《Lossy Jurisdiction》


 After The Finest Moment

    Through near shattered windows, a maimed almost rag of what once was a solar sail was all I could see sans the void of space. Now the damage was awesome from what you can call a last stand, and many fundamental mechanics of the vessel had been hit, however the annihilation of half of my ability to steer at the helm was what I readily labeled to be the grandest of all the ship had endured. I continued to watch it in its ruined state long enough that I considered committing a punch, a kick¨C or any physical sort of assault¨C to a nearby bolted table full of pictures of people I didn''t know, which were glued on to the table. I was up and ready to do it until, when I lifted a fist, I saw the state of my hands; I had already forgotten; they were encased in a material wet and drenched.


    So I held out my hands in front of me for inspection, while the remains of the sail flailed around in the solar wind¨C that I could see from between my fingers and through the window that backgrounded the sight¨C and I understood the finality of the circumstances: there was shrapnel in my hands, still. So much shrapnel. And I knew because some light came from the window¨C and the others around it in the eastern hall¨C and told me that my hands were massacred like maybe what you would do to a chocolate chip cookie: place the chips in the dough, moving the dough, entering the dough, disconfiguring the dough in a horrible preparation for the oven that invariably awaited all treats of that kind. They all have to face the oven.


    Now the wound wasn¡¯t what I would call terminal, though; I already bandaged it, but I had to triage, and I had simply left them alone for too long. They ached mechanically and around the joints¨C as if I had been climbing for all of the day prior and then today; it hurt to manipulate them, and the bandages had gotten so deeply red. I didn¡¯t understand finality as in my own death from that injury¨C no, I understood from the truth that I cannot operate my ship with these ruined hands. Under my breath, I cursed the absurd jurisdictional technicalities that had wrought all this on me. I gnashed my teeth and sighed through the cracks between them.


    ¡°You are pathetic,¡± I said to the window.


    The caulk sealing that I had done all throughout the eastern hall was shoddy but still capable of maintaining the proper difference between the vacuum of space, and the pressure of the cabins¨C only just capable, however.


    Red faced, I stepped away from the window, and I let my hands fall down helplessly to my sides. They were ruined.


    ¡°The Army is hunting me, yet here I am, an invalid with a broken spacecraft,¡± I ranted to the eastern hallway. My ship wasn¡¯t very big, and the hallway had only two rooms at the left, three windows at the right¨C all of them nearly shattered¨C and at the end the door to the cabin. So I suppose that my meaningless words could be heard from every point in the ship that was still pressurized, including the upper boards that I had often forgotten to clean. Wooden boards made up the ceiling, and a kind of brown fabric composed the interior walls. The previous owners had likely intended to install something like an attic, because the whole place looked something like an RV, but I stole it before the construction was finished. Now I¡¯ve been there¨C sealed it tight¨C but that was all only on the day I got it.


    I continued ranting as I walked up the hallway to the second room just before the cabin at the left: medical. The whole place was in disarray¨C not just the room I mentioned, but even the hallway I walked to get there because there was, although I wouldn¡¯t call myself a huge documenter, a certain amount of manifests required to prove validity of certain objects that I have acquired, if my meaning is clear. Those items also require storage, and so the room had two designations in reality, although the sign was short so it was only ¡®Filing¡¯ and nothing more. That so-called filing room¨C which was on the other side of the ship, connected to the western hallway, had been hit. Naturally, I tended to the room shortly since it had very delicate items, naturally, but I had made something that you can call a mistake. And, through some unfortunate events, paper¨C and very valuable commodities¨C had gotten everywhere. Those that didn''t were those that were lost to space. They had reached even this side, and there was a great amount of papers everywhere as well as some ¡®delicate items¡¯ that I had been yet unable to fence. General furniture not unlike that of a house was upturned, too, providing even more inconvenience¨C they came from the dormitory which was the only other room connected to the eastern hallway, preceding medical, nearest to the rear of the hall.


    I closed the bulkhead to medical behind me and mused about strategies that I already knew would fail. I undid the bandages around my right hand.


    ¡°If I try to make it to the nebula, I think I will only meet there my end. I will not lose them there. They have no doubt covered that possibility.¡±


    I tossed it into the biological waste bin. I moved to the wash basin and turned the squeaking lever above the faucet and let some water run. I still kept the pressure low, though, because I had not been to a settlement or station for what bordered on dangerously long and water was very important.


    ¡°If I pull the sails and stay here, The Army will close in on me. I meet my end in that scenario, too.¡±


    I cleaned the many wounds on my right hand. I reached up into the medical cabinet above the sink, too, and grabbed the tweezers. With my non-dominant hand, I began to remove shards of metal and wood from my right palm over the sink that was gradually made redder and redder by the effort.


    Through gritted teeth, ¡°And if I turn back, The Army will be waiting there, too. They¡¯re everywhere, so many¡­ so many.¡±


    More pain, this time from shoddy self-stitching.


    ¡°And yet¨C¡± a sharp inhale from pain, ¡°Yet here I am, alone, and surrounded. With only the company of stolen items, and weapons that I can no longer use. Maybe ever, if my stitching is that terribile. Or if there is something deeper is in play about this pain in my hands.¡±


    Before the filing room was hit, it was the cabin. From HAVE, of course. Most of them were from that. I hadn¡¯t got in the range of any of the forefront squadrons when the first salvo came. The cabin held firm, but the instruments at the left¨C the ones for the secondary weapons and routing¨C were annihilated, still, and I was forced to cover my eyes and face with my hands. Glass and metal and wood. It had set the tone for the encounter.


    The stitching was done. It was done by my offhand and subsequently horrible, but it completely stopped the bleeding.


    ¡°Grand.¡±


    And then I attempted to begin again with my left hand; the bandages off, the biological waste, however¨C as I had put my hand under the water¨C there was a grinding further up, around my elbow, but a bit above. It didn¡¯t hurt any more than the stitches, but it was a dull, fearful pain¨C a pain that induced fear because of its simplicity. Or rather it induced fear because I had encountered its kind before: the dull, unendingly monotonous pain of a ruined bone.


    I had fallen to the ground, ceiling, and even the walls many times, especially during the encounter¨C and I came to terms with the reality that I couldn¡¯t evade this injury for long like that. It was just the first time it happened on my ship, where I had to deal with it alone. And I felt very cold¨C and a nauseating feeling. I felt as if The Army was already around me, again, and encircling¨C choking me to death, a boa constrictor.


    So I abandoned the sink and put myself against a wall. I let my weight fall against it¨C almost like a dear lover, you can say, but I had left any chance of that behind when I made this choice my reality. Only the wall was behind me now. And it was just me and the ship that I very often referred to as ¡®she¡¯ for some reason somewhere in the biology of a man very, very far from home¨C not that I am the kind to get homesick, but, well there is this limit I think every mind has¨C some arbitrary limit¨C not necessarily in stone¨C where they no longer are themselves. Now I think I have found that limit for me. I can admit that to myself, at least.


    My heart was uncontrollable. My lungs kept up with it, but that only left me panting and so devoid of breath that I thought that I should die from asphyxiation. I slid down against the wall involuntarily, but maybe rightfully like a man moving to his position of death, that position in death where he is found not in which he has died, because I had already died. It was painful, but not more than the realization. My hands were not the only point of injury, after all, they were just what triage left for last. And my back was destined to have eternal scars. And so were so many other parts. The stitches were almost all gone.


    And then it felt like everything was too close and encroaching more and more. There was a darkness in every corner of the room¨C and above every crack in the planks that constituted the ceiling. And then there were insects¨C all of them, only of the worst kinds¨C everywhere, and everywhere; so I needed to get them off. And I was excited now¨C I started scratching, but only to where to centipedes were at of course¨C the spiders are no big deal¨C and I scratched and¨C inevitably I caught a stitch on my right hand¨C but I kept going and then, well, of course there was a little blood, but it was only because there was these bugs all over me, and if I just got rid of them, I would finally have time to think about my grand escape¨C that was going to be successful, rightfully.


    And then there was a very loud noise somewhere, and it interrupted me somewhat. The bugs seemed inconsequential. And then I suddenly looked back down at myself and then, ignoring them, focused on my two, bleeding hands. Both bleeding for different reasons. They felt a little numb and I thought it was probably a black widow, so I went and wrapped them both back up again, but with toilet paper this time; the bandages were all used up. So I had to wrap them up with bows since they wouldn¡¯t really stick like gauze does. I made something like a sling for my left hand¨C it still needed to be set, though.


    I turned the bulkhead with my right hand painfully and stepped through the fallen papers and furniture for an immediate investigation for what I hoped was just the ship settling and not yet another leak. Now nothing seemed particularly odd¨C there were the moths eating the walls in large clusters there, and the termites here devouring a portion of the ceiling¨C one plank¨C that had fallen. A group of cockroaches moving in what you can call a herd across the carpet¨C I avoided them¨C and a number of millipedes I itched out of my ear, occasionally.


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    The thing about bugs is that they don¡¯t really mean too much alone, and even when there is a group of sufficient size, they never really pose any danger. You can say that it would take a lot of bugs to kill me. You can say that I have a lot of vitality in that way¨C it would take a lot to bring me to my knees. Or to the ground against a wall.


    ¡°Now that¡¯s really what The Army is, isn¡¯t it? A hoard of bugs. They all have their little roles and all¨C each and every one¨C but in the end they are nothing but insects, aren¡¯t they?¡± I spoke to the window again. I recall the cruisers. Those are the ones with the HAVE; they are heavy and long; and they move fast despite what the void of space would suggest. They are not unlike a centipede. They use their width. They broadside in the distance alongside the stars and planets.


