds. The way I see it, it's our duty to help these people."

“They may have valuable intelligence on UEC movements in

the nebula as well," Alice noted.

They walked (and floated) down to one of the doorways they hadn't explored, the two entering a whitewashed space about the size of a bathroom. Basic medical equipment lay scattered about, secured to the deck by harnesses, a single examining table in the middle of the room.

Mezul must have recognised the room as being medical in nature, floating over to the table and peering at all the equipment.

Lambert didn't even need to ask it to sit down, the alien curling its big digitigrade legs up against the edge of the table.

After a bit of looking, Lambert produced a device that looked very similar to a glowstick with a metal grip. The blue rod was packed with sensory equipment, Lambert flicking the tool on with a push of a button.

“Alright Mezul," he said, getting the aliens attention. “I'm going to scan you now. With this thingy."

The alien peered at the scanner, its feathery headdress rolling until the plumes flattened. Did that indicate nervousness, perhaps? Like how the fur of a cat would fold back when it was threatened?

“It's nothing invasive," he said, trying to sound assuring. “Look."

He demonstrated by waving the scanner over his arm, his suit painted blue by its flickering glow as the tool thrummed loudly. If their suits were anything like his own, the alien wouldn't need to disrobe.

Seeing how harmless it appeared, the alien nodded, the gesture allowing Lambert to step up to it. Slowly he began to run the sensor beam across the aliens body, Mezul holding out its limbs to help once it understood what he was doing.

When the front was done, he moved round the table, the alien watching him over its shoulder as he ran the scanner across its back. He noted a subtle curvature below the hindquarter sheathes that housed what must have been its feathery tail, pausing to examine two orbs protruding out from behind its flared hips, before curving back towards its large thighs. This alien had a rump that would put any model to shame.

“Lambert," Mezul said, its eyes locked on his as if to say keep

scanning.

“Right," he said, his eyes shifting from its butt as he continued mapping out the suit contours. After a few minutes he stood back, flicking the scanner off.

“All done," he said, the alien clicking its beak as it watched him. “How'd I do?"

“I'm building a rendering of Mezul's biology as we speak," Alice said. “it shouldn't take long. Interesting…"

“What is?"

“The scanner had to penetrate ten layers of material to get access to the flesh beneath. The alien is still rather large, but its spacesuit is adding a lot more mass to its makeup."

“Our suits were like that when humans first set off into the Milky Way," Lambert said. “maybe they've just become a space- faring species?"

“That is a logical conclusion," Alice replied. “this assessment also aligns with your earlier observations on their ship designs, yet contrasts with their shielding capabilities."

“You're a strange bunch, Mezul," he said to the alien. “Primitive and advanced at the same time."

A few minutes passed as he waited, and then Alice directed him to a screen mounted on the wall, Lambert and Mezul watching as a three-dimensional, wireframe image of the Balokarid rotated on the monitor.

As the AI had said, Mezul wasn't as stocky as its suit suggested, but was still a large being, standing on a pair of backwards legs that were bare of feathers from the knees down, making it almost look like it was wearing feathery shorts. From there, the feet split into three long toes tipped with claws, covered in what appeared to be black scales.

Its thighs and waist were wider than its torso, the feathers pinching into a narrow midriff that gave off a distinct impression of an hourglass figure. The legs had to be powerful to support such a large frame, Lambert guessed. When the render rotated to the side, the chest had a pronounced bust that extended out of the biceps, the torso as wide around as a beer keg.

“This make-up is analogous with some of the avian species

we're familiar with," Alice began. “You see the holes running along the bones in its arms?"

“Yeah," he said, peering at the hundreds of little cavities in the forearms. Alice highlighted the spine and the humerus, where similar divots could be seen. “So they've got hollow bones?"

“Only in the upper body, however. As you can see, Mezul here has a set of wings on the backs of their arms. They do not appear to be nearly large enough to allow it to fly, so they may just be there for aesthetic purposes. I suspect with sixty-percent certainty that they may provide a more practical function, though without properly examining it this is subject to error."

“But some of the other aliens out there didn't have wings at all," Lambert said. “How come the ones like Mezul do?"

“Wings," Mezul said, following along. It was paying attention, even if it couldn't speak their language. “Wings Mezul, wings Shaliyya."

“Yeah, Shaliyya had them too." Lambert scratched his hair as he gestured at the alien rendering. “Can you tell me anything about how it's speaking so well?"

“It is not necessarily speaking as it is mimicking your speech, sir. This alien does not appear to have a larynx as humans do, but another organ with a similar build to a syrinx, located closer to the spine. When Carl compared these creatures to parrots, he was quite accurate."

“Hopefully not too accurate," Lambert said. “How can we actually talk to these people if they're just copycats? We're not

diplomats, we're certainly not linguists." He sighed. “I feel like we're not going to get anywhere anytime soon."

“Do not forget this is a space-faring species, Lieutenant. They

are as capable of learning as… as you are with primes, for example." That cheered him up a little, at least. “Let's hope so." “Lambert," Mezul said, floating out of the chair and motioning

at him. “Come on."

“You want to go somewhere?" he asked as if it would just answer him. It floated out to the corridor, this time holding his hand as it went down to the cargo bay, Lambert walking behind on his magnetic boots as it dragged him along.

They moved back out into the open space of the hangar, Lambert tasting the metallic scent of the air on his tongue as Mezul used the handholds spread throughout the bay to move down to the main deck, then across to the left. A short walk later, they stood before the dial that housed the ship Mezul had flown in on.

The twin prongs of metal that terminated above the main

canopy shadowed an open ramp jutting out from the ship's belly, Lambert looking up to admire the alien design of the hull. It was bigger than the corvette, not counting the pair of fixed wings that extended its bulbous width. Orange lights drew thick lines all across the hull, like someone had taken a giant orange stencil and scribbled over it. If a giant stingray had grown blocky pustules over its flesh, this was probably what it would look like.

Behind the ramp, the twin-barrel laser cannon was facing the hangar bay doors, Lambert walking around one of the landing struts

to get a better look at it. The housing that attached the great weapon to the ship reminded him a lot of tank turret mounts, the exposed wiring wrapping around the base of the barrels drawing his eye.

Each barrel was about ten meters long, perfectly smooth save for the capping muzzle and the flared midsection. He wanted to reach out and touch it, but hesitated, remembering those brilliant beams of light they'd fired on those Raptors. The amount of heat they must have produced would be insane, and he wondered what methods they used to cool the barrels down for continuous fire.

He felt a presence nearby, turning around and blinking when he saw Mezul right behind him. Perhaps he'd done a disservice to humanity by taking an immediate interest in weaponry, but he

couldn't help himself.

“You got some impressive firepower, Mezul," he said, his hands

on his hips as he remembered those Raptors being disintegrated.

“Sala'ci," Mezul said, waving its arm at the gun. “That's what you call it? We call them lasers."

Mezul cocked its head at him, its eyes narrowing as if it was thinking. “Human Lambert corvette," it said. “Balokarid Mezul Sala'ci."

“Oh, is that what your ship is called?" he asked. “Sala'ci?" “You got it," Mezul said, nodding. “Come on."

It led him over to the ramp, the human following Mezul inside.

There did not appear to be any kind of cargo bay or airlock on the

Sala'ci, instead the walls slanted in towards a hatch, which Mezul opened by sliding a part of the panel back. The angle for walking got too awkward as Lambert reached the hatch, the man turning off his boots with a click as he floated after the alien.

“Taking a tour of Mezul's ship," Lambert said into his suit. “Be right back."

“Can I come?" Carl asked.

“Stay with the ship," Lambert replied, Carl grumbling over the

radio.

“Fine. Someone has to make sure these guys don't go snoopin' through our stuff."

“They're not interested in your sticker collection, Carl." “They're stamps!"

Through the hatch, a wide shaft opened up before him, the irregular surface of the metal walls providing many handholds for Lambert to manoeuvre himself deeper into the ship. From here Lambert could see many other tunnels trailing off from this one, spreading like veins through to other parts of the Sala'ci.

The first thing he noted was the smell. Gone was the metallic scent of recycled air, replaced instead by a strange earthy musk. It

wasn't exactly pungent, but the scent of burning leaves was enough to give Lambert pause.

Mezul led him down the passage on the left, the alien's shoulders just brushing the sides of the tunnel, another hatch terminating at the far end. Inside was a space about the same size as the cockpit, filled with what appeared to be terminals judging by the screens of alien text shimmering over the glossy surfaces. There was another alien present in the room, sitting before a wide-screen TV's worth of scrolling information, and other strange equipment he simply couldn't make sense of, the electrical equipment bathing the space in a sunset-orange glow.

Its chair was oversized to Lambert, more like a lounge than a seat, but appeared to be a comfortable size for the big alien. Like Mezul, it wore a grey spacesuit that made it appear a bit bulkier than it actually was, the wing sheaths sprouting from its forearms making it look like it had a pair of glaives at the ready as it fiddled with modules and buttons.

The alien and Mezul shared a few unintelligible words, and then the new alien lifted its helmet off, exposing its exotic plumage the colour of wine that shimmered as it caught the light. The feathers on these Balokarids were so dynamic from one another – was it a natural feature, or something artificial, like paint?

The new alien turned its yellow eyes on him, staring at him down the length of its long beak. He caught glimpses of its little, numerous teeth as it opened its mouth.

“Ru-var-ra," it said, touching its chest with a hand. Lambert guessed that was its name, copying its gesture and tapping his chest piece.

“Lambert," he said, the alien seemingly amused by his gesture, coming close and drinking in his features, this one a lot more curious as it lifted his arms to get a good look at him.

“You guys don't care much for personal space, do you?" he asked, looking to Mezul as Ruvaara tapped at his shoulder pad, taking a great interest in his arms and face.

Whether Mezul understood him or not, he could not tell, but Mezul said something that caused Ruvaara to step back, the new alien chittering as it looked him over.

Mezul waved to get his attention, pausing for a moment to think. It gestured at itself and said: “Mezul ghosha, Lambert ghosha, Ruvaara kasim."

“Kasim?" he asked, Ruvaara's eyes going wide as if Lambert was a master of language. “What's that mean?"

The new alien returned to its seat, Lambert noticing a hole had been cut out of the backrest. He wondered what it was for, then got his answer as Ruvaara slid their tail sheathes through the gap so it

could actually sit down. The sheathes weren't segmented, just stiff metal that probably wasn't too comfortable for the wearer if the tail underneath was flexible.

