AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Without any kind of explanation, our guide continued walking, clearly expecting us to follow. The pink fluffball squeaked every few seconds, a sound as irritating as sneakers catching on rubber floor. By the time we finally got to a set of large double doors, I was ready to throttle that squeak-thing. If it even had a neck to throttle.
The pilot held her wrist against a sensor on the wall and the doors slid open, revealing a circular room beneath a glass dome. It reminded me of a planetarium, with stars sparkling all around us, except that these stars were real. One of those tiny bright dots was the sun, our sun. For a moment, I felt dizzy as I realised just how vast space really was. I'd felt exactly the same during our journey to Kyven. I'd felt small and unimportant, like an ant crawling on the ground without any knowledge of the world beyond her anthill. How many civilisations were out there? How many people, how many aliens were staring at the stars this very second?
"Welcome to the P0TA-2. I'm Captain Ellabee,” a smooth voice said.
I turned my attention to the three aliens in front of us. Two were seated at consoles, but the one that drew my gaze was the captain standing in the centre of the room. Her skin was a darker shade of blue than that of the Ta-Kavalla sisters, a deep midnight blue with a purple hue. Her braided hair was the opposite, the colour of a bright summer's sky, so pale it was almost white. Tiny golden beads graced the ends of her many braids. She had a don't-mess-with-me sort of look, enhanced by the metal bands around her biceps, the dozens of piercings in her pointy ears and the leather coat she wore over her simple black clothes.
"Ellabee, good to see you," Sahra greeted the captain. "Thanks for making this detour."
"We were in the area. Besides, if what your sister says is true, it'll be worth our time. Earth goods are a rarity that will make us good money on the black market."
Yes, definitely a pirate. Or at least a rogue.
"This is my mate Abby and this is Heather, another human," Sahra introduced us.
I tried hard not to cringe.Another human. Was that all I was to them?
"Welcome," Captain Ellabee said with a smirk as if she found something amusing. "While you're on the P0TA-2, you live by my rules. They're simple. Do what I say. Do what my crew say. Don't kill anyone. Don't steal. Stay out of the way of the crew. Don't mess with the bots. And finally, enjoy yourselves. You look like you need a bit of fun."
She looked at me while saying that last bit, that amused grin still curving her purple lips.
"I wonder what she meant by that," I muttered to nobody in particular. While I got on perfectly fine with Sahra and Abby, I didn't really know them. They both worked at the animal park the Ta-Kavalla sisters owned and Abby had been a veterinarian back on Earth and she’d checked out our animals when we first arrived but I hadn’t really got to socialise much with her beyond that. Like every mated couple, they existed in a bubble that left someone like me on the outside. Just like Rachel and Tamsia, I thought bitterly.
I was happy for my cousin that she'd found someone, there was no doubt about it, but it was weird to be on the outside. Rachel and I had grown up together, I considered her my sister, but now she had a life of her own and I needed to adapt.
“Time to get off the bridge,” Captain Ellabee commanded. “Crew only during launches. You can sit in the lounge for now until someone shows you to your cabins.”
We hurried back along the corridor we’d come from when something hit my legs and I looked down, finding the little pink squeaky thing rubbing itself against my shoes.
Two blue hands scooped the creature up from the floor and the pilot with the green hair smiled at me. Her eyes weren't blue like the other Kyvens either, instead they were emerald green and sparkled just as much. It made them stand out even more against her deep blue skin. "Sorry about that. He's not usually like this. Jiji must like you."
"Thanks, I think?" I studied the fuzzy ball, trying to figure out where its front and back was. "What is it?"
"A qoark."
"I don't know what that is." I stared at the qoark, whatever that meant. "Is it a pet?"
"What's a pet?" the pilot asked in return.
"An animal friend that lives in your house," I explained. The translator software definitely needed another upgrade.
"Oh, then yes. But he mostly lives in my cabin." She ran her free hand through her striking green hair, making it ripple like seaweed on a coral reef or maybe grass in the wind.
I blushed when she noticed me staring.
"You like my hair?" she asked with a knowing grin.
"I've only seen Kyvens with blue hair so far," I replied, although admittedly, I hadn't seen that many of them. Just the Ta-Kavalla sisters and a handful of others who had visited their animal park, but they were all rather plain looking. Very different from the green-haired pilot or the pirate captain.
The pilot chuckled. "One of my parents was Kyvarak."
"Ah." I didn't know what the significance of that was. "Sorry, I don't know what Kyv..."
"Kyvarak. I believe it can be translated as one-who-walks-underwater."
That raised more questions than it answered but I had a funny feeling she could explain things to me the entire flight, and I'd be none the wiser. This was a completely different world and as exciting as it was to discover it, it was daunting at the same time. It reminded me of how I'd felt when my parents died and I felt lost in the world without anyone to guide me.
The qoark squeaked loudly again and the pilot nodded, like she could understand what it said. "You're right. It's time, isn't it?" She gave me somewhat of a smile. "We're about to take off, you should find your seat or the captain will give you a full ear."