    And they lined the distance. Everywhere. Hundreds¨C no closer to thousands. They looked small, but only because they were hundreds of thousands of miles away¨C truly each is the size of what you would liken to several towns. And each of them equipped with hundreds of the cannons¨C all loaded with HAVE. And even hundreds of thousands of miles away, they grate a ship like cheese. Or rather they are the machine that implants the holes into the cheese. A line of them¨C several lines¨C all firing, broadside at me so far that I couldn¡¯t see them until it was too late. And then suddenly there was a wall of fire coming to me. Hundreds of cannons on each ship and thousands of ships. Millions of projectiles traveling through space all bright and glowing.


    But they¡¯re not really all that bad¨C no, they¡¯re very fine, truely. The thing about HAVE is that it¡¯s slower than most other projectiles, I¡¯ve learned, and so while I did not yet see the cruisers, I saw that which they fired at me. I have become a little of a master of the sails, and there was a wind blowing from a nearby star that I rode¨C like a surfer a wave¨C and I altered the angle of the sails to turn and evade. It was grueling and manual; I had reconfigured the ship to run longer and disabled what you can call a kind of electrical power steering into a more mechanical mechanism to shift the sails.


    ¡°But even now I imagine them all straight and in a line, all going this one direction that will lead them to me.¡± I began to lecture the wall now.


    ¡°They are all centipedes, though. Nothing more. I will¨C I will overcome. Them, and anything else.¡± I punctuated my words by jamming a finger at the wall. ¡°We will overcome, ship.¡±


    I then suddenly remembered that I had left the ship on a particular course that sooner or later would be up and invalid. That is, I set things in order such that a general sort of desired arch would be followed, however once a certain point is passed those calculations would be meaningless, wrong, and will end with me heading the wrong way. And heading the wrong way means that I may meet The Army again.


    I considered the dark and infinite void through the windows that surrounded the central wheel in the cabin. Like in other places, there was a general air of destruction here. The unique feature, of course, is the protrusion near the left of the wheel where the exterior underside of the ship was hit by HAVE that would have depressurized the entire place in an instant had it broken the hull. It, however did still destroy the control panels for the secondary weapons and electrical routing systems¨C although the latter was only what you call a quick access convenience; there is an additional way to route power although it is in the western hallway near to the end¨C too out of the way to reach during an altercation, and now completely breached and subject to the vacuum of space after an altercation. My eyes focus on the protrusion.


    ¡°Again, I am reminded of another way I could have met my end. And this one would have been instant. And I would have been gone before I understood the feeling of death¨C the threshold¨C the instantaneous change in life to death, the ultimate derivative of life.¡±


    I was coming down now, and melancholic. I had downgraded the lighting system of the ship some time ago from electricity into candlelight since I was a fan of long hauls. So there was a region of the cabin that was dark and rotten¨C rotten wood and charcoal fabric¨C from what was a fire that I had put out¨C and aside from the light from the windows¨C the ship was left in total darkness since I had to, of course, snuff out all of the candles to avoid burning alive¨C another end.


    ¡°There were not really any bugs, or any noise,¡± I informed the helm. A strange light filled the room from the windows from a nearby white star. I had angled the ship earlier to get just near to it¨C since solar wind is always closest to any supranuclear body¨C to ride it far, far away, widening the distance between me and the fleet. I was banking now so only a small amount of the star itself was directly visible. Yet its light reached almost everywhere each window could hit.


    Of course the electrical systems¨C and the main routing control¨C had already been obliterated from what should have been my true end, so you can say that I had to do a fair amount of homework to get everything in order. Almost everything besides the cabin and medical room-- and the eastern hall-- had been breached and depressurized, so I had to measure the distance of the stars to triangulate myself in the void of space. I had made several maps and put them all along the back wall of the cabin¨C where there were the two doors on either side to the two halls that constituted the ship¡¯s layout. The maps were in between them, of course. One for handling the vertical axis, one for the first horizontal, and one for the second horizontal, and together they made something of a three dimensional graph of my place in the universe. Of course, I had done all of these calculations after I had successfully bought myself time from The Army¨C time I am steadily wasting now.


    You can call me something of a planner because I had brought a dictionary of solar systems, planets, and stars that I would have been lost and helpless without. Even more helpless without, that is. I verified that it was still in the drawer near the helm.


    I was at ease, then, and I began salvaging some of the many candles that had collected near a corner of the cabin. There was never a gravity synthesizer on my ship. So I always angled the ship against the winds of some star so that the force applied by the wind would push against the ship, and against me, similar to an amusement park ride: I am stuck to the floor like I recall being stuck to the walls of a fast-rotating ride as a child back home. It was never perfect, though, and the present orientation of the ship had actually rolled them to that corner behind and to the left of the helm and the central dash that came immediately after it. The was a gap between the central dash and the windows at the front of the ship¨C the helm and dashboard were something like a kitchen island, made of mostly wood and trimmed with copper, furnished with copper switches and buttons, and built into the floor with a kind of hearty cement mixture that I had put a little rug on for my own comfort. The rug was nowhere to be found, however.


    I gathered the candles and placed them fairly around the cabin. I ignited them with a lighter that I cannot do without. So a warm, orange light filled the room, and I would''ve drawn some curtains if I still had any. I was even more at ease, so I decided that maybe something productive could be done¨C although I was still hesitant about my arm, I didn¡¯t feel like I was all there to attempt to set it. Not yet, at least. And the same went for the stitching. ''Triage'' once again-- or rather something that you can call procrastination.


    The captain¡¯s chair had been incinerated from the fire, so I sat down on the dashboard. It has three levels, flat, curved, and then straight as it goes up to just below the ceiling. The flat part was low enough to comfortably sit on in terms of height, but horribly uncomfortable for wood.


    ¡°The weapons room is flooded with the vacuum of space, and so is the entire western wing. I am glad that I was so lazy as to move the refrigerator into the cabin, and all the food, because the western wing held the kitchen¡­ and valuable item storage.¡± I glanced at the refrigerator that I had haphazardly placed at the side of the central control dashboard. Nothing was really being refrigerated-- no power-- but at least there was food in the fridge. Food that would rot, though. I turned away before I fully understood that I was in a wasteland where only bandits and ''the law'' roamed-- that would have soiled my good mood.


    My eyes settled on the planks of wood that lined the cabin ceiling. So I began addressing them as my audience, continuing my ramblings.


    ¡°The dormitory is also flooded, so I¡¯ll have to allocate a place to bathe and other things of that kind.¡±


    One of the planks moved and I answered its question.


    ¡°Yes, I should also go ahead and pick up whatever items and documents are still left and at least attempt to organize them. And the ruined sail I can still see in the corner of my eye may still be salvageable, although the EVA room is also flooded, and that has the space suits which is horribly funny, right?¡±


    The plank was not one for laughter. But the one a few paces to its side was. It squeaked horribly loud¨C it groaned as if some pressure had been placed on it. I knew I should¡¯ve done something about the strange roof design of the ship, but it looked like so much work that I only ever planned for it, yet never did it; in the filing room I had sketches of a remodeled ceiling, however I did not know if they had survived.


    Then there was a cacophony of unanimous groaning. I laughed.


    ¡°Oh well there¡¯s something new. I suppose the proximity to the star has altered the ¡®gravity¡¯ here so oddly that it is beginning to loosen the planks in the strangest way. And with the most perfect timing.¡±


    I got up and bowed to the audience. Afterwards, I walked to the door to the eastern hallway to go ahead and start picking up some of the many things scattered around out there. But, then, something like a flower fell into my hair. Or I thought it was a flower since I was in that sort of playful mood¨C no, it was actually a note. Yellow. A sticky note. Like one of the ones that I had kept on the central control dashboard; I had thought they all were burned or lost in the vacuum of space since there were¨C and still probably are¨C several leaks on the ship. I had actually run out of calk and had to use duct tape¨C only on the minor leaks, of course.


    ¡°I should probably go and gather some oxygen from what water I have left. The episode earlier was maybe just from the decreasing oxygen concentration. Maybe. Although that is also quite manual and my arms are all sorry still.¡± I noted the thought for later and picked the yellow note out of my hair. Unfortunately, it had words on it.


    ¡°Companion, you seem to have gone a little mad. Would you like something to talk to?¡±


    The first of what I call bones of contention was that I do not have a partner. The second was that I don¡¯t think I still have any pens that hadn¡¯t been vacated to space by now. The third was that I do not often write notes to myself and set them on a sort of trigger to fall perfectly in my hair to remind me of anything¨C I usually stick them on a wall. Naturally, the fourth is that I do not want to talk to ''something'' that can write. Something that had caused the disturbance earlier.


    So I reread the note several times to myself, and at every iteration, I grew only more and more confused. And then the confusion became a terrible dread, and I moved my hand over my heart. There was something wrong now. Because I had wondered why The Army did not follow me directly, and so now that I have a very unwanted answer, only a sort of irrationality remained.


    But the truth was that there was something on the ship that was good and able to read and write. Very able¨C too able¨C and that is stuck with me on a ship that was already small before half of it was depressurized. The planks began to laugh again, but I was no longer very much in a mood to laugh anymore; I looked up at the darkness behind the labyrinth of a ceiling.