The alien pair gestured for him to come close, Lambert using the back of Ruvaara's seat to steady his floating body as he watched a part of the screen come to life, Ruvaara manipulating a couple of buttons. After a little flicker of static, a feed displayed, one from just above the barrels of the laser cannon outside. What looked like a crosshair sat in the centre of the screen, alien symbols that might have displayed the range written just beside the reticle.

Ruvaara dragged a claw over to another device embedded in the terminal, manipulating a thing that looked a little like a trackball. When the trackball moved, so did the feed, the laser cannons swivelling side to side, the crosshair displacing against the hangar doors to compensate for the change in distance.

“You aim those things manually?" Lambert asked, looking at the aliens in disbelief. “That's like shooting a goldfish in a pond, only the pond is fifty kilometres away!"

The aliens must have detected the awe in his tone, Ruvaara indicating Lambert should try and use the trackball. Lambert grumbled as the little marble sphere slipped against the tips of his fingers, unable to keep the crosshairs still on any one point without fiddling with it for a few moments.

Ruvaara laughed at his frustration, taking the trackball and easing the cannons back into place, its fingers surprisingly dexterous as they manipulated the controls with ease.

“Hey, Carl," Lambert called through the radio. “these guys aim

their guns by eye, with a crosshair and a mouse-thing too." “Like an FPS?" Carl asked. “How the heck do they aim at

something that's way out there? And compensate for the travel time?" “They have remarkable eyesight," Alice interrupted, the

machine always present. “I've been taking a look at Mezul's biology. Its eyes are a lot larger than a human's, packed with at least twice as many photoreceptor cells. The fovea centralis, of which it possesses two, are nearly three times as dense with cone cells compared to humans, resulting in much greater resolution."

“Fovea-what now?" Carl asked, lost already.

“With so many retinal receptors, coupled with their long beaks, they can see many times further than a human can," Alice continued. “There's a strong chance – eighty-seven percent exactly – they could also use secondary lenses to help bring distant objects into greater focus, much like birds from Earth do, but this is just speculation."

“But we're talking about spaceships here," Lambert said. “That's some super telescopic vision you're talking about."

“Perhaps they have other devices at their disposal they use during combat, we don't know. Plus, their lasers do not appear to have much travel time, compared to conventional bullets at least."

“Lambert?" Mezul asked, bringing the human back into the present. The three aliens were quietly watching him speak into his radio the whole time.

Hold on, three? Lambert turned his gaze to the third alien, this one having already taken off its helmet to expose a headdress the colour of a setting sun, the iridescent tips of its feathers shimmering with each subtle movement the alien made.

“Balyn," it said, its beak clicking as it introduced itself. It copied Lambert's name perfectly when the human introduced himself

“You've got wings too, Balyn," Lambert noted, more to himself.

The ones without wings were very few around here – were they a sub-species, perhaps?

“Wings," Ruvaara said, picking up the keyword. “You've got

wings, Balyn. We're talking about spaceships here!"

“Yeah, that's what I said," Lambert replied, looking between the three aliens as he folded his arms over his chest. “So. Is it just you three on this ship?"

The aliens cocked their collective heads at him, Lambert scratching his chin as he tried to think of a better way to explain. “Three," he said, holding up three fingers. “You guys know numbers. Three."

“Saying the same word over and over won't help explain its context," Alice advised. He didn't like how it was always ready to point out his mistakes.

Frustrated, Lambert turned to Mezul. “Where's that thing you gave me earlier? The thing that beeped?"

He mimed twisting the radio/cellphone device that he used to demonstrate prime numbers, Mezul thankfully more receptive to his

gestures as it produced the device from its belt. He took it, and beeped the device three times, pointing to each alien in turn. “Three," he said. “Mezul, Ru-shav, Balyn. Three of you man the Sala'ci."

Mezul shook its head, then held up five fingers, having to use both hands to do so. He hoped that meant five crew, but he couldn't see anyone else. Maybe they were off doing something else.

“Sala'ci five," Mezul said. “Corvette, two." “Yes, two. Our corvette has two crew.

“Aren't you forgetting someone?" Alice asked, its tone

suggesting it was pretending to pout. Lambert ignored it.

“Human Lambert… Einstein," Mezul said. “Two crew. Sala'ci five crew. Three." It didn't seem to know what else to add, but Lambert thought he could tell what it wanted to say. The corvette had three less crew than the Sala'ci, but could fly just as well.

“Yeah, some of our ships can be used by just one person, too." They nodded along, at the very least appearing to understand. “Lambert," Ruvaara said, catching his attention. “Corvette. Ruvaara,

corvette."

“You want to check out the corvette?" he asked, the one called Balyn nodding along in agreement. “Sure, okay."

“Sounds good to me," Mezul said, mimicking Carl's speech to a

fault.

Speaking of, Lambert hoped his fellow human wouldn't mind a

few extra tourists on their ship.

4

“Put that down!" Carl said. “How did ya'll even open my locker, it's locked."

Balyn hung its head when Carl snatched the book out of its hands, Lambert grinning as it seemed to be pulling off an alien version of puppy-eyes. After overcoming their initial wariness of the corvette, the aliens were keen on putting their claws on anything they could find, Mezul's crew and even a few new aliens sticking their

beaks into anything that wasn't bolted down, which soon became a mess when they figured out how to work basic locks and even keypads.

“What was your password?" Lambert asked, watching from the

doorway of the gunner station. “One two three four?" “Doesn't matter what it was," Carl said. “these guys are

snoopin' where they shouldn't be snoopin'."

“At least they know what no means," Lambert said. The Balokarid's vocabularies were expanding with each passing minute, Carl doing most of the heavy lifting as he scolded the curious aliens when they took a specific interest in his section of the ship. Call him crazy, but Lambert suspected they were picking up on the subtle social cues he and Carl gave off to help overcome the language barrier.

“Not as much as they should," Carl replied. “How'd they even guess my code?"

“Numbers and math are a universal language," Alice said over the intercom. “as I have stated previously. They need only see you enter the code once, and they can reciprocate it perfectly. Fascinating creatures…"

Lambert watched as Ruvaara tried to squeeze itself into Carl's chair, chittering in agitation at the obviously underproportioned furniture. He felt someone tap on his shoulder, the man turning around to look. Unlike the others, Mezul was sticking by his side rather than exploring, raising its shoulders and arms in a shrug that had become its way of asking him a question.

“Hey Mezul, what is it?"

“Mezul, Ruvaara, Balokarid. Balokar. Human…" Mezul mumbled, struggling to find the words. “Human, Humanarid? Humanar?"

“You want to know where I'm from?" he asked, the alien angling its beak so that both of its unblinking eyes faced him. “I'm from… well, humans are from Earth."

“Earth," it repeated. “Earth what?" “What's Earth, you mean?" “What's Earth?"

“Earth is a planet. I could show you a picture or something, hang on."

He fumbled through his pocket for his phone, tapping into the onboard systems to bring up some images. He showed it to the alien.

“Here, check it out," he said, swiping at the screen as Mezul bent its head forwards to look. The first photo was of Earth from afar, the blue oceans and green landmasses sticking out against the blackness of space. “That's Earth, and this one here's a forest."

Mezul was amazed, its beak right up against the screen as its eyes tracked the images. There was one of a coastal city, and a panorama of a lake that bordered the beginning of a desert.

“Earth… all?" Mezul asked, blinking at him.

“All of these pics are from Earth, yeah. What about you, Mezul?

Where are you from?"

The alien paused, eyes flicking around as it tried to think of a

response. “Mezul... Mezul Dur'shala."

“Oh, you're from Dur'shala?" he asked, Mezul nodding in affirmative. “What's it like?"

The alien didn't appear to have photos, its eyes widening as it came up with an idea. It rubbed at its exposed forearm with a talon, a thick layer of the dust Lambert had seen earlier coming with it. The alien rubbed the stuff between its fingers, making sure Lambert was watching closely.

“Dur'shala," it said, motioning at the dust. It then took his phone and swiped to the panorama, pointing at the sandy banks on the far side of the image.

“So your planet is sandy?" he asked. “Or mostly desert? Must be if it's getting caught in your feathers so much."

“All, Dur'shala," Mezul said, pointing at its companions.

“You're all from there, okay. So why are you here, and not

there?"

“All… Dur'shala… human," Mezul said. “Put that down."

When it saw Lambert wasn't understanding, it huffed like it was annoyed, looking around for a moment before continuing. “Human, these guys are snoopin' where they shouldn't be snoopin'. Why are you here?"

Lambert shrugged apologetically. “You guys invited us aboard, remember?"

The alien chirped in a way that came off as frustrated, seeing that whatever it was saying wasn't making sense, its feathers flattening against its long skull.

The alien broke the silence by clicking its beak to get his

attention. “Lambert cockpit come."

“You wanna go to the cockpit? Sure."

It followed him up the main corridor, the two returning to the pilot's chair. It was already claustrophobic with all the equipment crammed around the chair, but it was worse with Mezul taking up what little space there was. His shoulder was rubbing up against their bicep, but if the alien was at all uncomfortable it didn't show it.

“Picture," Mezul said, motioning at the monitors.

“Which one?" he asked, the alien giving him a blank look. He decided to just flick through the recordings of the past couple of hours, Mezul nodding its head as if it was saying keep going. When the recording came to the point where Mezul's ships were under fire, it gestured for him to stop.

It pointed one of its claws at the Raptors, the image flickering as

the nebula's energies continued to interfere, even inside the alien ship. “Human," it said, then pointed to Lambert. “human."

“Oh no, we're different from them," Lambert explained. “They're human, sure, but those are the bad guys."

“Bad guys," Mezul repeated. “I'm afraid you've lost me."

Lambert tried not to recoil too much, feeling he was so close to having a full-blown conversation with this thing. “Those were humans, okay? But they weren't with us. Obviously. They were with the UEC.

“Human yoo-ees-see? What that?"

“It's like a… I don't know, a clan. They've got several planets under their thumb, and a lot of territory."

“Territory," Mezul said. “Human Lambert yoo-ees-see?"

He shook his head. “No. Well I was, but… let's just say no. My, uh, clan is the Hub."

“Hub," Mezul repeated. “What Hub?"

“It's a group of humans, another clan, fighting the UEC. There's a lot of politics, but in short, we're not on good terms. We separated from them."

