The Marco Polo was met by an alien ship at the edge of Earth space. Slightly smaller than a short-hopper, the wedge-shaped craft nonetheless communicated in a very loud, very deep voice.
“You are the Earth ship. Your destination is Kula’as. I am your assigned Mitradean pilot. Prepare to receive me aboard your vessel.”
On the Marco Polo’s bridge, all eyes turned to the man in the captain’s chair. Hiromasu Takamura stared at the image on the forward viewscreen for a moment, then remarked with practiced composure, “Well! It appears we are about to make a first contact on our landing deck. What do we know about the Mitrades, Commander Dedrick?”
“Almost nothing, sir. When the Vasco da Gama made this same voyage a year ago, it was escorted through alien space by three heavily armed ships, none of them identified as Mitradean. It was most likely a protection detail, ensuring the safe arrival of the witness and her evidence at the Galactic Tribunal.”
“Fleet Control must have assumed that we would be dealt with in like manner,” Takamura concluded. “Well, it’s a little late for us to be requesting background and cultural information, since the alien will be aboard in a matter of minutes.”
“There is Fleet protocol in place to cover an unexpected first contact situation,” Dedrick pointed out.
“The same protocol we followed with the Nandrians?”
Dedrick flinched, remembering. That encounter had not ended well. “Do you want me to assemble a reception party, sir?”
“No,” Takamura decided. “This alien is clearly here to do a job. Treating a Mitradean as an honored guest might be considered inappropriate. You and I will greet him on the landing deck, Commander Dedrick. Ask Doctor Deneuve to be there as well. If he should require medical attention during his stay with us, she will be the one providing it.”
“You’re assuming the Mitradeans are gendered, sir?” Dedrick ventured.
A shadow crossed the captain’s face. “I’m recalling what happened when Lieutenant Franconi referred to one of the Nandrians as ‘it’, and basing my decision on the voice we just heard on the comm. Until we are corrected, either by research or by the alien personally, I want everyone using the masculine pronoun when speaking aloud about him.”
“Yes, sir. I’ll let the crew know.”
“Good.” Raising his voice, Takamura added, “Open the landing deck door to space, Mister Tsieng. Let’s not keep our pilot waiting.”
—— «» ——
Standing upright, the alien was about a meter tall not including its eyestalks, and it was clad in a segmented brown carapace with gold and bronze tortoiseshell markings. As he watched it emerge from the hatch of its ship, Dedrick couldn’t help thinking, I’ve eaten Earth creatures that looked like that.
The Mitradean halted, its rearmost legs and bifurcated tail keeping it balanced and erect, and rotated its eyes to take in the three Humans lined up in front of it.
Captain Takamura stepped forward, introduced himself and the other two officers, and bowed from the shoulders. “Welcome aboard,” he said.
Moving in tiny, click-shuffling steps, the alien turned its back on them. Then, as Dedrick and the others gazed in fascination, the markings on the Mitradean’s shell seemed to come alive. Slowly, then faster, then slowly again, the colors flowed across its surface, merging and separating, trickling and swirling in a mesmerizing ballet. A minute later the dance was over, and the alien angled itself around to face the Humans once more.
This had evidently been a form of communication. Just as Dedrick was wondering how they could possibly understand it, let alone respond to it, the Mitradean reached a clawed hand beneath the edge of its carapace and pulled out a thin metal box on a wire.
In the same stentorian voice that they had heard before, the box began to speak. “The rules are these. I will take control of the helm of your ship and will remain in control until you have reached your destination. Do not interfere with me in any way while I am controlling the helm of your ship. Do not speak to me or attempt to distract me. Do not offer me nourishment or lodging. My vessel contains everything I need for the duration of this space voyage. Take me to your control room now.”
Dedrick was tempted to ask whether the pilot would need to be carried there. Fortunately, he decided to keep quiet. Any doubts he might have had about the alien’s mobility were laid to rest when he saw the creature drop to the ground and use all eight of its legs.
A hush fell over the bridge when the Mitradean scuttled out of the tube car, followed by Captain Takamura and his senior watch commander.
“Helmsman, stand away from your post,” Takamura ordered. “From this point on, our pilot will be steering the ship.”
Wide-eyed, the officer obeyed.
The alien had no need of chairs. It swarmed onto the console, its body arching over the controls as its many slender limbs worked them, apparently independently of one another. Meanwhile, the rivers and lakes of color on its carapace had resumed their liquid motion, against a perceptibly darker background than before. No metal box was produced this time to provide a translation, however, and almost immediately Dedrick realized why. The Mitradean was talking to itself. It was probably just as well that they couldn’t overhear what it was muttering about them and their Human technology.
Gael’s duty watch had already begun. Deneuve was in Med Services, having gone there directly from the landing deck. Takamura’s gaze swept the bridge twice. Then he dipped his head in Dedrick’s direction and stepped back into the tube car, leaving his watch commander in charge.