    ¡°I think I really should have let The Army kill me. Because I suspect that they are now going as far as to employ biological weapons. Very biological weapons.¡±

 Internal Investigation

    There was an interloper on the ship that I intended to do something about. So I put the note aside and analyzed the once laughing ceiling¨C that place this thing most certainly dwells. I felt alien and cold on my ship. Now the cold was legitimate and was because I only had one firebox which I left in the dormitory that had been depressurized from the battle; so the firebox was in the vacuum of space, and its warmth a long way away¨C naturally, I was cold. The other, alien feeling, however, came from the truth that, from the manner the ceiling was constructed, there was no way to hide from this thing.


    That is, the roof was hollow like a wall may be hollow: it was planked and there was a gap above the planks where, hypothetically, something may crawl to every place in the ship. Crawl and then come down violently from the planks onto its victim. So it was like the ship had two stories, the first having bulkheads and proper separation of chambers¨C which is imperative for safety¨Cand the second being nothing but a flat plane above the first with a low ceiling and a very weak material¨C wood¨C separating it from below. Now I did realize this safety hazard when I got the vessel and I installed copper barriers so that if there was a depressurized room on the ¡®first¡¯ floor, the ship wouldn¡¯t abruptly implode since wooden planks are not airtight.


    The barriers worked, of course. Numerous rooms were currently depressurized and the ship held firm with a proper separation of air bodies¨C it is the reason there are bulkheads: a room floods, and only that room floods¨C or, rather, is catastrophically exposed to space¨C ¡®flood¡¯ is too gentle of a word. In short, it ensures the most basic survivability that every ship needs.


    Yet the barriers didn¡¯t address the root problem which was that this ¡®attic¡¯ allowed for something of a rat to live in my ceiling and have something like free reign¨C I wouldn¡¯t be surprised if it had chewed through a few of the dividers up there to travel freely through all the non-flooded compartments. Luckily, though, it appeared to have had the sense to avoid chewing through a barrier bordering a flooded one¨C but the situation was still far from alright.


    I decided that this needed to be dealt with immediately. The utility closet was in the western hallway which was of course off limits at the moment; I had to get creative. The central control dashboard and the helm in front of it were bolted to the floor with copper nails, so I decided that they would do for a step ladder. My calculations for the angle of the force that mimics gravity was a bit off so, like how the candles rolled, it was very possible that anything not bolted that I would¡¯ve stepped on could¡¯ve fallen over, too, and my left arm was already broken enough-- or so I justified my decision.


    On top of the dashboard, I reached my right hand through a large gap in the woodwork; with that one hand, I attempted to lift myself. No dice. I was close to the ceiling, but I did not have a way to get myself up and through the planks to the attic. I pulled my hand back for a moment then tried again, but this time I noticed the draft rushing up through the planks of the wood.


    ¡°There¡¯s a leak somewhere in the attic,¡± I mumbled to myself.


    My hands were still numb and incapable of fine work but, luckily, applying duct tape to a small breach was still within the realm of my very limited ability. I stepped down and picked up the duct tape. I already had a lighter on me¨C that I never parted from¨C as well as a saber. I used to have guns, and I would¡¯ve been fine and ready to fire them despite the risk of causing a breach, but they were all evacuated when the weapons and ammunition room was breached by HAVE.


    So, I was planning to simply face whatever thing was in the ceiling with a saber in one hand and a lighter¨C to see in the dark attic¨C in my offhand, but after looking at the duct tape, I had a different idea. I stuck two long pieces of duct tape along the left and right sides of the saber¡¯s blade; the sharp edges of the blade were all still unobstructed and capable of cutting. I could ignite the duct tape with the lighter and have something like a fire sword although its lifespan would be limited. Additionally there was the risk of igniting the wooden ceiling, but I was confident I could avoid that. The fire extinguisher probably had some juice left, anyway.


    I put the rest of the duct tape in my pocket and once again climbed up the dashboard. In doing so I looked out the front window unconsciously since it was in my line of sight. There was a nebula in the distance that the ship¡¯s angle finally permitted me to see directly. The ship was currently in open space and highly visible, so I had purposefully set a course to go through the purple, gaseous region of space because I highly suspected that The Army was still following me. Purposefully keeping distance. I refused to believe that they have lost me in a plainly clear and visible portion of space. My initial escape wasn¡¯t all that grand, after all.


    ¡°They are stalking me to see if this new weapon of theirs¨C which is now in this ship¡¯s attic¨C is effective. There is no other reason why they would withhold an assault which would surely destroy my ship, and end me,¡± I informed my sword.


    I attempted to pull myself up again like last time, an absurd idea that failed, so I reluctantly brandished my sword and sawed a plank into two pieces. Both sloped down but remained attached. I grabbed the longer one and oriented it so that it would rest on the dashboard and be sort of like a bridge. On all threes, I climbed up it and squeezed through the gap it made in the ceiling. The draft followed me up.


    And then I was in the attic. It was dark, but light came in from the candles I had lit bellow, so it was safely negotiable over the cabin, at least; the other non-flooded chambers, the eastern hallway, and the medical room, would be darker.


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    The second thing of note was that this ''draft'' was revealed to really be a moderate gale now that I was standing in the attic proper; oxygen was draining fast, it was as if there was a windstorm in my ship. That couldn¡¯t be allowed to continue. And I started to move in the direction of the wind a step at a time.


    There were large gaps in the floor of the attic, and the planks ranged from unaffected, to rotten, to broken. All of them creaked with every step. The ship is not big, nor is the cabin, nor should the space above the cabin, but in that darkness it seemed colossal. The cabin felt much grander than only thirty or so feet in each direction.


    I heard a noise behind me. I severed the makeshift sling holding my left hand and faced the direction it came from. I unsheathed the lighter and flicked it on. So now there was a mixture of light in the attic; warm candle light from below and a fire in my hand, much whiter than those in the candles¨C white fire like the white of the distant star whose solar winds I sailed on. White and orange¨C and an evil pitch black¨C dominated the area around me, but there was nothing. Or at least nothing visible. The light came from below and told me nothing at all. Even the copper barrier that was above the bulkhead to the eastern hallway was intact-- that was all the light said.


    Most ships have a hum of life. It is typically from the engines, but most captains get somewhat poetic about it, and to them it''s always something else. The console, the automatic weapons, the air conditioning, the heating, the boiler.


    My ship doesn¡¯t. Because it doesn¡¯t have engines, aim-assisted weapons, central cooling-- paradoxical for space-faring vessel-- or anything else of any of those kinds. My ship has only solar sails, and manual, mechanical weapon systems. Therefore, when it is quiet, it is absurdly quiet. And it was quiet in the attic, then. And it was silent and dreadful.


    I didn¡¯t want to turn around, but air was leaking. So I made myself and made my way to the source of the leak, my back to what could be a monster of a thing within just feet of me¨C just out of sight. Or so some unwanted thoughts told me. The cabin was the largest room, and the trek along the planks took several minutes of careful deliberation over each and every step.


    I came up to the leak and it was larger than what I expected. About an inch, maybe an inch and a half. I sheathed my sword and used my right hand to handle the duct tape, while my left illuminated the working site with the white of the lighter. It was on one of the exterior walls of the ship, not the barriers I installed, and located in the cabin, the leak, so I was glad to have caught it so soon since the cabin was of course the place where I was planning to hold up since the dormitory, and pretty much everything else, was gone. I unraveled an appropriate amount and pasted the tape. Simple, easy.


    When I was finished, I leaned against the exterior wall¨C it was hard, cold and made of titanium¨C and watched the darkness that constituted the rest of the space above the cabin¡¯s ceiling, the rest of the attic that was over the cabin. The darkness was not absolute, but the light from below really did not illuminate much. I considered that in this space, which was moderately sized but still ultimately small in the grand scale, there was something else that, so far, had not done much to me and yet I wished to kill.


    I took out the note it had written.


    ¡°Companion, you seem to have gone a little mad. Would you like something to talk to?¡±


    Initially I had read it in a somewhat sarcastic tone, but it could¡¯ve been genuine¨C possibly. If it really wanted to kill me, it could¡¯ve gone and did it before I even suspected that there was something else here. It announced itself willingly. But that doesn¡¯t necessarily absolve it of murderous intent. It may see this as a game; it may be something of a fan of psychological warfare. It must be-- it simply must. There was no reality in which this thing was attempting to be my friend. It was evil, and a vassal of The Army, or at the very least a danger they knew about and wish to observe the effects of on what they think is a needless outlaw of a man.


    I put the note in my mouth, chewed it up, and spit it through a space between the wooden panels.


    ¡°You will not play games with me, Creature,¡± I announced to the darkness.


    But before there could be any answer, the ship abruptly jolted. I fell hard on my arm left arm which was already broken. I had the sense to close the lighter just before my grip loosened from the pain and it tumbled down into the cabin below, so there was no fire, but still my secondary light source was gone. There was a great disturbance below me. Now the candles didn¡¯t move, I had used an adhesive to keep them on the surfaces I placed them¨C I am able to learn¨C but almost every other item was moved in the same direction I was, including the fridge which toppled over with a loud noise, spilling some of its contents on the carpet of the cabin.


    My face was right up against the floorboards now and I could, through the gaps, see out some of the windows. Outside, it was all purple. I had entered the nebula and most likely encountered a heavy ¡®draft¡¯ from the alteration of the solar wind I had until then been riding; the heat of the three dimensional lighting that occasionally connected cloud to cloud like staircases of light would most likely be the culprit; the cause of what was now becoming turbulence in space. I was about to get up from the floor and head down when I saw it: a mass among the many gaseous clouds of the nebula. And the entire ship was shaking as if, too, afraid.