“Where Hub-clan?" Mezul asked, its striking gaze falling on him. “Human Lambert… Mezul Hub-clan."

“You want to go there? Me too, but my corvette's low on fuel, and I have to report back to the Gallipoli first, tell them all about you guys."

Mezul's eyes shifted from left to right, the human realising he'd thrown too many new words at it. “Let's try this." He switched the screen back to the skirmish, pausing the video when the camera was resting on the alien group of ships. “We're on this one, right?" he said, pointing at one of the alien carriers. “What are they called?

What's this whole fleet called?" “Balokarid," Mezul said.

“Yeah, I know, but what are these ships called? What's your fleet

called?"

Mezul squinted in thought, blinking once as it processed his

question. “What fleet?"

“Look, one, two, three ships. That's a fleet." He pointed at them to drive home the point. “They're all ships. What are they called?"

“All ships, called… Kaalesh. Kaalesh clan."

That was a new word, maybe he was getting through to it.

“Okay, Kaalesh clan. So who's the leader of your clan?" “Kaalesh all."

“No, I mean," he sighed, growing frustrated. “Who's the… the ghosha? Who's the pilot of this fleet?"

“Kaalesh ghosha?" Mezul asked, Lambert nodding in reply. “Ghosha… no. Shaliyya Kith. Kith, ghosha, Balokarid… I'm afraid you've lost me."

So Shaliyya was like a pilot, or at least had more say in the fleet's movements like he'd suspected? It was good enough for Lambert, the man waving for Mezul to join him as he left the cockpit. “Take me to Shaliyya, then."

Once more they made their way through the hanger airlock, the sound of whirring engines and mechanical equipment filling the space as they went, the doors welcoming the pair as they stepped through into the corridor beyond. The ceiling was maybe three times as tall as Lambert was, wide enough to accommodate two or three Balokarids floating side by side, a lot less cramped than human ships were by far.

Mezul gripped the handholds built into the sides of the passage to move itself along, Lambert clunking along after it on his heavy boots. There were panels every he looked, probably designed so that the aliens could access the ship systems from as many places as possible. The passage split off in multiple directions after a quick walk, more narrow passes curving higher and deeper into the alien carrier. It was a stark change from the classical right angles of human architecture, more like ant tunnels than anything else.

Mezul took the pass on the right, Lambert following after. Now and then Balokarids would float along the other way, huge crates and other bulky equipment in their hands as they ferried themselves to other parts of the ship. They gawked behind their closed helmets at the human, some stopping to chat with Mezul, probably about why he was wondering around with it.

Some of the Balokarids had big packs strapped to their flanks, secured to their spacesuits by thick belts. Each pack was as tall as Lambert was, and easily heavy enough to give even the strongest humans pause, but the aliens showed no signs of fatigue in the microgravity. Lambert paused when he noticed a piece of metal sticking out of one of the flaps.

“Is that a…" He got a better look when the alien floated by. The piece of alloy was coated in jet-black paint, with half of a serial number etched into the lower part of the metal.

“Mezul," he asked, the alien nodding at him. “Was that guy carrying part of a Raptor?"

The alien looked from him to the other alien, its beak clicking as

it processed the question. “Human ship corvette."

“I guessed as much." It wasn't unusual that they'd be salvaging parts – raw material would be hard to come by out here, but what were they using it for? Did they repair their ships with human parts?

He decided to report it to Alice. Although he'd rather give the machine the cold shoulder, it could provide him with a better insight with its cold logic. “Alice, just learned something about our hosts."

“What have you found, sir?"

“Just passed by a couple of alien salvagers. They were carrying

bits of the UEC ships. Birds work fast."

“Intriguing. They wouldn't go through the trouble of salvaging if they couldn't use it, that must mean they know how to manipulate C-loys to at least a basic degree."

Colossus alloys, or 'C-loys' for short, were the most advanced material known in the Milky Way, and didn't exist on the periodic table before to its discovery. It was universally flexible in its applications, analogous to steel in its usefulness. Ship hulls, weapon designs, infrastructure support – one couldn't walk ten feet in a human world without seeing traces of it.

Humanity had discovered the alloy way back in 2250, when a giant machine had been found buried deep beneath the sands of

Mars. The machine was the size of a skyscraper and just as thick around as one, one of the miners giving it the creative name Colossus, which had stuck since. It was exclusively built from the strange alloy, and it took the greatest mining equipment days to pry apart. It was resistant to radiation, extreme temperatures, and as tough as diamonds, perfect for spaceships. After humans had taken to the stars, it was soon discovered that the machine had similar, sister- constructs spread throughout the Milky Way, seemingly in random places – planets, moons, even floating between the stars.

A new, modern Gold Rush to find these constructs and reap their resources began shortly after, and there were a few people who made a mint selling coordinates to the highest bidder after finding unplundered wreckages.

No one knew where the Colossi – the machine wrecks – came from, let alone who or what created them, but they boosted

mankind's journey to the stars, and the mystery soon died out, the wrecks becoming no more than resource caches. Perhaps these Balokarids found a wreck on one of their planets too – that would help explain their primitive designs mixing with the advanced technology.

“Scans show this very hangar is at least sixty percent made from

C-loys," Alice remarked. “Their ships almost eighty percent. What Colossus variant do you think they found?"

“Could be anything," he replied, not in the mood for small-talk with a machine. “Are our new friends giving Carl any trouble?"

“He's got them contained to his compartment. May I ask what

you're doing out there by yourself?"

“Mezul's taking me to Shaliyya. I'm hoping they're like the equivalent of a Captain or something, and can get us back to the fleet."

“Don't do anything to jeopardize humanity's image, our

superiors will find out everything we did here, be tactful."

“You'd be an expert on jeopardizing humanity's image," Lambert muttered. He waited for the machine to try and talk back, but it seemed to have decided to hold its peace than risk him reprimanding it.

Lambert was brought back to the present when Mezul waved to get his attention, the man switching off his radio. “Who Alice?" it asked.

“Who's Alice?" he corrected. “Who's Alice?"

“It's… part, of our crew," he replied reluctantly. “You know

what crew means, right?" “Human crew… two."

“Technically it's three with Alice, but I'm not sure how to translate what it is to you."

“Translate," Mezul repeated, its voice a little like his own, mixed with an unplaceable accent. “What… What's translate?"

“You're doing it right now. Switching up my language so I can understand you. You know, ghosha means pilot, Sala'ci means ship."

“Translate human Balokar."

“That's right… I think. So how long until we get to Shaliyya?" “You wanna go to the cockpit?" it chirped. “Come."

At the next junction, Mezul floated through the passage leading directly up, the passage curving out of sight like some sort of underground volcanic tunnel, orange bands of light on either side providing soft illumination. Lambert deactivate his boots with a click, and floated up after the alien.

They soon came across a closed hatchway, the doors sliding open to reveal a huge expanse of space. The floor and ceiling were sitting flush against the top and bottom of the passage, but the sides were flaring out hundreds of meters to the left and right, the space between them just tall enough to fit a Balokarid through.

It was like Lambert had just entered the thinnest, most widest room of all time, the far side of the chamber hundreds of meters

ahead, with the roof and ground squashed together with just enough room to let a Balokarid stand.

The space stretched on to the left and right, Balokarids choking up the space with their bulks, disappearing from one passage to another.

Handholds and gripping poles connected the floor and ceiling like scaffolding, every surface bristling with support rails to help the aliens navigate the microgravity. For some reason they all had their feet and bellies facing him, giving off the illusion that Lambert was staring up from the ground.

Mezul reoriented itself until it too was pointing its legs at him, appearing from this angle like it were lying down in mid-air, craning its neck to peer over at him. “Lambert," it said, spinning a finger to demonstrate that he should turn.

When he did, Lambert's perception started messing with his head, forward becoming up as the floor and ceiling became the sides of a giant, squashed space that towered far above him.

His brain grasping to make sense of the sudden shift in orientation, he and Mezul glided through the space to some unseen destination. In basic flight training, each recruit had to drill out their usual grounded perspective, to realise direction in space wasn't the same as in an atmosphere, but very few got used to it permanently, and Lambert wasn't one of the lucky ones, his instincts sure he wasn't the right way up anymore and he could start falling any second.

He saw more Balokarids carrying those big packs full of wreckage, both human and alien scrap from the prior fight. He wondered where they were taking them, perhaps there was some sort of manufacturing deck in one of these many hatchways?

They travelled higher, or maybe it was forward, he could tell what direction they were going in relation to the ship's orientation. The walls were pocked with dozens, if not hundreds of hatches, this part of the ship a kind of nexus for the Balokarids. Around halfway up, Mezul stopped in front of one of the portals.

As he followed the alien in he realised it was no bridge like he expected, but a room similar to the initial holding area back near the hangar. There was three Balokarids inside, each one wearing jumpsuits that bordered between white and silver. Like Mezul, they had wings on the back of their arms, concealed beneath large sheathes, their flat, long profile making them appear a little like the wings of a bat.

Their clawed hands were bare, as were their heads – their yellow eyes tracking him as he moved into the room. Each one was carrying some sort of device, holding them up to the lights as they fiddled with modules and settings. They looked like they'd been waiting for them.

“Is Shaliyya in here?" he asked, looking to Mezul for an answer.

The alien shook its head no. “Then… what are we doing here?"

The new aliens closed in on him, one of them holding up some sort of flashlight as it ran the torch over his arm and chest, chittering in its odd language. Another alien squeezed his shoulder as if to test his flightsuit's integrity, the third pointing some kind of laser at his hands and chest.

His eyes wide in alarm, he began to push the aliens away. “H- Hey, what are you guys doing?"

The Balokarids scattered away, squawking at one another and fixing their intense eyes on him. Was that confusion he could see on their faces?

His companion reached over and laid a hand on his arm, giving him a comforting squeeze as it blinked at him. “Lambert," Mezul began. “Kaalesh clan. I'm going to scan you now. With this thingy."

The aliens held up their devices, Lambert getting the picture. So they wanted to scan him? Run some tests? He asked it why they

weren't going to Shaliyya.

“Shaliyya, scan," it said. “Scan, Shaliyya." It squeezed his arm

in a way that was probably supposed to come off as reassuring.

He guessed it wanted to repay the favour, after he'd scanned it back on his corvette, and then they would go find Shaliyya. He was still a little pensive all the same – he was taking a lot of liberties introducing these aliens to human biology, some might say he was rushing into things. Screw it, he trusted that Mezul didn't mean him any harm.