Gael braced himself for a flurry of whispered questions. But the bridge crew were all silent, watching the hypnotic display on the alien’s back.
Nearly an hour later the metal box announced, “The pilot has control. The course is set for Kula’as. Estimated travel time is two standard intervals.”
Dedrick smiled and leaned into the cushioned back of the captain’s chair. At last they were on their way.
—— «» ——
The Mitradean craft parked on the landing deck was the same shape as a wedge of layer cake. A candle was all it needed to resemble the generous slice Gael had put in front of Lania at her birthday party three intervals earlier, the day she’d turned fifteen. She paused to savor the memory, licking her lips as though hoping to capture a sweet, lingering taste of it.
On that day, Lania had sensed nothing but joy and excitement. Now there was something else hanging in the air. Anger. It settled like a sooty film on her skin, making her want to scrub herself all over until she burned. She’d spent too many years around Abner not to recognize this particular emotion. And she’d quickly realized where it must be emanating from, since she had first become aware of it shortly after the Mitradean pilot had boarded the ship.
Anger in general made the air harder for her to breathe, but this alien’s anger was different. It had somehow managed to pass through the ship’s thick metal decks and bulkheads and burrow deep inside her, creating an itch she couldn’t scratch. Worse, it was blocking her from escaping to the safe, quiet place in her mind. Lania had no choice. Since she couldn’t avoid the itching, she had to try to stop the emotion that was causing it.
The Mitradean vessel looked locked up tight. Cautiously she circled it, keeping her distance to avoid setting off any proximity alarms, and staying alert for the sound of the landing deck door sliding open. She would have to take cover if anyone came through it. The short-hopper bay was restricted to authorized personnel only. Lania was breaking several rules by coming here alone. However, as she had learned from one of the bridge officers, it was easier to ask forgiveness for a thoughtless action than it was to get permission for a forbidden one.
“What are you doing?” demanded a deep voice behind her. It nearly launched her out of her skin.
Lania spun, half-expecting to see Commander Dedrick, and froze when her gaze alighted instead on the alien. Doctor Deneuve had shown her a snap of the pilot, so his outward appearance came as no surprise; however, he was much larger than Lania had anticipated. His eyestalks stood rigidly upright as well, bringing his height nearly up to her shoulders.
She’d guessed correctly about the Mitradean being the source of her discomfort. Anger was spreading away from him in waves, each one briefly worsening the itching inside her.
She struggled for a moment to find her voice, and then to think of something to say that wouldn’t intensify his emotion. “I — I was just admiring your ship. I guess you were inside it.”
As she watched, the alien reached across his body and produced a metal box connected by a wire to the inside of his carapace.
“And what do you find so interesting about my ship?” said the box. This was the same loud voice that had startled her before.
The landing deck was surrounded by reinforced bulkheads. No one should have been able to overhear him from out in the corridor. Nonetheless, Lania glanced around nervously. She’d been wrong about such things before.
Several heartbeats later, she let out the breath she’d been holding, looked the alien straight in one of his eyes, and replied, “Your species is new to us, and I was curious.”
A pause. Then the box said, “You are a child,” sounding as though it were accusing her of a crime.
“And you’re angry all the time,” she accused it back.
“I cannot be angry,” said the box. “It is not permitted.”
“Then you’re breaking the rules, because you are angry. I can feel it.”
The alien’s carapace had been growing progressively darker. By the time the box finished informing her, “This discussion is pointless. You are a child. You notice nothing of consequence, and you cannot understand enslavement,” it was nearly black.
“You’re wrong. If enslavement means you have no freedom and aren’t allowed to live a normal life, then I know a lot more about it than you think,” she retorted.
There was a longer pause than before while the alien digested this. Then the box demanded, “You are a slave?”
“Not anymore. But I was.”
“How did you free yourself?”
She hesitated, selecting the safest version of the truth to tell him. “The people on this ship are my family. They fought a battle and won me my freedom.”
“The Mitrades do not have families,” said the box, and once again it sounded as though the alien thought Lania was to blame.
Was this the reason for his anger? Was he feeling trapped and bitter because he believed no one cared enough to help him break his bonds?
“It doesn’t matter,” she assured him. “Humans will fight to help anyone who wants to be free.”
“Anyone?”
The alien subsided into silence just as a familiar voice erupted from an overhead speaker. “Lania Dedrick, please contact the bridge. Now!”
The commander was upset. His final word made her flinch.
“You are Lania Dedrick?” asked the box, in a much softer voice this time. The Mitradean’s shell was lighter in color now as well.
“Yes. I have to leave. I’m not supposed to be on the landing deck by myself,” she told him, backing away in the direction of the corridor.