    Nebulas are never ending storms that remain after the death of a star almost like a wrathful ghost of a million year old object. They are thousands of miles wide. I found this one in the star dictionary and planned to weather it through. The only reason they are dangerous¨C aside from the effect they have on solar wind if there is a nearby star¨C is the effect they have on electricity. But in my present state, my ship running on zero electricity and using only fire and sails, there was next to no danger for me, at least.


    But what I thought was only one mass was steadily revealed to be several arranged and ordered together in a line, broadside. Although I couldn¡¯t see them directly. It was only the occasional light of the thunder and the fleeting light from the nearby white star which leaked through the thin purple clouds at the perimeter of the nebula which revealed at, the most, their dark silhouettes. And, as soon as they appeared, they then vanished. The thunder, and the light of that helpful star, revealed nothing more.


    ¡°The Army.¡±

 Versus Eustacia, Capital Ship

    ¡°Criminal. It ends today. This ends today. You end today.¡±


    I had created a radio from seven potatoes I took from the fridge, a copper screw I took from one of the panels on the dashboard, a long portion of a copper trim that was around edges of the dashboard, some duct tape, and a backup headset I almost forgot I had under the dashboard¨C just in time. Although I had to leave what turned out to be several other leaks in the attic unrepaired to do so.


    There was static¨C and we have entered a clearing now, and the nebulous clouds between us were all gone¨C vacated¨C and only sort of a perimeter remained as if we had somehow reached an eye of the never-ending storm. Or maybe this nebula had simply decided to give us some room. And we had room; the capital ship¨C the only enemy¨C almost demanded it, room. It wasn¡¯t as large as a cruiser, but that was only because it served a different role; it was not distant, mobile artillery. No¨C it was a medium-ranged ship with far too many weapons to be called a transport vessel. Although it did transport; it transported hundreds of fighters. But it hadn¡¯t released them yet.


    Yet without firing it loomed terribly over my ship of only a hundred feet. So it must have been at least a four thousand or so feet long. It was too small, though, to carry any HAVE, so it instead had an array of short-ranged weapon systems, Independent Body Explosives, gas-powered cannons, and a number of weapons that I did not recognize¨C all likely automated.


    There were a hundred capital ships for the hundred jurisdictions under the control of the Confederation who, of course, oversees The Army, although, recently, it appears to be the other way around ever since it was granted autonomous control over this newest ¡®jurisdiction.¡¯


    So, in the scheme of The Army proper, it was rare to run into a ship like this. So you may call me somewhat special for this privilege that was forced onto me.


    Now this ship, in all embroidered gold, was named after the eleventh jurisdiction : Eustacia. Fully, it was the C.L¨C Confederation Liner¨C Eustacia, a high jurisdiction known widely for its ability to subsist entirely on what it alone has produced. ¡®Liners¡¯ were simply ships longer than they were wide, which was most of them.


    Time passed from the first and perhaps only message from the Eustacia. I couldn¡¯t respond because my makeshift radio set lacked the faclities to do so, so instead I weighed my options. It was terribly hard¨C my hand over my chest, I could only feel what I thought to be a motor where my heart should¡¯ve been, and I was so distracted by it, and it was that my mind was racing. And it beat so fast that it was hurting my hand, near pushing into and away from the stitches which were already loose and nearly gone. Yet I couldn¡¯t take it away. What was now the hum of the ship¨C an incessant shaking from turbulence¨C only worsened this; the ship was making me shiver as it shivered.


    I crouched down and looked under the space under the dashboard.


    ¡°It wouldn¡¯t be bad if the creature just came down now and cut this dread short,¡± I said. But, the hatch was not one for conversation. That is, there was a hatch, there, under the dashboard and behind the helm; copper, cold, absurdly small, and difficult to reach because of the helm which was bolted to the floor right in front of it¨C but it was a hatch.


    It was open and showed the turret''s cab, which protruding under the bottom of the ship, could be rotated horizontally in any direction. The leather seat as well as a label above one of the many buttons, which read ¡®Fire,¡¯ were both still plain and easy to see despite the relatively low amount of candlelight able to reach down there because of the many windows of the turret that let the persistent white of the star and intermittent lighting illuminate the little space. What could also be seen was the handy copper rod I kept beside the turret seat that was still angled appropriately to the fire button.


    ¡°I could fire you, but I don¡¯t think,¡± my eyes hung over the invincible enemy, ¡°I don¡¯t think that would all do too much. You only have one round, I believe, since I don¡¯t remember getting the chance to use you in¡­ well,¡± my voice trailed off. "You have one round."


    I had originally plotted the course to the nebula since it was close enough to reach in a reasonable amount of time and would¡¯ve provided adequate cover from the majority of the fleet that I knew was hunting me or, rather, watching me. I knew that something like this could happen, I just hoped that it wouldn''t. But it did. So I cursed my poor judgment.


    The Eustacia was too close to get away from, merely a mile or so away. Even without LIDAR being active¨C which it very well could¡¯ve been since a capital ship would probably have properly insulated wiring against something like this nebula¨C the rangefinders on deck could simply track the reflection of the white light piercing the nebula that reflected off of my port side solar sail which was all out and horizontal toward their direction. Had I been deeper in the nebula, that wouldn¡¯t be a problem, but I also wouldn¡¯t have any solar wind to drift on that far away from the star. That probably only made it easier for this ambitious captain to predict my whereabouts independently and claim me as his trophy.


    Truely, the turbulence was already almost knocking me off course and I was hardly a hundred miles in the nebula; combined with this clearing we¡¯ve entered into¨C where the nearest set of clouds to retreat to were a couple miles away¨C there was no escape that didn¡¯t leave me very much open to an attack.


    The captain seemed to be playing with me, giving me time that he knew I could not use for anything. But, in rhetoric, I still frantically looked around the cabin. The one-shot cannon had to be a last resort, final attack. But there was nothing there that could defeat this. Nothing to remedy a capital ship at my door. Not even that ¡®final attack.¡¯ So I looked back at the cannon, jammed the rod through the hatch, and tried to angle it toward the portside where the Eustacia was, but after only a second I dropped the rod and it once again fell and slid back into the hatch. My hands were bleeding again, and the dull pain increased in intensity. So I saw a cockroach crawl out of the hatch.


    I looked up at the darkness behind the planks and considered yelling at the creature up there¨C if I hadn¡¯t been so involved with its existence I could¡¯ve maybe, just¨C maybe I could have avoided being snuck up on like this. Avoided this¡ª avoided this end.


    I took my right hand, which had involuntarily gone back over my heart, bleeding, and pointed a finger, painfully, at the attic.


    ¡°I know who you are!¡±


    And the blood streamed down my finger, down my arm, down onto the carpeted floor


    ¡°There is only one thing you can be¨C so that is why I know you. I know you, death. Yes¨C I know you very well.¡±


    I began to pace around the cabin, keeping my head and finger up towards the labyrinth above my head.


    Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.


    ¡°I know you because you know my friends, whom you have taken. I know you because I see you every day, a passing glance, sometimes a touch. I see you when you linger around unburied corpses, mangled, dirty, and covered with some invisible substance, something like a mud that I know you place on everything that you end¨C the substance that makes me mourn a loss. The substances on those whose bodies float beside imploded ships in a wasteland of a space. Ruined from you and that thing you cover them with.¡±


    The darkness above the ceiling loomed. But it did not respond.


    ¡°I know death is lurking on my ruined ship and giving itself comfort in its walls and especially in its ceiling. And maybe that is why the rest of The Army kept their distance. Because I have death on my ship. And because I know death and yet I have not died.¡±


    The radio¡¯s nonsensical static suddenly cut to a voice.


    ¡°I suppose you cannot hear me, then, criminal. Or maybe it is just that you cannot respond.¡±


    My attention returned to the capital ship, and I approached the port side window to watch it as its captain spoke.


    ¡°But if you can hear me, then know I do not fully understand how you¨C and your wreck that you call a ship¨C have made it this far from the initial encounter at New Levens. No. I do not understand it at all. But I do understand that you cannot fight any more. No, you cannot even alter your course¨C one of your sails is almost entirely gone, the rangefinders tell me, and the western portion of your ship has been lost a long time ago, they say too. So I understand that I can destroy you alone, without the fighters my crew may send out at any time. Alone, without the many cruisers that lined the distance before. Alone, without the frigites or the Interplanetary Artillery that obliterated your accomplices and yet strangely missed you. Alone. Alone, so it¡¯s that no preparation is needed anymore. And you will be lost at the hands of this ship, not any other. That is why I have revealed myself to you.¡±


    And I was a trophy to him and nothing more. But I was no longer afraid of his ship anymore. No. I now knew why The Army proper had left me alone. And he, alone, was not The Army. So if they left me alone, I, knew that this ship, even if it is a capital ship, will not be what ends me. No, it was impossible. So I was calm. And I went back over to the helm; I sat down in the office chair I had found somewhere in the mess of the eastern hallway; there was a squeak as I sat down. I was very glad I had haphazardly taken it from the dormitory before all that had happened at New Levens; it was meant to be brought up to the that desk with the glued pictures to make something of an auxiliary work station, since the view from the eastern hallway was always paradoxically more grand than the western.