“Fine," he said. “I've got an ideal male body anyway."

The aliens didn't understand him, but Mezul translated his

willingness for him, and soon they began their tests.

5

The examination didn't go for very long, but the Balokarid Doctors – at least he thought they were Doctors – took their time in pouring over his data, the aliens retreating to their terminals to work. Although Lambert was keen to get moving, he didn't mind spending more time with Mezul to try and iron out its ever-growing vocabulary.

What he found strange was that the Doctors were picking up on his taught words as well, despite them having never met before now. Was Mezul uploading his English into some sort of program the whole ship had access to, perhaps they had their own Alice? It would certainly speed things up if both their species were working on breaking the language barrier, even if Lambert felt like he was woefully inept at it.

“I got a D in Latin," he said, remembering his schooling years. “What is Lateen?" Mezul asked, bringing him out of his

thoughts.

“Ah, nothing. So how're the tests?"

“Test done," Mezul said. Movement out of the corner of his eye drew his attention, and he watched as the trio of Doctors moved over to one of their strange, blocky machines, standing there as if waiting for it to do something. After a delay, a panel opened up on the side, and a slip of what looked like paper furrowed out into a tray.

Lambert craned his neck to get a better look and saw the page was blank. One of the aliens flicked what looked like a UV light onto the parchment.

After a delay, something began to appear on the page. Like an image fading into focus, the silhouette of a human with its limbs slowly filled in. One of the aliens fixed a lamp over the tray, casting the page into its heat, Lambert realising the process was speeding up. Did they not have printers to ink directly onto the paper?

The process took a few minutes, the whole thing reminding Lambert of the ancient cameras of old where dark rooms were used, before one of the aliens took the photo of his anatomy out from the tray, holding it up to the light to examine it.

A couple more images were printed out, one of an X-ray and one with just his muscles visible, Lambert getting a good look at his own body plan as the Doctors discussed among themselves. They clicked and chirped at each other, Mezul adding her thoughts to the group as they pointed to different parts of his body. He wondered what they made of him.

Mezul's eyes began to widen the more the aliens talked, Lambert feeling a bit out of the loop as they clicked their beaks, talking about him. Finally he decided to ask. “Hey Mezul, what are they talking about?"

The alien cocked its head at him, thought for a second, then took one of the X-rays and held it up so he could see. With its free hand the alien pointed at his crotch. “What is this?" it asked.

“Uh." He felt his cheeks warm as he looked at the printed outline of his groin. “That's my… well, I'm male, right?"

“Male?" it asked, then turned to the Doctors, the aliens huddling together like they were gossiping, stealing glances at the human every now and then, and pointing to his groin, both the real and printed one. Soon they reached an understanding, Mezul turning back to him.

“Lambert male?"

“Yeah, Lambert male."

The aliens looked him up and down in a way that came off as disbelieving, Mezul looking especially confused.

“What about you?" he asked. “You a male too?" “Mezul male… no," it replied, pointing once more at his

genitals, then at its waist. “Mezul male no. What is… male no?" “That'd be female," he replied.

“Mezul no… male," the alien said, motioning to its crotch. He guessed that meant Mezul wasn't packing, so did that mean she was female?

“Are you all female?" he asked, turning to the Doctors.

“No males," one of them replied, shaking its head. The other two repeated the same. “Lambert no male?"

“I'm pretty sure I am," he said, the aliens cocking their heads at him. Why were they so surprised? Maybe males in Balokarid society weren't very numerous? Maybe they didn't even have males.

The Doctors used Mezul to translate their thanks to Lambert, and the two turned to leave. The hatchway opened like an elevator door, revealing the huge drop in all directions beyond the examining room. He grabbed one of the handrails on the outside, turning to watch Mezul follow him out.

“Well then, you're a female, Mezul?" The alien nodded. “Well. You are male?"

“You look like you don't believe me," he noted. “Why is that?" “Lambert ghosha?"

“Yeah, I'm ghosha."

“Lambert ghosha, Lambert male. No."

“No? Are you saying males can't be pilots?" “All pilot – all ghosha – all female."

“All your pilots are females? Why?"

Mezul's feathers on her headdress flattened, the ones just above her eyes folding down and back so it looked like her brow was

furrowing. She was trying to find the right words. “Male fly no. Female fly yes."

“But why do females fly, and males don't?" “Female… fly," she said, and when she saw he didn't

understand, she held up her arms as if she were about to hug him. When her arms raised above her shoulders, the thin sheaths that contained the wings on her forearms exposed themselves, their span big enough to encompass an engine block. The gears in Lambert's head clicked.

“Do only females have wings?" he asked. “Is that how?" “Wings yes. Female wings yes, male wings no."

So every Balokarid who had wings was a female? He supposed that would make their women more intuitive with aviation compared to men. Could Mezul fly then? He looked her up and down, guessing her weight. She and every other Balokarid seemed just too big for that to be possible, she must weigh too much, and her wings seemed too small.

As they continued through the nexus, using the handrails to guide them along, Mezul tapped him on the shoulder. She was holding up one of his X-rays, pointing at his neck and chest. “Lambert. What is…"

She struggled for the right words, soon opting to just point.

Looking closely, he saw she was tapping at a grey mass built above his left lung, the grey metal contrasting with the red blood and sinew.

“That's one of my implants," he said, Mezul waiting for him to elaborate. “that one you're pointing at helps my lungs pump oxygen more efficiently. Breathing, basically." He exaggerated drawing in a lungful of air. “It's made of metal. Like your Sala'ci or these walls." He wrapped on the deck nearby with his hand.

“Metal?"

“Yep, just metal and wires."

“Humans Einstein!" the alien squawked, impressed beyond doubt.

“Yep. Humans Einstein." “Implant… Lambert needs?"

“Humans don't need them, but they help us adapt to harsh environments, like space," he said. Implants had been restricted to just military personnel during the pioneering age of cybernetics, but

years ago the privilege had been extended to civilians to help combat muscle atrophy during long space flights.

“What is this?" She pointed at another implant, the blend of

machinery easy to pick out against the red of his internal flesh.

“That's iron plating wrapped over my heart. I can stand a lot more G's than someone without one."

“Geez?"

He began to explain basic force, but it wasn't long before his words were just as confusing as Mezul's expressions. She could imitate pretty well, but discussing gravity was beyond the basic

dialect they'd established. She could glean his intent, however,

deciding to move on and ask about another implant she'd spotted. “That's my translator," he said, the machine in his lower neck

about the size of a tennis ball. “You remember that word don't you?" “Switching up my language," Mezul replied, in an accent that

was both hers and his.

“That's right. Translators speed up the process by imprinting a dictionary into your brain. I don't know the specifics, but it basically

shoves a language into your head, and then lets you sort out the rest." “Speeds up translate?" Mezul asked, looking closely at the

photograph as if that would help her gleam its intent. “Implant… Mezul?"

“You want one?" he asked, the alien nodding. The idea had

crossed his mind, but it wouldn't be as easy as installing a software update. She would have to undergo surgery and get a part of her brain opened up to interface, assuming the device was even compatible with her alien brain.

Lambert remembered learning French a long time ago through the same means, but he still had to learn – the translator was a quick and dirty accelerant, and not without its risks. Mezul did have a good grasp of English so far, however…

“Would you even be willing to have a human do surgery on you?" he asked. “Don't get me wrong Mezul, but having aliens open you up is like, something out of a nightmare for most people."

“Lambert implant have?"

“No, not on me. We don't even have the right equipment on the corvette. The Gallipoli has a medical bay, and an actual team, but even then… Mezul, let me try and explain to you how it would all go down."

He did his best to teach her the right words to explain the process, floating along as they talked. He mimed taking a pair of forceps to his head and neck, tearing at the X-ray parchment to demonstrate cutting skin. He even pretended to start bleeding profusely from the neck with a little sound effect. As much as he wanted to communicate properly with this alien, he didn't want to force it into anything that could hurt her.

He didn't know if Mezul understood him or not, but the alien seemed content on going through with it all the more. Perhaps Balokarids were comfortable with shoving machines into their bodies, and Lambert was just being cautious for her? He couldn't be sure.

It seemed they'd arrived at their intended destination, Mezul stopping before a hatch identical to all the others, save for a red discolouring ringing the hatch like a rope of neon, signalling this portal as important. The door revolved open, Lambert following his alien companion inside.

The room inside was shaped like a large cone, about twenty meters across and twice as long. The walls gradually flared out as the walls stretched away, ending in a conclave wall of glass that capped the far end. The pink and purple hues of the nebula lit up the dozens of metal machinations that ringed the walls of the room, the angular

machines casting stark shadows on the silver deck. The machines looked like desks, set up in slanted rings that corkscrewed along the walls in an exotic pattern.

A Balokarid was sat behind each desk, Lambert guessed they were stations of some kind. Judging by how many readouts were being fed through to this one deck and the number of aliens, he surmised that this was the bridge.

Mezul motioned for him to follow, floating up and to the left side of the bridge. There wasn't much room to walk around, so Lambert opted to float behind, flying over many confused faces as the seated Balokarids turned their beaks up to watch him. Each were

wearing red markings on their chests, similar to Shaliyya's own. The sounds of clicking keys and chittering voices were a comforting piece of background noise, like he'd just stepped into an internet café.

One larger station stood out from the rest, Mezul moving towards it. It was up on the ceiling in relation to the door, Lambert's perception all muddled as he righted himself. Shaliyya was floating by the station, her winged arms folded over her stomach as she watched the human approach. She talked with Mezul for a few minutes, Lambert picking up a few words he was familiar with.

Mezul was teaching Shaliyya English, he realised – just how fast did she expect her superior to learn?

“Lambert," Shaliyya began, the human glancing at her. “Mezul speak… human Hub-clan?"

He was amazed by how much she understood in so little time, but he could be impressed later, right now he had to get through to these aliens. “Yes, my clan is the Hub, yours is Kaalesh, right?

“Kaaleshi clan, all." The alien spread her arms wide, gesturing around her. That must be the plural for their clan.

“Okay. Kaaleshi, uh, in danger," he said, trying to use as few words as possible. “Hub in danger. The UEC is still out there – those Raptors had to have come from somewhere, a fleet or capital ship

maybe."