“And you weren’t,” the box said. Its words were followed by a series of buzzing sounds. She had no idea what they meant.
—— «» ——
“What were you thinking, Lania?”
“She wasn’t thinking. That’s the problem,” growled Dedrick.
Deneuve threw him a frown. “Commander, please, I—”
He batted her concern aside. “I expected more from you, young lady! Entering the landing deck without authorization — all right, you were curious, that I can understand. But you broke a personal promise to me by leaving your wristcomm in our quarters so that no one could track your location. What if there had been a shipwide emergency? If Ensign Petersen hadn’t spotted you from the control room and alerted me to what you were doing—”
“What exactly were you doing, chérie?” cut in Deneuve.
Lania stood in the strategy room, sensing curiosity from her doctor and annoyance from her guardian and darting anxious looks at both of them. Captain Takamura had almost certainly been made aware of this meeting. Right now she was counting herself lucky that he had chosen not to attend.
“I was trying to find out why the pilot is so angry.”
Deneuve inhaled sharply.
“On the landing deck?” Dedrick prodded.
“No one is allowed to talk to him while he’s on the bridge,” Lania explained, “and he doesn’t have quarters assigned to him. So I decided to wait for him near his ship.”
“She’s right, Gael,” Deneuve told him. “I felt it too, the moment he arrived. Anger, and plenty of it.”
Returning his attention to Lania, Dedrick asked, “And did you speak to him?”
“I did,” she replied uncertainly. The mood of the room had changed. Was she in trouble or not?
“What did you find out, chérie?”
“I think he’s a slave. Or he believes he is. The conversation ended before I could find out any details.” The rest came out in a rush. “But I wanted him to know that Humans are good people, and whatever else might be making him angry, he shouldn’t be taking it out on us, so I told him how you fought to free me a year ago and—”
Dedrick and Deneuve exchanged worried glances.
“And…?” When she didn’t answer right away, Dedrick continued in a low voice, putting an edge on each word, “What exactly did you say to him, Lania?”
He was displeased with her. The itching inside her was getting worse, but she didn’t dare lie to her guardian. “I wanted him to understand that we sympathize with him, so I — I may have suggested that we would help him win his freedom as well.”
Dedrick clapped a hand to his forehead and uttered a brief, mirthless laugh. “We’re traveling through alien space on the sufferance of the Galactic Great Council, tiptoeing on eggshells the whole way, and she wants to free the slaves. Unbelievable.”
“I’m proud of you, chérie,” declared Deneuve.
“Doctor, this isn’t something—”
“Her talents are blossoming, Commander. Given her past history, it shouldn’t surprise us to learn that she is especially sensitive to anger. However, instead of escaping from it into a coma, as she would have done a year ago, she went to confront the alien about his emotion. This was an act of courage, Gael. Your cousin has made great strides. We should be celebrating her progress, not scolding her for speaking out of turn.”
His shoulders dropped. “I know,” he said, “and I’m happy for her too. But I’m a senior ship’s officer as well as her guardian. The captain has made me responsible for her conduct aboard the Marco Polo, and I doubt whether he will want to celebrate what she’s done.”
Lania felt a pinch of conscience. She wasn’t really as brave as Deneuve had painted her. And it had never been her intention to get the commander in trouble with his superior.
“I don’t think the alien likes children. Maybe, if one of you came with me next time—” she began hopefully.
“There won’t be a next time,” Dedrick cut her off, his features settling into an expression that matched the hardness of his voice. “Our pilot made the rules quite clear when he arrived, and we won’t be doing Humanity any favors if we break them the first time a Mitradean is aboard an Earth ship. He has a job to do. We’ll let him do it. Meanwhile, young lady, this is your fair warning. Remove that wristcomm once more and you will be on galley duty for the duration of this voyage.”
The comm unit on the wall chose that moment to buzz.
“Commander Dedrick,” said Takamura through the speaker. “Is Lania still with you?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Please escort her to the bridge.” The captain sounded bemused as he added, “Our pilot has requested her presence.”
Dedrick’s jaw had fallen open. He closed it again and replied, “On our way, sir.”
Lania followed her cousin out of the room and onto a tube car, in silence. The itch inside her had become almost unbearable. Gael Dedrick wasn’t angry the way Abner had been — all the time and at everything in general, like the Mitradean — but he was definitely upset with her right now. The safest thing to say was nothing. The most calming expression to wear was an emotionless mask.
When the tube car door slid open and Dedrick didn’t step out behind her onto the bridge, Lania was relieved. Then she noticed the stern look on Captain Takamura’s face.
“Approach me, child,” commanded the pilot’s metal box.
In the time that it took her to cross to the navigation console and stand beside him, the alien must have turned the volume control way down, for the next words to come out of the box were clearly meant for her ears alone.
“Tell me more about these fighters-for-freedom Humans you travel with.”