    I duct taped myself to the seat, an approximation of a seatbelt, I used almost all of it in thick bindings. I knew he could fire his many cannons at me at any moment. But I also knew that he wouldn¡¯t. Not until I was good and ready. But, before I could do anything else, I saw what I suspected to be an odd lightning. I ignored it, but then it happened again. And I looked over and there was yet another brilliant light coming from what seemed to be the windows of the Eustacia. Flashes which came from windows near its midsection, near where I suspected the fighters would be held. I assumed that they must be igniting the engines, that the captain lied.


    I looked away and at the front windows and saw that this sort of eye of the storm was going to end soon, and that we would both be back in the throes of the nebula storm where it would be very easy to lose a small ship such as mine¨C the reason I came here¨C especially if there is a violent situation onboard, maybe a grandly timed mutiny. Interesting, since, if I didn¡¯t know that he cannot kill me, I would assume that he would fire now, before I had even that much higher of a chance to escape, but, as herd of cockroaches coagulated in that corner of the cabin that had been damaged by fire, I knew that he would not fire because I had death on my ship.


    So I bided my time, and my heart was calm, and my hand was not over my chest, so I calmly orchestrated something of a plan. Now the starboard sail that extended horizontally from the ship was mostly destroyed, however the one on the port was all well and good still which was enough for a janky course correction despite what the captain said. Additionally there was the large, supporting sail near the rear that I believed was mostly intact although I had no way of completely knowing given its position and my inability to EVA to get a closer look since the airlock was currently flooded, and that¡¯s where the space suits were. Regardless, that was well enough in terms of catching enough solar wind for the turn be successful.


    I sighed contentedly. I rested my right hand¨C the hand that had the most dexterity¨C on one of the hands of the helm.


    ¡°This will bring this body pain, but if I bank enough that I can get under the ship I will lose them. Or, if I do not, panic them. When I am under there, I will then decide the next move¨C no point planning that far ahead.¡± I breathed in and out and then summarized my plan to myself. ¡°No extreme maneuvers, just a turn. Simple, easy.¡±


    I considered jamming my arm into the gap between the handles of the helm, but I didn¡¯t want to risk damaging this body any further since something can wrong go wrong easily in such a tight fit.


    I wondered what death thought about all of this, but, as both of the ships were once again emerged in a never-ending storm, out of the clearing, I perished the thought, and turned the wheel.


    It hurt very much; the stitches were torn under the make-shift bandage on the palm of my right hand, and there was a very strong ripping sensation like my hand was a cloth being bent just too far. The ship was already somewhat uncontrollable even when I wasn¡¯t touching the wheel, so it had gotten all excited, and anything unbolted was vibrating along the floor; the cockroaches gaining air. I held firm and the turn went somewhat as expected. But didn¡¯t account for what the ruined sail at starboard would change about the maneuvering of the ship very well.


    I had previously angled my ship in a specific manner to induce something like gravity, so once I banked in that extreme way¨C almost upside down from my original position¨C gravity followed suit. The fridge, as gravity went from ¡®normal¡¯ to gone to upside down, had been the most dangerous object in the room. Dangerous if I was still a death-fearing man. It was sort of to the right and behind me, so when it slid left it didn¡¯t hit me, as expected, and when it went up through the planks and into the attic, I would¡¯ve been afraid that a catastrophic breach would follow, but, of course, was not.


    There was a loud clammer as it hit the interior side of the exterior ceiling of the ship. It must¡¯ve dented it, but it did not destroy it utterly. I made a mental note that I should consider bolting more things down later once I got new tools because such things, especially when the candles were knocked over and started that fire, were annoying. The tools were all evacuated during the New Levens encounter, though, so that plan was in the far future.


    I had, however, secured the office chair I repurposed to the ground with the last of the adhesive.


    The remaining ¡®problem¡¯ was that I had no idea where the ship exactly was compared to the Eustacia. Now I knew I would get away, but it would¡¯ve done me well to be aware of the other ship¡¯s position. I was originally planning to get by just with feel since this is my ship, but since the handling was all different due to the damage, it was that I had really lost track of things¨C especially from the calamity in the cabin which sapped that much of my attention away from piloting.


    Just as I was wondering if the cockroaches were among death and all in the ceiling, something emerged from the purple clouds; the gray and black of the Eustacia¡¯s hull, directly in front of me. Its title ¡®C.L Eustacia¡¯ was all upside down from my orientation.


    And then I was out of my trance, and my heart jumped and adrenaline set fire to my veins. It hurt, but I was back and it felt like the little cockroaches were all gone. ''Death'' was gone and a creature again. I was me, and the insanity was over. But I had no time to appreciate that nor why the Eustacia hadn''t truly fired. So, practiced and familiar with my own ship, I responded instantly: I kept the helm steady, as a steady stream of blood went up to the ceiling, and I simultaneously extended my left foot under the dashboard, finding the rod with it, and kicking it just right such that it hit the fire button of the turret.


    There was a metallic clank and the cannon fire and its mechanism absorbed the recoil¨C its barrel came back in and then back out¨C and the ship shook wholly. Then a silent explosion in space which blinded me, my vision all bright and unclear. The munition made a wide hole in the side of the Eustacia; wide enough for most of the ship to fit through. So I aligned it and braced myself; I put my hands in front of my face and my legs up against the dashboard.


    I prepared myself to enter, through the most absurd means, the capital ship Eustacia.

 Meeting Her

    I was jolted forward; my positioning eased it and kept me all well, but my knees felt the impact; and it felt as if they had all but broken, an odd numbness. That was when my ship passed through only the hole, that tight fit. The eastern hallway was shaved off, and anything still left in the western utterly obliterated. I had my eyes closed. But if they had been open I suspend that the second impact, when my ship, now through the hole made by the cannon earlier, hit the floor of one of the many decks of the Eustacia, would¡¯ve delivered to me the sight of all of the front most windows behind the dashboard in the cabin¨C all of the things around them, the front of the hull¨C being crushed into what would be a bloody heap had my ship any life.


    And if there was any electricity, I would¡¯ve seen the flood lights go on, too, but there wasn¡¯t. And my eyes were closed. So I only knew that the cabin was depressurized when there was a loud ripping of the hull and crashing of the windows and, finally, when I felt all the air in my lungs being ripped out. I had trained for this, though. And I let the air¨C my life¨C go easy, no room for fear, because had I attempted to hold my breath I would¡¯ve only destroyed my larynx and lungs proper. Would''ve died brutally in blood.


    The force of pushing through the layer of steel that made up the floor of that deck was terrible. So terrible that it ripped the chair I was on¨C which I had stuck to the carpet earlier with a strong adhesive¨C all off from the floor and sent it flying over the dashboard. One of my shins which had not cleared the dash well enough hit it painfully and a cracking could be felt. Grinding and a dull pain. The chair, with me on it, danced somewhat in the air for a split second; it danced because the ship was righting itself since those two previous collisions had altered what was a straight plummet into something of a ¡®landing.¡¯ That is, the underside of the ship hit the next deck as if, having gone through the first, it decided that the cabin had taken enough.


    And with that, everything in the cabin was sent horribly to the ground. The fridge fell off behind me from the attic, falling heavily and crashing into the carpeted floor and partially through it. The candles¨C which had all been put out from the evacuation of air from the cabin, and had been removed from the tables despite the adhesive just as my chair had¨C crashed one after another. The chair I was in fell hard although it fell backwards such that the back portion¨C the cushion¨C absorbed most of the fall. Although I still felt an odd sensation as if something in my had been grotesquely maimed.


    The ship was at rest.


    It was at rest and so I needed to act quickly. I was in the vacuum of space, and my lungs were dreadfully empty. I ripped the duct tape off from around my torso¨C which had only served to strap me to something of a deathtrap, the chair¨C and attempted to get up onto my feet. It was easy without any gravity. I used my right hand to push off of the ground at and at an angle so that I would glide forward towards the front of the cabin which was almost wholly ruined and gone.


    I hadn¡¯t noticed earlier it, but now that everything was at something that you can call a standstill here in this quiet solitude of space, I saw the red flood lights. Not from my ruined ship, but from the still operating ship that I had just crashed into. Red that illuminated the bodies.


    Those crew members who were unlucky enough to have been in this hallway¨C or the one above it¨C had all died. Maybe it was instant for some of them, or maybe they suffocated, too afraid, too surprised to do anything. But they met their end all the same. And there was blood in zero gravity.


    But I was suffocating now, and I couldn¡¯t waste my time. Only a few seconds had passed but I was already feeling light and no longer of the world. A gray haze like that which I imagined eternally surrounded death, if that thing was even real¨C or if my delusions of a creeping death in the darkness above my ceiling were maddeningly correct. Regardless, my time was running out.


    The hallway was wide and had three ways to enter it. But all those ways were electrically shut by some automatic system because of the flood. I supposed that The Army¡¯s protocol was that all crew in flooded chambers were to be declared dead without even bothering to save them.


    I came up to one of the locked breach doors. It was hearty steel and indestructible. However, above it was a vent probably used to simply allow air into the space for if the breach doors were ever pulled down for a reason beside a flood: quarantine and so on. But that provided an easy vulnerability. It was locked and shut, of course, but a vent was surely easier to bypass than a door twice my size.


    I pushed up off the door and up to the vent. The ceiling of the hallway was all fancy and arched, and there was a section above the vent, which was naturally near to the top of the hallway, seemed like a grand place to ¡®hang¡¯ off of. I grabbed it and used it as an anchor to swing myself toward the vent; I was attempting to kick it in whilst in low gravity.