It all seemed to go over Shaliyya's head, but Mezul stepped in to translate, the two aliens coming to some understanding. “Yoo-ee- see clan where?" Shaliyya asked.

“I don't know, but they probably know something's happened to their attack group by now. I can see we're still right by the fight," he said, pointing over her shoulder at the large window, the expended fuel from where a ship had been destroyed still visible against the backdrop of the nebula. “You need to get your fleet out of here, they'll be looking for you. Kaaleshi must leave."

“Kaaleshi leave… no." The Balokarid shook its head, and when he asked why it said: “Dur'shala home… no."

They couldn't return home for some reason, but Lambert wasn't sure how to ask. “We can help you," he said, the aliens perking up. “I came from a fleet, you know what a fleet is? Mezul?"

“Fleet ships four," she explained.

“Right, my fleet isn't too far away, a few hour's flight time. Do you have a map of the nebula I can take a look at?"

The aliens tilted their heads at him, Lambert already knowing they didn't understand. “A map," he said again. “A scan of the nebula. How did you guys navigate here?"

The aliens stared at him, blank looks on their faces. Growing frustrated, he pointed at the canopy again, the aliens glancing at the roiling clouds. “Where is Kaaleshi? Where?"

“Kaaleshi here," Mezul said, as if that was all that needed to be

said.

“And where is here?"

The aliens huddled together to discuss, and then Shaliyya spoke

up. Before long, another alien approached, this one holding a large slip of what looked like parchment. It reached down and spread the material across the desk, smoothing out the corners as Lambert got a look at it. There were markings scribbled onto the top face, black strips of what looked like ink wreathing between grey smudges that covered most of the surface of the paper. There were straight lines

connecting some of the black dots together. Shaliyya brought down a claw on one dot just off from the centre.

“Kaaleshi here," she said. It was a map! Lambert gripped the edges of the desk, leaning down to examine the markings as his legs floated behind him. He could see it now, the smudges were the gas clouds, the lines where the fleet had travelled, perhaps. It didn't look like any scan of the nebula Lambert had seen, human ships preferred sector scans in three dimensions.

He knew where the rendezvous point was, but without a computer or his ship systems handy, pinpointing it on an alien map would be pretty difficult. They might not even be on the same orientation – this map could be upside down for all he knew.

Maybe Alice could help, he thought. It felt like the longer this mission went on, the more he had to count on it for help. The alternative would be messing around with this map and guessing. He would have to swallow his pride for both his and the Balokarid's sake. The UEC would turn up looking for their dead sooner or later.

“Alice, sending you a photo," he said. “See if you can make any sense of it, we're the dot near the middle."

There was a camera built into the chestpiece of his flightsuit, Lambert using it to snap a picture of the map before uploading it to the corvette's databanks, the aliens watching him with their heads cocked curiously. After a short delay the machine replied.

“This map has a lot of discrepancies compared to our own records. Would you like to know how inaccurate these markings are? Sixty-three percent. It is much like the first Earthen continental maps, very disproportionate."

“Can you make heads or tails of it?"

“Although crude, I can make some corrections and form a comprehensive rehaul that we can use. What is your intention, sir? I have a more accurate render on the ship systems."

“I'm getting these birds out of here, and they're going to transport us. Where exactly is the rendezvous point?"

The robot told him, and he pointed at the physical map,

drawing the attention of the aliens as he tapped it. “Here, this is where we need to go Shaliyya."

“Kaaleshi… Lambert?" Mezul asked. “All?"

“Yes, all. And the sooner the better. Our fleets will stand a

better chance together if the UEC show up."

“Hub-clan fight yoo-ee-see-clan?" Shaliyya asked.

“Yeah, we do. And we're technically winning with our kill count."

The aliens looked impressed, Mezul in particular, chatting in their own tongue before Shaliyya spoke again. “Kaaleshi go. Hub- clan, Kaaleshi-clan… sooner the better."

Shaliyya turned away, her voice attracting the attention of everyone else on the bridge as she gave out orders. It wasn't long before the view of the nebula through the glass began to shift, the massive carrier ship adjusting course to set a new heading, one of the other big alien ships panning across the view before the ship aimed towards the Galactic south.

Lambert watched as the world of purple slowly shifted as the carrier engaged its engines, feeling a wave of relief wash over him. Finally, they were going to get moving, though he felt a little apprehensive about how his fellow Hub companions would react when a bunch of alien ships turned up to the rendezvous.

Mezul bumped into his side, her long neck angled down to appraise him, her headdress fluttering like there was an invisible gale washing over her. The way he had to look up at her made him feel

strange inside, but he couldn't place why. “Lambert, not as male..."

“No, I am. How many times do I have to tell you?" He

chuckled.

“Lambert not as male like," she added. “Human female like

Lambert?"

“No, they're shorter, generally slimmer, and with longer hair,

most of them anyway."

“Human… strange." The alien clicked her beak. “Male can't fly, human can't fly. Lambert pilot, Lambert fly. Lambert… strange

good."

“Ha, thank you?" He grinned. “You're pretty strange good

yourself, Mezul."

The alien returned his smile, the feathers on her headdress standing tall.

6

After leaving the bridge, Lambert's stomach lurched as he looked down the way they had come, his mind sure that he was about to tumble off a tremendous height. The bridge was up on the very highest level of the nexus, with dozens of levels running all the way

down to the 'floor', like the façade of a skyscraper. The other doorways were spread randomly throughout the narrowed walls, no two alike in terms of spacing. The aliens who designed this ship

didn't care much for symmetry.

“Mind if I check out a bit of your ship?" Lambert asked, holding

onto a handrail as Mezul followed him out.

His companion braced herself against the doorway, shrugging at him as if she didn't care what he did, even though that gesture was her way of saying she didn't understand him.

“I'll show myself around," Lambert said, beginning his tour by

picking a hatchway at random, floating over to it with Mezul in tow. His first stop was adjacent and one level down from the bridge, the sounds of many chittering voices reaching Lambert's ears when the doors slid open.

The space within was wide enough to fit a corvette inside twice over, two thick pairs of support columns that stretched from the silver floor to the curved ceiling filling the space. They were covered in seats and tables bolted onto their thick surfaces, hundreds of them

jutting out to accommodate the dozens upon dozens of aliens packed into the room.

The aliens closest to the hatchway turned their beaks, cutting their conversations to stare at the human. The closest group was a trio of winged females sitting sideways in relation to him, Lambert floating over and greeting them with a wave.

“How's it going ladies?" he asked, grabbing a seat to steady himself. The one closest to him reached out to touch him, hesitating as it turned to Mezul to say something. Maybe she was asking her if she could pet him?

“I'd prefer if we keep our hands to our… never mind." The alien brushed her claws through his hair, tickling his scalp as her friends leaned in to examine him. It wasn't long before he was being petted from all sides, Mezul chuckling as he glared at her annoyedly.

“What's on the menu?" he asked, waving them off as he peered at their table. They'd been holding tiny silver things that looked like lunchboxes in their hands, the smell of cooked meat reaching his nose when one was offered to him. What at least appeared to be food sat within the recess, little flip locks securing smaller parts of the lunchbox to hold presumably more food.

There was some sort of assembly line trailing up the side of the column nearby, the thin tracks crawling up and down the entire length. There were hundreds of the small boxes fasted against the slow-moving line, secured by magnets maybe, Lambert watching one of the Balokarid's pluck one from the line. It produced some kind of meat slab from within, its sharp teeth showing as it began to chew on it.

“Food place," Mezul explained, taking a meat chunk for herself and demonstrating how to eat food. The space could accommodate hundreds of aliens, packed in tightly as they were, but he assumed there had to have been several other identical rooms spread throughout the large ship.

He watched one of the females produce some kind of bottle, upturning its contents onto her chosen piece of meat. What looked like herbs sprinkled out onto the flesh, the alien slathering it on like glue. She wasn't alone, Lambert noticing every alien was spicing up their chosen dishes. They must like their herbs.

One of the curious aliens finished her meal early, deciding to kill time by touching and fiddling with his suit. It eventually figured out how to work one of his pockets, not in the least bit apprehensive as it reached in and pulled out his music player.

“Hey!" he said, snatching the device away. His finger brushed the play button, and music started blaring through the alien mess hall. So far Lambert had gone fairly unnoticed, but now nearly all alien beaks snapped in his direction, closing in on the source of the sound like vultures around a corpse, Lambert quickly surrounded by the curious creatures. They chirped along with the sound, their heads bobbing and throats warbling as they began to whistle in time with the beat.

“You guys like Collins too, huh?" Lambert asked, laughing as the Balokarids mimicked the tune down to a fault, one of them devoted just to the drum snares. He watched as Mezul craned her long neck down, peering at the little play and pause symbols on the tiny screen.

Eventually the aliens grew disinterested, Lambert switching the music off and heading back out to the nexus, Mezul by his side. She seemed fascinated by his music player, repeating the tune while tapping her chest with a claw, like how a human might tap a rhythm on a desk.

“You got a nice voice Mezul," Lambert said. “You like music?" “Music," she said, whistling like she was cat-calling someone.

He handed the alien his player, Mezul turning it over in her hands. He was surprised to see such a large creature handle the device like it was made of glass, keeping her claws from scratching at the little screen. She quickly figured out how to scroll through his playlist, the

Balokarid skipping through the songs until it found one that she liked.

“That one's a classic," he said. “Carl thinks they're too old, but they're not bad, huh?"

Mezul took charge of the music while Lambert led the way, the two floating down the nexus, attracting the attention of many passing Balokarids. Lambert picked another hatchway at random, floating through the opening doors with only curiosity as his guide.

This space was just as populated as the mess hall, hundreds of aliens filling the microgravity with their large bodies as they travelled up and down a tall, cylindrical room, three bands spiralling up to the ceiling, Lambert coming out of the band in the middle. Each band consisted of about five circular entrances, the doors ringed with supports for the aliens to push off from, giving the distinct impression of balconies. The sound of doors sliding open was constant, the aliens disappearing by the dozen behind the portals all around him.

The Balokarids here were dressed differently than Lambert had seen so far. Gone were their colour-coded, bulky jumpsuits, their suits featureless and black, their heads exposed as the aliens watched the human explore. It was a remarkably 'civilian' type get-up, or maybe these crew were off-duty. They didn't try to stop him, even as he picked a random door and opened it up like he'd seen the aliens do.