    Now I knew that I was probably destroying whatever hadn¡¯t been already destroyed in my hand, but their state wouldn''t matter if I were dead. It helped that all pain was almost entirely absent.


    So as my vision began to turn almost all monochrome or maybe some odd shade of gray, the vent, finally and on what was probably the last kick in me, exploded with pressure. My work had exposed some portion of the hall on the other side to the vacuum of space which consequently resulted in a rush of air coming straight towards me and my legs which had just kicked the vent. The air pushed the vent now in the opposite direction towards me violently, and, since my legs were still on it, forcefully rotated my body clockwise as it slid past below me. So I was up against the ceiling and air was rushing below me; I angled myself and grabbed the vent before it was out of reach. Then, with the other hand I pushed off the ceiling and towards the entryway I had made.


    The air attempted to send me far back toward my ship behind me where I wouldn¡¯t have had the strength to return. So I reached my hand through the empty gap where the vent once was there and grabbed the other side. I then pulled myself through the rushing current with the last of my strength.


    The fit was painfully tight but I got through, and with the vent still in my off hand. Once completely through, I put my legs up against the margins of where the vent was on the other side so that the air was merely pushing me against the wall that my legs were using as if the ground where I, lastly, put the vent into place. But it didn¡¯t hold very well, so with my other hand I took out the last of the duct tape, cut off a piece with my mouth, and sealed the vent into place. I was now in a pressurized portion of the Eustacia.


    The ship had a gravity synthesizer, so I fell to the ground on all fours, and I took a large breath of air. I looked up from the concrete floor and analyzed my environment.


    Firstly, the emergency lights were on. And an automated voice was repeating a message over the intercom.


    Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.


    ¡°Unauthorized biological anomaly on deck six.¡±


    I assumed that was me at first, but after I got to my feet I saw very clearly that I was on deck three. I had crashed into the middle of the ship and went through a deck so I was naturally closer to the bottom.


    The message was eventually cut off abruptly and I changed my focus to weigh my options now that I had the ability and the time to breathe. I leaned against a nearby wall since my legs weren¡¯t walking right, and my arms wouldn¡¯t respond to my commands anymore.


    ¡°I¡¯m so¡­ so disoriented¡­ I¡¯m so¡­ dizzy,¡± I mumbled to myself.


    I tried moving my arms again¨C which moments ago were working¨C but there was nothing. Nothing. No movement. I was too afraid to look at them. They were so numb that I worried if they had simply been amputated when I wasn¡¯t looking.


    ¡°That¡¯s a funny thought.¡±


    I tried to get off the wall and walk to the other side of the linear corridor, but my legs kept moving all wrong. I stumbled and fell back again against the wall.


    So, I turned to the wall and said to it, ¡°Oh you¡¯re my lover, aren¡¯t you? Will you mend my wounds and take me to your place far away on a distant planet? You¡¯re sure in favor of supporting me, so why don¡¯t you go ahead and do that, too.¡±


    But, moments after my bout of insanity, the breach door at the end of the corridor, which had been automatically shut from when I kicked in the vent, opened. And there were armymen before me. So I made myself get off the wall and stand, even though it was all terrible and shaky.


    There were eight of them. The majority of their uniform was gray, and what wasn¡¯t was black. The only gladdened color was the yellow that marked their surname below their left shoulder, and the gold that read ¡®The Army¡¯ under the right. The uniform had helmets but these men had taken theirs off. They were humans without any visible augmentations.


    According to the gold, it was some ''Azimuth'' who stood at the forefront of the men. He kept his hands down at his sides in some military stance; his men, however, leveled their gunpowder rifles at me which were all black and dreadful. He spoke while his men took practiced positions all around me.


    ¡°I was worried that I would never see you again. That I would never get to tell you what I''ve learned about you. Because I used to wonder what that name of yours meant, Fare. And I just couldn¡¯t figure out even the first¡­ the first place to look for that meaning. I didn¡¯t even know the spelling.¡±


    Two at my left, four at my right, one behind me, and of course him who was in front, blocking the way.


    ¡°Fair¨C a fair guy? Does he fare well against all odds? Does he make others say ¡®farewell?¡¯ Is he the fair that is in town?¡±


    And he tilted his head to the side in mock rediscovery of some absurd meaning of my name.


    ¡°Or he is the Fare that must be paid?¡±


    This ship had a hum from its many engines that moved it along the infinite cosmos. So it wasn¡¯t silent when he stopped speaking. But it felt silent because I knew how this must end.


    ¡°I don¡¯t know you, armyman. I don¡¯t know you at all. And I do not know if you''re trying to say that you intend to line my pockets because in this case I think goes the other way around. So come here. Come here and get a payday and let me go. Come here and get a share.¡±


    I did not have any money on me.


    ¡°You know me. And I know you. And I told the captain that you would be here alone in this nebula. And you knew that. So let''s not play dumb here." He closed the distance. "I have a team I lead now, and I''ll be a captain of a ship all soon enough." He tilted his head the other way. "But what do you lead? What do you have? I saw your ship plunge into ours, so you don''t even have that anymore. I saw your-- how you say-- ''friends'' meet their respective ends in the wretched battlefield made of what was a beautiful station complex-- New Levens. And even before all of that you''ve met me boots out in the tundras of Gymen where I suspect you were hoping to flee to again after your grand heist in a move that was absurdly predictable. So of course none of that worked out. The Army is collecting ''the pot'' from your ''friends'' and will collect yours after today. The day your ship was destroyed, and the day you died." He drew his revolver and leveled at me.


    I could not face him properly. My legs were all ruined. There was a mechanical noise from the weapon.


    And then the lights went out.


    Although dazed and exhausted, I reacted well enough. I let my legs slip and I fell purposefully onto the ground. It hurt because my arms still would not move, but I endured. Azimuth fired first-- his weapon sending my ears into a horrible bout of ring, and blinding me with its fire. Then the armyman behind me fired, and the black hallway was all white and then dark and then white again. Neither of their bullets, luckily, made no breaches likely because we were away from any exterior sections of the hull. And they all missed me, of course, because they were aiming at torso height and I was now on the floor.


    But then the one behind me cut off with something like a squelch. I expected him to stop shooting at some point, but he only got off four or so shots before he abruptly stopped.  Before I could think about that any further, someone else, probably Azimuth, began to shoot. Not at me. But then they were cut off as well. And then the next. And the one after after.


    And then it was just the hum of the ship and a powerful darkness. And I had the strangest feeling that death was around me. That delusion from before. It was just that the air was thick with some invisible substance¨C like mud¨C that only this time did not cause me to cry, it caused me to feel some odd humidity in my throat and chest. And I was so afraid. There was so much fear throughout all that has happened today, but the fear now was at its zenith. The fear that death¨C as absurd as it is¨C was with me in this hallway.


    There was a skittering in the darkness. It came from far in front where the men had entered and continued, circling around me, until it ended just behind me. Whatever it was moved fast.


    And then the humidity in my throat and chest strengthened almost so that it felt like there was water in me, and that I was drowning¨C but, oddly, I could still breathe. But then it grew. It grew closer, stronger. And I felt a breath against my ear. Humid, flowing with water. As if I were near to a never-endering river-- or perhaps a rain under an infinite overcast.


    ¡°Companion, you seem to be at the very end of your rope. Today was probably the worst day of your life." ''She''-- assuming it is not some absurd replication of the voice box of a human female-- let that linger in the air.


    ''She'' continued, "But it¡¯s all alright, companion,¡± and the voice flowed like honey with an aftertaste of a faint, throaty wind, ¡°it¡¯s all alright because you are still able to breathe. A wonderful accomplishment... even if your arms may no longer pick you back up. So I''m glad. I am glad because I didn''t know if you would be able to take advantage of the opportunity I gave you against this formidable ship that should have been that which ended you."


    The odd light I saw through the windows of the Eustacia must''ve been gunshots, then, not the engines of fighters preparing to engage. They were gunshots. Aimed at ''her.''


    "Now if you wish¨C and only if you wish because you have declined my previous offer¨C I may help you. And I apologize for interfering without asking, but I wanted to give you a fair choice since not wanting to speak with me doesn''t me you wouldn''t want help in such a dire situation as you are in now. That is why I boarded the Eustacia in the first place before that poorly timed clearing you entered. Although I have to say that I intended for you to simply escape in your ship rather than violently make this... entry." There was something that I suppose approximated a sigh, although it was all wrong in a variety of ways.


    "So we are together again. And I am in the dark again. All is normal and standard for us. So, companion, what do you say? Would like something to help you?¡±

 Bondage

    ¡°No, thanks.¡±


    I was all tired and proper weary; my arms did not respond when I attempted to move them and my legs had some odd trembling that never went away. Even my lungs were tired. In fact, I was so exhausted that I had the strangest feeling that I would become forever narcoleptic; an eternal sleeper doomed to lose consciousness at any moment. All the while there was that unnatural moisture in my throat and chest¨C an odd lubricant¨C and I felt like I was going to choke. So I went and I made myself cough a little, but it did nothing to stop the feeling and I resolved to ignore it in hopes that it would fade away.


    Now as for my rejection of my wretched guest who has, so far, done so much to bother me and so little to help-- at some point even enfeebling my mind so far that I had even thought ¡®her¡¯ to be nothing but death-- you can say that I found her a little unforgivable in nature. Additionally, I had no certainty nor promise that she would take me to any place that I would want to go; ¡®helping¡¯ could¡¯ve meant a trip straight to the engine room and into a vat of some absurd, boiling solution of radioactive chemicals. And, if I were to disregard that obvious problem with accepting her proposal, there were still other issues.