He floated through the threshold, a strange sight making the man blink. Built into the walls of the confined space were rectangular sections a couple feet deep, the edges curved rather than meeting at a point. There were dozens of them, each containing identical accommodations: fluffy cushioning padding, a belt that loped around the middle, along with a kind of cloth that looked as thick as a quilt and larger than any king-size sheet Lambert had seen.

Almost all of the sections were occupied, the aliens using the strap to strap themselves against the soft padding, their beaks resting on their sides as they dozed beneath their sheets. A few who had been nodding off peered down at Lambert, their lazy eyes blinking

groggily as he intruded on their sleep, their large frames just barely able to squeeze into the bunks.

“This is your sleeping quarters?" Lambert asked, not really expecting an answer but turning to Mezul anyway. “You guys are packed in here like canned fish!"

There had to be around fifty aliens in this section alone, and if the several other adjoining rooms were identical, there were hundreds of Balokarids in just this small part of the ship alone. Human warships had to save on space too, especially when it came to infantry units where whole squads bunked together, but there were three of these alien carriers, and they were as large as cargo freighters. The

Balokarid's use of space was lacking, to say the least.

Mezul tapped him on the shoulder, getting his attention as she waved for him to follow. She seemed to want to show him something, heading out from the bunk area and towards a different portal, rather than back into the nexus.

The corridor beyond was quick float through, similar in design to the airlock with a portal on either end. Like playing the radio on a long car trip, Mezul used the music player to fill the silence as they crossed into the next part of the tour. When he tried to take it back, Mezul politely kept it out of his reach, her tall stature making it easier for her to keep her new prize.

The hatch irised open, a strange, familiar scent hitting Lambert like a wall as they floated into the new space. Packed against all six faces of the cube-shaped room were shelving units and metal crates, some taller than others and creating thick towers that seemed to hang off the walls and ceiling.

He watched as a Balokarid pried open a crate and begin fishing through its contents. No, they weren't crates, but lockers, the man spying an alien flightsuit along with other alien equipment hanging via hooks inside. The alien was putting something inside each locker, some kind of pouch it was careful not to puncture with its claws.

“What's he got in those bags, Mezul?" he asked, his companion

watching him point at the alien.

“Fentula," the alien explained.

“Looks like everyone's getting a bag," he noted. The Balokarid placing the bags floated over to a pair of other aliens present, who were tending to a strange apparatus near one of the other exits. One of them was raising the lid of some kind of cauldron, using a bowl to scoop out whatever concoction broiled inside. What looked like heated panels cupped the base of the pot, a strange sizzling sound audible even from this distance. Thick tubes snaked this way and that into another receptacle, unknown fumes travelling through the transparent pipes.

The alien passed the bowl off to her companion, taking up a spoon to swirl the fentula, if that was what was inside. Its companion emptied the contents of the bowl into a bag it produced from below the device, pulling the neck taught with a simple string and adding it to a pile of other prepared satchels. The deliverer took up an armful and continued its rounds, making sure to go to every locker and stock them up.

Lambert wrinkled his nose at the earthy smell. Mezul's ship had smelled like this, rich and pungent. He looked back the way they'd come. Was this the first stop right after the aliens woke up, where they collected their suits and tools and fentula? Now that he thought about it, it wasn't just the sleeping quarters that were tightly packed, all the rooms so far barely had any space between them – as if the Balokarids were starved for every inch of space.

When they were done, the three Balokarids took their strange contraption by the handles built into the sides, pushing it through the microgravity towards one of the hatches. Lambert floated after, using the lockers to push himself along.

“Wish I could ask you what all this is for," Lambert said, his

alien companion chewing on the quills above her wrist like she was

itchy. “You don't seem to mind, though. Let's see where this fentula

comes from."

The aliens wielding the contraption turned around, Lambert's heart racing. Then he realised he wasn't sneaking around, he had an escort, and the aliens didn't seem to mind, going on their way through another short airlock.

The scent of dirt and herb was strong, practically stinging his nose when Lambert reached the far end. Here the room was shaped like the bottom of a bathtub, with the top half covered in light strips, bathing the room in a magenta hue not unlike the nebula itself.

The bottom half of the room was populated by half a dozen trays, stretching up the length of the twenty-meter-long room, stacked with shelves that ran meters into the air. The vertical shelves were lined with plants that resembled jungle vines, trailing into the lower trays where other plants resided. Some were leafy like tiny shrubs, others looked like thick tree roots that wreathed throughout the entire length of the trays. Maybe a dozen Balokarids were tending to the farms, some shaving off the usable parts while others planted new flora while digging out the old.

Lambert moved over to one of the farms, glancing at the alien deliverers who pushed their giant machine like it was an oversized hot dog stand. There was a recess in the wall on the left, the two aliens plugging it in, seemingly done for now.

He could feel a low thrum through his hands as he leant on the edge of the tray, guessing there were engines built somewhere beneath him. The stench of burning leaf pervaded everything in this place, but none of the aliens seemed at all bothered by the smell.

There seemed to be a lot of root-like plants and leafy variants compared to more solid foods humans usually grew in hydroponic vats, Lambert seeing another vat full of what looked like giant, brown leaves individually placed along the tray, their diets must be more accommodated to greens than humans.

Upon closer inspection, the underlying layer of soil was not dirt, but some kind of sandy substance a dark amber in colour, packed inside a thin layer of plastic or some other material. He kept his hands clear just in case, afraid he might contaminate something, breathing through his mouth by how powerful the smell was. “Geez, Mezul," he said, coughing into his arm. “Smells like my brother's room in here."

Lambert realised she wasn't having as much trouble as him, watching as her nose holes closed like two tiny airlocks, a section of flesh shutting over just inside her nostrils. Her mouth was open enough to allow her to breathe, the alien cocking her head as she noticed him staring.

“Weird," he muttered. “Anyway I've seen enough, let's get back to the corvette before I start choking."

“Lambert corvette?" Mezul asked. “Hangar come." She floated

back the way they had come, Lambert following behind.

7

The corvette was in an interesting state when Lambert returned. He'd been expecting Carl to be chewing the ears off the curious aliens, the machine relaying its concerns to him, but the ship was quiet,

Lambert's eyebrow raised as he appraised the general calm surrounding the ship. Maybe the aliens had finally grown bored of the human vessel.

Even Mezul seemed confused, poking her beak through the cargo bay hatch and looking round for its brethren, her snout snapping towards the stairs as they heard a voice.

“-And this one is from 2098, one of the last stamps before they

were fully phased out of human postage…"

Carl's voice echoed through the ship, Lambert and Mezul sharing a look as they moved up to the gunnery station, Lambert peeking through the portal to a strange sight.

His human companion had managed to round up all of their guests, Lambert recognising Ruvaara and Balyn near the forefront of the group, the two turning to give Mezul a greeting in their chittering, strange language.

“See you've been busy showing off your antiques," Lambert mused, shooting Carl a grin. His friend stood like a lecturer before the class, the aliens his audience as he held out a black, leather book with square pockets built into the plastic sleeves.

“It's better than them turnin' our ship inside out," Carl replied, closing his book much to the disappointment of the aliens. “And it ain't just me, Alice thinks their English is so much damn better than before. Check it. Hey Ruvaara, what's my job?"

“Carl fire point defence!" Ruvaara chirped. “And what do you do?"

“Ruvaara fire frickin' laser beams!"

“Don't teach them how to curse, Carl," Lambert chided. “When

we get back to the fleet they'll know we've been messing around." “Speakin' of, Alice tells me we've set a new headin'. I guess you

managed to get these aliens movin' to the rendezvous?"

“We're on the way." He told him about the parts of the ship he toured with Mezul, noting that despite being crammed in together, the aliens were orderly and were always busy doing something, maintaining a strict timetable.

“You can say that again," Carl said. “Check out the landin' pad over there." He jerked a thumb at one of the cameras on the gunner console. The view panned across the wide hangar, the half a dozen

Sala'ci ships secured to the other pads while alien engineers tended to them.

Lambert almost did a double take. Besides Mezul's ship, there had only been one other alien vessel present when they'd first entered, but all the pads were now occupied by a craft in varying stages of completion. The aliens were assembling brand new ships, the skeletal

frames slowly taking shape as the Balokarids welded parts of the hull together. The aliens didn't waste time replacing their losses.

“Here, here!" Mezul said, noting what he was looking at and gesturing to the large hangar doors. “Sala'ci ships all. All hangar."

“You're making ships in every hangar?" Lambert guessed. “It's

barely been a day and they're already rebuilding."

“They got some impressive production power alright," Carl

noted. “Even Fed shipyards take weeks to assemble a fighter if they're workin' round the clock."

From behind the humans, Mezul leaned on their shoulders to

get a look at the feed, the alien's hands almost encompassing their

shoulders. “Mezul, your people work fast," Lambert said, nodding as he watched. “How many hangars do you have on this ship anyway?"

“Hangar…" Mezul clicked her beak in thought. “Hangar four

and four… eight?"

“You taught it to count?" Carl asked, quirking an eyebrow at

the alien.

“She's got a knack for numbers. Eight will always equal eight, no matter what planet you're from."

“Wait wait wait." Carl raised his hands. “Did you just say she?" “Yeah. Found out on the way to the bridge. From what I know,

female Balokarids have wings, and the males don't."

Carl turned to look back at the rest of the aliens milling about in the room. “No shit? Never had a group of women in my station before today. Where are all the guys at?"

“I saw a couple of them in their mess hall, but I didn't get a chance to get close. The wings aren't for show, the airforce is a completely feminine pursuit in Balokarid society, but I'm not a hundred percent sure they can actually fly."

“Make sense if they can. They got that… what's the phrase?

Female intuition. You think they're a matriarchal species?"

“I'm not sure," Lambert replied, scratching his chin. “Hopefully

someone on the Gallipoli specialises in language and can help us

out." He checked his watch. “I'm gonna go get some shut eye, wake me if something happens."

He left for the crew quarters; a simple bunk area divided into four rooms. They weren't too flashy, just a bed and a lamp for each room, but they allowed the standard four-man crew some privacy and their own place to relax.

As he opened the door to his bunk, he felt a presence behind him. Mezul was following, probably thinking he was on his way to the cockpit. “I'm going to get some rest," he told her, shooing her away. “Go hang out with Carl or something."

She could tell he wanted to be left alone, turning around and wandering away as he shut himself inside the bunk. He caught a few hours of sleep, but it wasn't very restful – his body was just too excited at what was happening, he was one of the first humans to interact with new, alien life! How could he get his regulation eight at a time like this?

He gave up trying to rest after a while, eating a protein bar for breakfast before wandering out to the corvette's main hall. Carl had said they'd taken a few grazing shots during the fight, maybe he could take a look at the hull for other damage, kill time before they reached the rendezvous.

A Balokarid female passed him by on his way to the cargo bay, giving him a wave. He waved back as he passed her by, pausing as his brain processed the last few seconds. It was uncanny how casually he returned the wave, like he was almost used to having aliens wander his ship so freely.

Once outside the ship, he clicked his mag-boots off, floating around the ship, pulling himself along the hull to assess the damage, soon coming across a few streak marks left by machine gun fire. It would make a good story to tell, even if it gave the corvette a more weathered appearance. The corvette was armoured with Colossal- alloy-laced plating, but a bullet with no constraint on speed could deliver a lot of kinetic power and punch through the thinner parts of

the corvette, like the bottleneck where the cockpit joined the with

main body of the corvette, that part wasn't as thick around as the rest.

He turned his head, watching the Sala'ci on the neighbouring pad being worked on. He marvelled at their speed, the craft was already taking on its familiar stingray profile, where hours ago it had been less than a bundle of scrap. There was a chance they were putting in extra effort to impress their human audience, but Lambert didn't care. It could take months to churn out a corvette from scratch, and these guys were pumping out four to six attackers within a day.

He floated gingerly down to the thrusters, pulling away a maintenance panel with a grunt of effort. He was no mechanic by trade, but he did know the basics of how to recalibrate the engines of his ship and assess if something inside had been damaged.

He took a few trips back and forth to the cargo bay, doing his share of maintenance to occupy himself for a few hours. He wiped his brow of sweat with the back of his hand, the moisture clinging to his skin in the microgravity, looking over his shoulder when he heard something click against the hull.

It was Mezul, her talons tapping on the corvette as she scaled up to greet him. He grinned as he wiped his hands on a rag, finding himself pleased to see her around.

“Hey Mezul."

“Hey Lambert," she replied. “What you doing?"

“Just some maintenance on the old ship," he said, patting the

hull with a hand.

“But… Lambert ghosha," the alien said, her tone suggesting she was confused.

“Yeah, Lambert ghosha, but I know the ins and outs of my own ship. Have to."

Mezul's headdress bristled in a way that came off as pleased or maybe surprised, the alien watching him work. The silence became a bit too much for him, the man making small talk as he worked. “You

were talking earlier about your home. Dur'shala, was it? Your Kith said you couldn't go back. Can you tell me why?"

The alien considered, rubbing the top of its arms uncomfortably.

“Dur'shala home. Human fleet corvette, raptor, carrier. No

Lambert corvette like. Human fleet… danger Kaaleshi home, Kaaleshi fleet leave. Yoo-ee-see clan follow fleet, fleet number ten, now fleet number three."

Lambert's heart sank. The Balokarids had set up a colony on this Dur'shala, and the UEC turned up and drove them out. To what end Lambert could only guess, but expanding their reach was the most obvious reason. Habitable planets were as rare a commodity as Colossus wrecks, and going as far as declaring war on an alien

spacefaring species seemed in line with the UEC's morals.

He hadn't felt pity when they'd killed those UEC raptors during the earlier fight, and he certainly didn't now, realising they'd been picking off this clan one ship at a time. People who willingly fought for that corporate cesspool should be shown no mercy. He was aware of how contradictory that was, being formerly aligned with them, but that was a different time.

“We'll protect your fleet," he said. “I won't let another one of

your carriers get destroyed, promise you."

“Hub-clan protect Kaaleshi?" Mezul asked.

“That's what we do," he replied, nodding. “When the Hub went

independent, we promised to be different. I'd say this is just what we've been waiting for to prove ourselves."

No matter how much she comprehended, she could gleam his conviction well enough, and she seemed to perk up. No wonder they had been so hesitant around them initially – humans were the enemy in their eyes – but he was glad to be the one to save face.

“Human Lambert brave," Mezul said. “Yoo-ee-see fight, Lambert fight. Lambert pilot, Lambert know the ins and outs of my

ship." She examined him with those golden eyes, the human feeling weird as she appraised him before meeting his gaze. “Lambert, brave."

Lambert didn't feel like it, but he liked the praise regardless. “Thanks, Mezul, appreciate the sentiment."

“Lambert friend," she continued, her blue feathers sparkling under the orange lights of the hangar. Her headdress was standing tall again, the alien looking around warily as if afraid of being

overheard. “Mezul like Lambert friend."

“Well, Lambert like Mezul friend too," he laughed.

8

Lambert checked the seals on his wrists as he worked through his flightsuit's integrity, turning to glance behind him at the co-pilot chair. Normally that seat remained stowed in the wall recess, but now it was unfolded, Mezul occupying it, her large frame just barely able to squeeze into it, the avian chittering in annoyance as the safety belt compressed her flared hips.

An hour earlier, Shaliyya had returned to the hangar with a guard in tow. After a bit of help from Mezul to translate, her speech much better than any other Balokarid, the Kith told Lambert that they were close to their destination. At last, they were about to regroup with their fellow humans.

His stomach swelling with apprehension, he had woken up a napping Carl, and told him to suit up. As he did the same, he asked the machine if they had enough fuel for a quick ten-minute flight.

“As long as we keep to minimum thrust, of course," Alice confirmed. “What are your intentions?"

“I don't want to risk the Gallipoli firing on the Balokarid ships.

We'll fly in front of the aliens first, explain the situation."

“Good plan," Alice replied. “Should we take a few of them on board with us? Their ships are too big to dock with our own."

Lambert nodded even though the machine had no physical presence, turning to Mezul to translate. “Alright Mezul, we're going to meet up with Captain Anders. He's our… our Kith, you could say."

At the word Kith, Shaliyya stepped forward. “Kith to Kith, yes

yes."

It seemed she understood his intent, and wanted to meet his

leader. “Great, we've got a few spare seats around, one here in the

cockpit, a couple in the rec room and the medbay."

The aliens huddled together, and after a few minutes of deliberation, it was decided that Mezul, Shaliyya, Ruvaara, and the unnamed guard would stay aboard the corvette. They had just enough room to accommodate the large aliens, though their seats were just too small for them to stay secure without the extra belts Carl had hastily installed.

He checked in with his companion over the ship line. “All ready back there, Carl? How're the guests?"

“Had to make a few modifications to strap em' in. Won't be winnin' any health and safety points, but we're ready."

“Would you like to know the chances of potential injury to our alien companions?" Alice asked him, expecting he wanted more specifics.

“Rather not please," Lambert replied. “Just tell me if we're ready."

“All systems nominal. Ready when you are, sir."

He lifted his helmet over his face, clicking it to the neck of his suit, wincing as the internal oxygen sealed up with a loud burst of air. He glanced over his shoulder, Mezul sitting back and to the right of him, all the cockpit devices looking comically small compared to her large body.

“All good?" he asked, giving her a thumbs up.

She returned it, twisting her own helmet on and hiding her features away behind her angular faceplate. She looked like a

cybernetic vulture with that thing on, the silver snout shining as her black eye sockets peered back at him.

He flicked on the engines, engaging the thrusters as he gripped the twin joysticks, the cockpit vibrating around him as the ship came to life. As if on cue, the massive hangar doors began to split down the middle, the gap between them slowly widening. Mezul was probably on her own channel, signalling the crew to open the hangar.

The dial the corvette rested upon suddenly began to turn, a moment of panic coming and going as the view through the glass panned. Like when they'd first entered, the hangar was packed with Balokarids, eager to see his ship in action maybe?

They were observant enough to stay clear of the backblast, the space behind the corvette cleared as the engines whirred to life, blue jets of flame igniting as the craft slowly rose from the deck. The opposite branch of the alien carrier came into his view, the rectangle of alien polymer flanked by the soft hues of the nebula, distant glittering stars framing the vessel.

He eased the joysticks forward, feeling Mezul's eyes on his

back, the alien interested in seeing another ghosha in action. He

certainly didn't want to disappoint, the man hitting the button for the gears with a thumb, the struts easing back into their housings.

The corvette glided through the hangar threshold, Lambert tilting the craft down and sideways. To their audience it would have looked like they were flying out on their side, nose to the floor. Once they were clear of the hangar, and his canopy was filled with the endless void, he hit the thrusters, gaining speed as he got clear of the large vessel.

He added a little spin just for flare, flying underneath the belly of the carrier, glancing up at its smooth surface as they passed. There was just so much metal stretching on into the distance, the occasional panel interrupting the smooth surface. The corvette flew into the clear, Lambert spinning round so that they were facing backwards.

Even several kilometres out, the carriers were still an impressive sight, rivalling that of even the biggest human cargo ships.

He saw the carrier that had been damaged from before. It was lagging noticeably behind the other two, thick smoke trails wisping from the flank of the left side branch. They seemed to have not been able to repair the hull while on the move, and he doubted they'd want to stop with the UEC on their tail.

Mezul hadn't made any comment, so he supposed it was still space-worthy, the man flipping the corvette on its axis, reorienting so that he faced the rendezvous point. His instruments were a mess with all the interference, but they had mapped this way before their lucky encounter with Mezul's ship, so it should be a straight shot from here.

He noted on his tactical view, the large symbols indicating the three alien carriers had turned from white to green, their previous unidentified tags removed. They formed up behind his corvette in a column formation, matching his speed as he engaged the main thrusters. They were well aware to let him take the lead on this one, putting a remarkable amount of trust in him now that their Kith was on his ship.

After maybe half an hour of flying, a new IFF tag appeared on his map, floating between two gas clouds ahead of them, giving off a subtle ping and creating tiny circles on his tactical view. Lambert remembered placing the marker down when they'd first set off on their scouting mission. Who would have thought he'd have returned with an alien convoy in tow?

As they closed in, green dots popped up around the marker. There were several smaller ship tags, along with a single larger one, the tag above it labelling the ship as the Gallipoli. The smaller tags were the other scouts, having returned on schedule, unlike him who was a little less than a day late.

“Sir," Alice began, a hint of worry in its perfect voice making Lambert strangely anxious. “I'm detecting power fluctuations in the Gallipoli weapon systems."

“I think they're lockin' us!" Carl said through the channel.