    I''ll admit that there was some aid in ¡®her¡¯ actions just now¨C but that didn¡¯t particularly impress me at all nor quell my still very negative impressions And even without those impressions¨C if our relationship was a clean slate which is very generous in this little analysis¨C I still wouldn¡¯t have been moved. That is, am I supposed to be impressed that, likely as an apology for demanding so much of my mental energy that this capital ship even snuck up on me in the first place, ¡®she¡¯ went and¨C now I hate this word¨C ¡®saved¡¯ me from my grand old friend Azimuth? Even with my blood pulling into something you can call a small pond, I was clear headed enough to avoid any unreasonable attachment to this guest due to that minor stunt.


    I was a ''criminal'' to The Army and an ''outlaw'' to everyone else, and I met a variety of men¨C and women¨C who were dangerous, occasionally some with a fool¡¯s heart who insisted on attending to me for even the most minor things. Should I¡¯ve been moved every time they aided me? Killed for me?


    No. And they were human. And I somewhat knew that they were on my side because-- and I had not previously thought this as a requirement for trust-- they never instilled existential dread into me. Dread like realizing that there was an uninvited guest on my ship who had probably been there for far longer without me even knowing. Dread that, even as I rant now, is compounded by some insanity in the corner of my mind that still keeps telling me and telling me that I am in the presence of death; some odd small of rot at my nose and a never-ending ticking form the clicking of legs of centipede¨C although I give into the delusions again. Without saying anymore, it is clear that her ability to ¡®impress¡¯ me is forever soiled. Never to change. I really do not like this guest who insists on following me to what seems like the end of the universe.


    After my response, there was something that I believe was a sigh¨C although I¡¯m not sure¨C and then ¡®she¡¯ spoke again. ¡°Companion¨C companion, are you serious about this? No¨C no, no you must not be. I am sure that I have misheard you, companion, please repeat yourself¨C¡±


    ¡°Do not call me ¡®companion,¡¯ guest,¡± I interrupted. ¡°Leave me here¨C even in the dark, if you will¨C and go elsewhere¨C anywhere. I have no intention of being your plaything nor of being subjected to your absurd presence any longer.¡± I attempted to mask my dread with a kind of blunt anger.


    Then there was a period of silence before my guest spoke again, still somewhat close to my ear yet with the rest of ¡®her¡¯ body somewhere that I did not know.


    ¡°Companion, you¡¯ve picked an odd time to call me ¡®guest.¡¯ Your ship is gone. If anything, you should¡¯ve gone and called me ¡®guest¡¯ on your ship and ¡®creature¡¯-- a title you bestowed upon me after very oddly eating my first message to you¨C now that your vessel is gone.¡± I wouldn¡¯t say that there was anger, but there was a certain swiftness to this guest¡¯s voice that may have been the approximation of anger this guest¡¯s species has. Before I could respond proper to further dissuade ¡®her¡¯ more from the very annoying title of ¡®companion,¡¯ this guest spoke again.


    ¡°I do not know why you are so cross with me, companion, but I have to admit that I was only offering the illusion of free choice just now, in reality. I was not at all expecting a rejection to my offer to help, and since you do not seem to be of sound mind, I must rejection your rejection, you can say. Thinking about it now, I really only ''offered'' out of politeness. So, companion, do you mind not resisting too much? There are a lot of activities that need to be done now that you and I are now on a ship of a hundred¨C this capital ship."


    I believed very much that I was in my right state of mind, and I still had no intention of going with this guest who had only delivered to me misfortune and a certain amount of persistent dread like what I feel for something like a mountain or cliff far off in distance, threatening me with an unsolvable climb. Therefore, I formed a plan.


    It was still impossible to see, and my enemy had abilities that I did not fully understand; I had not, even, gotten to see how exactly those army men were killed. They just cut off. So I did not know how to avoid that, whatever that attack was. But I did know that¨C for some odd reason¨C this guest wanted me alive, so that meant I had some leeway which those men did not. Of course this frightened me because I had no doubts that this persona of care and friendlessness was only to make this process easier, and, from my encounters with The Army, I knew that an enemy who wants you alive is often times worse than one who does not. Especially when they resolve to capture you forcefully whilst they are angry¨C which I was now believing that this guest was steadily becoming.


    My arms could not move but my legs could albeit poorly. My core was mobile as well. So I decided that I would roll over from my stomach to my back where I was then going to listen and react to any move this guest made in the darkness. It would be something like a stalemate. ¡®She¡¯ would get close and I would push her away with a kick that should be easy enough to guess despite the darkness and all the while I would be steadily moving on my back to the breach door I knew was behind me where I would then let the vacuum of space in and¨C well the rest would be figured out from there, I supposed. Flawless plan.


    So I attempted to roll over. I was subsequently pushed hard into the cold, concrete ground and immediately rendered immobile.


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    ¡°This is what I am saying to you, companion. You are not all here right now. Your mind is in a place that I do not know, and that I think you do not know either. I saw you scratching at things-- like insects-- which did not exist on your ship¨C even before your shoddy attempt at stitching which failed so it had been going on for a while. So you are not alright, companion. Just now you attempted to¨C to ¡®escape¡¯ while having already forgotten that I am right behind you, my maw very near to your ear¨C do you not feel the overwhelming moisture, the feeling of an amount of phantom water that you cannot for the life of you cough out? You felt all of that and yet irrationally resolved to ¡®escape?¡¯ Companion, I am trying to help you.


    ¡°This last stand does not need to end with your death, although I think that you secretly believe it does. I was only kidding when I said that I believed you crashed into the Eustacia to be with me; it is very clear that you crashed in an attempt to die, companion. So I think that your right to make your own decisions needs to be somewhat¨C how can this be put? Ah¨C temporarily done away with.¡±


    The warm and flowing appendage that had pressed into my spine moved down to just above my tailbone; it wrapped around it somewhat tightly. I would¡¯ve taken the opportunity to move but two other impossibly strong¨C or rather was I that weak¨C appendages went and were already wrapped around my two shoulders. With my lower and upper axis under the control of this guest, there were only my legs.


    So I started kicking and I imagine that I looked something like a toddler throwing a tantrum to this guest who, of course, had some kind of night vision to be able to be so coordinated in such oppressive darkness. Darkness which left me in a very high state of dread since I could not tell when and where I would be touched¨C constricted¨C next.


    ¡°Companion, your name is Fare, right? Now I don¡¯t want you to think of me as cruel even now when your mind is so backwards, so I want to listen to your earlier request since, even for me, it is getting a little odd to continue referring to you by a title rather than a name or even an alias.¡±


    Without so much as altering her¨C and I have gone and fully convinced myself that this guest must be a the female variety of whatever kind of organism she is¨C  tone, another appendage¨C this makes four¨C wrapped around both of my legs and tied them together almost like a rope. I was unable to physically protest any further without risking something like a cramp.


    Now I do not know what I was feeling exactly because everything was becoming all airy and far away. The fear had gone away at some point as it usually does for me at least in a shootout, so there wasn¡¯t really anything else beside an exceedingly dreary feeling, and the water in my lungs. It felt like I could never breathe air again, and yet I was, I was breathing while she was talking to me and I could speak¨C but felt like I was miles underwater. And there this odd pressure that was beginning to rise now that I was being physically touched by this horrid guest. And I supposed that death could be called a guest since she only visits and never lingers.


    So I was so drained; I couldn¡¯t respond to her words.


    ¡°You¡­ you are alright, aren¡¯t you? I know that I may be delivering an odd sort of sensation to you, but it should not be impairing you at all. It should not be¨C it should not be harming you in any way, I¡¯m very sure of that.¡±


    Now throughout she had been alternating between being near to my ear to a bit further maybe to idly look around, she was now up at about my eye. That is, she had moved past simply whispering into my ear and had gotten right past it and up to beside my face. Which I had been resting on the floor, my chin on the floor, because I could not even lift my head up anymore.


    But, of course, this positioning had allowed more contact since what I had to assume was her core body, something like a torso but most likely very differently constructed; it was all humid and like a river, and it pressed up against my back as she was over me now; she was neither cold nor hot, she was room temperature. Like the condensation of a glass of water; no longer cold yet yielding a strangely fleeting feeling not unlike it but so far away.


    Oh¨C I was getting poetic now, and it was only because it was becoming impossible to form thoughts all orderly and logical and I felt a tingling rise from my feet and to my ankles while the tiredness became an unbearable pain.


    ¡°What could¨C oh¨C¡± then an approximation of a laugh, ¡°it¡¯s because you''re bleeding, Fare¨C if I can, well, call you that since you have still not answered. But, well, this is much better than what else I thought could¡¯ve been happening. This can be remedied. I would just need, well--¡±


    And the tiredness was up to my knees.


    ¡°Fare¨C and I am beginning to enjoy calling you this¨C you do not need to worry. I think¨C to me you seem very prone to that, aren¡¯t you? When you went through the super fortress after the second of your accomplices was defeated by the neighboring planet¡¯s offensive systems, is when I boarded your ship. It had its name in a pretty white color like the star that had brought you to this nebula. It was¨C oh what was it¡­the Kestrel. So the point is that I have known you longer than you have known me. But-- oh that might worry you more wouldn''t it?