Mezul exclaimed something in her foreign tongue, Lambert glancing back at her. She did not have to translate into English, he knew what she was trying to say. The alien ships were likely receiving warning locks as well.

He clicked the bead on the chin of his helmet, cursing when he missed the first time. He had to be quick or his own people would blow them all out of the void.

“Gallipoli, come in! Blue on blue! This is Corvette one-five, blue on blue. Do not fire, we're on the same side here!"

He waited with bated breath, ready to try evasive manoeuvres should his message get through too late. The local channel hissed with static, Lambert just able to make out the dark shapes of ships through the canopy.

The tension left him in a sigh as a voice crackled through his helmet. It was a woman, her Australian accent just thick enough to be obvious. “Corvette one-five, this is Gallipoli control, you have three unidentified contacts on your six."

“I read you control, they're friendlies. Do not fire on them," he added again. “They're not UEC, they're… something else, XT's." In Confederate military doctrine, XT was code for extra-terrestrials. “They're with me."

“Hold position, one-five."

He flipped the ship and countered his thrust, relieved when the carriers did the same, slowly coming to a halt. He could almost feel the targeting computers of the human ships tracking the aliens. One could only imagine how many Balokarid Sala'ci could pour out of those carriers if they decided to launch missiles. He hadn't thought things would get this hairy so quickly.

The silence was becoming too much, and right as he was about to hail the Gallipoli again, a new voice crackled into his helmet. It had a tinny effect, garbled with static, but he recognised the voice.

Although his tone was gentle, there was an iron will behind it, the kind only veterans attain after several years of service.

“Lieutenant, this is Captain Anders, I'd appreciate it if you told me why the hell you're leading three unidentified craft towards my

ship."

Never one to mince words, Lambert thought, unconsciously straightening up in attention as he responded to the call. “Captain, I… we found them out on our scouting route. They're not UEC, they're not even human, or Suvelian for that matter, but something else,

another race. I brought them here because they were under attack." “By who?"

“You might want to pull up a chair, sir. A lot's happened. I have

a few of their number, including their own Captain, on board with me. If you'll let us board, you can see them for yourself, and I'll explain everything."

There was a pause, likely the Captain was consulting his aids for advice. The air was thick with tension, Lambert waiting for a response, Anders' voice crackling through the channel after a few minutes. “Approach at low speed, one-five, and standby for

docking."

“Will do," Lambert replied, sighing in relief. He gave Mezul a reassuring thumbs-up, then eased the ship forward. The alien carriers floated along after him, and before long before the Hub fleet came into view.

Several smaller craft hung in a sphere around a much larger vessel, screening it just like the Balokarid shields did. The Gallipoli was a frigate-class ship, able to act as a flagship for smaller attack groups, with docking ports on its flanks to allow emergency docking for damaged ships. Its underbelly was bristling with artillery guns, the sloped hull painted black to match the darkness of space. Radio prongs and sensory dishes jutted out from all sides of the ship, its flanks layered with missile blisters, the mounted turrets along the spine slowly swivelling to track the alien carriers. Every inch of the

hull was covered in either armour or weapons, the crafts hull flaring towards the rear of the ship where the bridge was located.

Mezul leaned over his shoulder, putting a hand on the back of Lambert's chair, marvelling at the powerhouse of a ship they were approaching. What did she make of it, he wondered? Human ships certainly had less windows than her carriers did, and were much smaller to boot.

The two fleets slowly closed in on each other, until the tactical map was almost full of ship tags. Lambert had never seen so many ships in one place, and they were all close enough to see each other, which was an unusual occurrence given the vastness of space. For a moment it seemed the two races were squaring off against each other.

“One-five, prepare to dock with us," Anders said. “airlock four is opening up."

Lambert eased the corvette over, flying adjacent to the angled hull of the frigate. They came to a break in the uneven surface of the ship, a flat, square cavity sliding open to reveal a dim interior.

The bay was barren except for a pair of landing rails sitting

flush against one of the walls, Lambert angling so the corvette's belly lined up with them. The corvette was equipped with magnetic bands, and they locked onto the rails as Lambert flew into position, the ship lurching as they were pulled and locked with the frigate.

The airlock door snapped shut behind them, shrouding the ship in darkness for a second before the fluorescents clicked on, illuminating the rustic housing of the dock. Another large hatchway

sat in front of the corvette's nose, where the rails abruptly ended in front of it. The docked ship would be wheeled into a maintenance bay that way, but there was a walkway off to the left that ran along the side of the airlock that would lead into the ship proper.

He heard Mezul slipping her harness off, Lambert quickly holding up a hand to stop her. The alien watched him curiously,

before they both jolted in their seats as if they'd just hit a speed bump.

Lambert unbuckled himself, and stood up without turning on his boots, the alien no doubt going wide-eyed at that.

“Gravity drives," Lambert explained. “Pretty much every

frigate-class ship and higher has them."

Mezul clicked off her belts, hesitating as she rose out of her chair, almost expecting that she would float away. He grinned as she stamped her foot on the deck, like she was testing the gravity. “Alice, send all the data we've got to control."

“At once, sir."

Out in the main corridor, Lambert found Carl, Ruvaara, Shaliyya and the guard waiting for them, Lambert taking the lead as they followed him down to the cargo bay, the ramp already extended. The bay was very barebones, designed to accommodate many ships and then use the rails to lead them to their designated maintenance zones for repairs and rearming.

A catwalk led off to the right, ringing the bay and ending at a door at the far side, not wide enough for the Balokarids to walk side- by-side. The group of humans and aliens walked down it single file, the latter turning their beaks in every direction as they surveyed the strange environment.

The handrails barely reached Mezul's hips, but he wasn't worried about the aliens toppling over, though they still seemed amazed that they could walk normally while on a spaceship.

The door on the far end opened up automatically, Lambert taking one last glance at his ship before leading the procession through. There was a group of humans waiting on the other side. One of them was dressed in officers' fatigues, his blue cap pulled over a shaved head. The insignia pinned to his breast made it obvious that this was Captain Anders.

He was flanked by two guards, submachine guns gripped in their hands that came off as distinctly ready. Lambert met the visor of one of them, their black combat armour covering them from head-to- toe in kevlar and ceramics. There was also a woman to one side, along

with another man Lambert didn't recognise. Officers, judging by their

uniforms.

Carl and Lambert snapped to attention, Anders waving a hand clad in a white glove for them to be at ease. A wave of alarm flickered over the older man's features as he examined their alien escort. “Lieutenant's Hall, Ramirez. These are the… what are they called?"

“Balokarids, sir," Lambert replied. “we found them fighting the UEC out on our patrol route."

Anders approached the one called Ruvaara, the alien clicking its

beak at him as he looked her over. “UEC you say? You're sure of this?"

“It's all recorded, our machine's sending it through to control right now."

“You've really thrown a spanner in the works here, Lieutenant," Anders replied. “Which one is the leader?"

“That one, with the red feathers. They call her their Kith, which I think means leader."

The Captain stepped in front of Shaliyya, the alien cocking its head down at him. Anders was a tall man, but even he looked like a dwarf compared to the eight-foot alien.

“Hello Kith, I am Captain Anders of the Gallipoli, welcome aboard."

Shaliyya bowed her head, her headdress roiling like the surface of an ocean. Anders waited for her to look up, before extending his hand out. Shaliyya didn't have to be told what to do, the alien placing its larger hand over his.

“Cap-tane," the alien said. “I am Kith Shaliyya, welcome aboard."

To say hearing such an odd combination of accents and voices surprised Anders, let alone the broken English, would be an understatement, the Captain glancing at Lambert with his brow raised.

“I think I'll take you up on that chair," Anders said. “Tell me everything."

9

Lambert and Carl were thoroughly debriefed by the Captain and his aids, recounting their tale of how they followed Mezul's ship to the brawl several times over. Alice provided the recordings, and these were gone over extensively by the officers.

“Those are Confederate markings, no doubt about it," Anders remarked, watching the recording of the skirmish between the Balokarids and the UEC. “And you eliminated three ships as well? Good work."

“The presence of an attack group has serious implications," one of the aids noted. They were on the bridge of the Gallipoli, the officers standing on one side of the command table, Lambert, Carl, and the aliens on the other. Keyboards clicked away from all sides, but it was muted, the novelty of having aliens on board not lost on the bridge staff, many heads turned in their direction to stare.

“A scout group couldn't sustain themselves without a flagship," the aid continued, adjusting his collar. “Not this far out from UEC lines."

“They're bound to be on the lookout, with their whole patrol wiped out," Anders said, scratching his beard. “I'm glad you got these Balokarids moving when you did, Lieutenant. They wouldn't have lasted long if a capital ship found them."

“Should we return to the Hub?" another of the officers

suggested, the woman glancing at Shaliyya's armed guard. “This is a huge development. Senator Estera would want to hear of this as soon as possible."

“We haven't accomplished our mission," Anders replied,

shaking his head. “And we sure as hell can't leave a UEC presence uncontested. This nebula is the Hub's backyard, losing it isn't an

option."

“Permission to speak, sir?" Lambert interrupted, the eyes of his superiors turning on him. Anders waved for him to proceed. “Did the other patrols find anything? The missing ship, or any other aliens?"

Anders shook his head. “Nothing so far. Your route was the only one with any noteworthy discovery." The Captain blinked as Shaliyya chittered something to her guard in her native tongue. “I'm more concerned with our new friends at this time, however. Is this their whole population? Why are they fighting the UEC, and not us? We must establish some way of communicating with them before we form a plan of action."

“We've been trying our best," Lambert said. “but we haven't gotten far aside from a few basic words."

“Perhaps Doctor Cairns can help," Anders mused. “She's been itching to get a look at these aliens ever since hearing the news, and she's our most qualified medical staff. She'll want to examine them."

“The machine on my ship has a few basic anatomy notes recorded," Lambert said. “we can send them to her."

“I'm sure she'll appreciate the help. I want you two to help Cairns get us talking with these aliens fluently without delay. Since you've got more experience with these… Balokarids than anyone else, you're best suited to the task."

“We'll keep them out of trouble sir," Carl said.

“Lead them down to the medical bay then, I'll send word that you're coming. Wyatt," Anders said, turning to one of the aids. “what do you make of their laser weaponry?"

Lambert took that as a sign they were dismissed, the Balokarids following the pair out from the bridge, some of the Captain's guard escorting them out.