    "So let''s talk about a hearty ship named the Kestrel, instead. So hearty that it was capable of going even without electricity, fuel¨C since you had removed that if I am correct, Fare¨C and even with a large chunk of itself missing. You wouldn¡¯t know since you couldn¡¯t see the exterior very well, but your ship looked almost as if it had been severed in two along the vertical axis. Oh, what a wonderful legend that should create once this is over, right, Fare?¡±


    Up to my waist.


    ¡°Oh, you seem very sorry right now. But I''ll tell you again not to worry so much-- and to let this tiredness overcome you gently. I have, of course, not simply sat here talking¨C I have¡­ repurposed a portion of your clothing for medicinal purposes, and I hope you won¡¯t mind that, it¡¯s somewhat necessary here, I think. But, while I am doing all of that, and this hum of the engine is vibrating the floor gently with a warm little noise, I think I should go and lull you off to sleep. Sleep that I think your mind needs to sort of reboot like the mainframe of some grand old ship like that which we are on.


    So why don¡¯t I just go ahead and tell you what I am? I am sure that you have already gotten some wild ideas, but I wouldn¡¯t know about them since I had to leave you shortly after I announced my existence to you with that little note. I had to keep the Eustacia from firing at your little Kestrel, of course. So I suppose I will not know what you think I am, and that little game of guessing will never happen.


    ¡°¡®What am I?¡¯


    ¡°¡®You¡¯re an old fae from a water-wrought planet¡¯


    ¡°¡®No, try again.¡¯


    ¡°And so on¨C I hope you liked my imitation of your voice, Fare, but, yeah, that sort of idle talk probably can''t happen after this, but I think that you''d like to know as soon as possible.¡±


    To my chest.


    ¡°But your breathing is become almost indistinguishable from a sleeping man¡¯s, so I should cut all this rot from my talk and tell this all to you swiftly. Now, firstly¨C¡±


    To my neck.


    ¡°I do not necessarily have what you would call a name, although I suppose I have what you would call a title. That super fortress that you used to confuse your pursuers¨C ¡®The Army¡¯ I¡¯ve heard you call them during one of your many dialogues with yourself¨C was my home for some time. I was squatting there, you can say. I don¡¯t need air, you see, so it didn¡¯t matter that it was all flooded with space¨C and that was how I was able to get onto your ship and this one. And¡ª¡±

 To Gymen, The Wasteland

    For the takeover, I only had flashes of violence. Now I assume there were a lot of men on the ship¨C all very well trained to be on a ship of this caliber. But that did not seem to make much of a difference from what I remembered. Their enemy was unnatural and attacked in a way that they were not prepared for; they had trained extensively in chess and yet were made to play blackjack. In the dark.


    When I came to, I was in the bridge. I had an overwhelming sense of all relief and freshness; I was already sat up in what was most likely the engineer¡¯s chair: there were monitors and readouts all which were a shade of red in one way or the other, and there were terms such as voltage and such, however it was very clear that the essentials were all still functional: the engine, the weapons, the oxygen, and the gravitation synthesizer.


    So I looked around; I thought for sure that I must have been dreaming, but as my memories gradually returned, it seemed more and more impossible. It was too real to be fake. The bridge was wide and tall; there were stations all about and at the front of it all an odd figure in the foremost seat that I easily labeled as the captain¡¯s, given the white silver wheel¨C the helm.


    For the lighting, there was the emergency lights which casted everything in a shade of red, like giving it breathing blood, but there was also the light of a white star; we had left the nebula, but since we were only about a hundred miles in to begin with, that didn¡¯t necessarily give me a sense of how much time had passed; the Eustacia had to actually slow down to meet the Kestrel initially, so if it had returned to full speed at any point, it probably would have cleared the entire hundred thousand mile nebula in an hour, so for a hundred miles that may have been mere seconds.


    Now the one piloting the ship was obviously that guest, but this situation had gotten somewhat unique in that I can now visibly see¨C at the very least¨C her general frame and figure. The color was already difficult to place because of the red lighting tinting everything, but combined with the white star silhouetting her, it impossible to place.


    But I could that she was not bipedal, even while she was sitting. Nor was she anything like a squid which I had been somewhat imagining from the previous interaction. It was hard to place what exactly she was. Her figure looked different at every millisecond. Before I could accurately place any string of words to describe her as anything but not bipedal and not a squid or octopus, the interior lights were cut off.


    ¡°Fare, there are some things best left unseen. I am one of them.¡±


    ¡°Well, guest, you can¡¯t blame me. You never told me what you were and you¨C now¨C obviously actively trying to prevent that. Additionally, you had strangely left the lights up and on until just now, so, maybe don¡¯t do that if you don¡¯t want me to look.¡±


    I attempted to get up since I was full and ready to try and meet her at the helm primarily out of ego since I was at least partially responsible for the takeover of the Eustica, but also simply because I had grown very tired of not speaking to her directly; that is speaking without direct eye contact. There was still light coming in from the bridge windows from that star, after all, so if I got to the front of her I could see her face.


    But my legs were bound to the chair I was in. The chair was subsequently bolted to the floor although I doubted that she was responsible for that.


    ¡°What gives, guest?¡± I said out of anger. I had already had enough of the mysterious nonsense and¨C if she was so insistent on being and alley¨C very much wanted to simply see her face already. It was the least she could do. I struggled more violently just to make noise and drive in the point.


    ¡°You don¡¯t tell me anything important about you, move me around as you please, take all the glory of taking over the ship and then what? Now we continue to be obscured in a kind of darkness while you decide where we go next? Will you¨C next¨C tell me what bank¡¯ll be robbed, then the cut, and then will I be made into a kind of crime boss¨C all well and good¨C but of course having to continue answering to you¨C is a grand old ploy, guest?¡±


    ¡°I wouldn¡¯t call it a ploy or control, I would call it me helping you, Fare. You seem very against that for some reason.¡± Something moved in the darkness, most likely her figure, but it was impossible to tell.


    ¡°But, I actually do not know any planets that would be safe to land at. This is a very high crime that has just occurred, companion¨C Fare. It wouldn¡¯t seem that way to you¨C you were out of it throughout the most of it so I assume for you, it probably feels like something of an anti-climax¨C but the reality is that I am behind the wheel of a capital ship, and you are here with me.¡±


    ¡°I guess I¡¯ll get two executions then? If I were taken to court, of course, which is not how life works out here in this jurisdiction, guest.¡±


    I looked down idly as there was some silence after my statement. I noticed that my arms were in slings¨C that much was visible from the starlight seeping in.


    ¡°Guest¨C guest, what exactly are my injuries? I had only time to guess given the speed at which everything happened, and now that we are at what you can call an impasse, I would like¨C¡±


    ¡°Give me a planet, Fare.¡±


    ¡°Gymen. Those lands of fetid frost where only beasts¨C and madmen¨C roam in a never-ending blizzard. That is salvation from The Army.¡±


    It additionally¨C and obviously¨C has a variety of other threats besides The Army, but I had always thought them to be more manageable.


    ¡°Hm.¡±


    She gave a meaningless response and so I decided that would use this opportunity to get some more information. She didn¡¯t seem very open to it but I figured that should try my luck anyway.


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    ¡°You said you had a title. What was it?¡±


    ¡°Title? Oh, Fare, you couldn¡¯t hear it could you? Ah¨C well I am a pathfinder. That is, I go ahead and mark the ways and routes to places and things¨C but I had dropped it some time ago, and was all ready to spend the rest of my life in that superfortress, but, well, then you made a very large mess around it that I couldn¡¯t help but get involved in.¡±


    ¡°Pathfinder? For whom?¡±


    ¡°For me, of course! Do you think that I would seriously be employed by anyone? No, no, companion. I made all those maps myself. In fact, I think I am more of a cartographer, really. Although I had left them all behind when I went and haphazardly jumped on your ship. You probably thought that you had gotten hit when I did, but, no, that was just me and nothing else.¡±


    ¡°Alright. Let me create a list of attributes, then. No name. ¡®Pathfinder.¡¯ No species. Grand.¡±


    ¡°Well hold on now, Fare. I had told you what I am, but I guess you¡¯ve simply forgotten. I am what you would call a space¨C ah¨C a space¡­¡± She trailed off.


    ¡°Macrocosmic entity? That doesn¡¯t have space in it, guest.¡±


    ¡°Ah¨C yes. That is¡­ me. How¡­ well that¡¯s all fine.¡±


    Now that was the first time I had seen this guest get even the slightest bit flustered. It was entertaining, I had to admit, and a tool I now had at my belt, it seemed.


    While she set the course to Gymen¨C told from the rapid amount of noise I was hearing from her direction like that of a systems manager who often manages things like this for the captain¨C I decided that I would push a little further, just to sort of feel the personality of this guest.


    ¡°Guest, you are daft, aren¡¯t you? You do not have a name¨C or maybe I suspect that you simply do not remember it; you do not, either, remember your own species. And, finally, you are a bit of an unemployable little creature devoid of any abilities besides murder.¡±


    There was silence on the bridge.


    ¡°So, why don¡¯t I assign you a name, guest. I am already very tired of calling you ¡®guest¡¯ since it reminds me of my ship which you have gone and went and gotten destroyed.¡±


    ¡°¡®Gone and went and gotten destroyed¡¯? Companion, you decided to crash into this ship. And don¡¯t you call me jobless. It¡¯s¡­ for me it¡¯s sort of different category of meaning, if that makes any sense.¡± Her voice had went from somewhat irritated¨C or the approximation of irritation¨C to low and unsure. And so I had a map of this guest¡¯s personality. I had gotten very quick at reading people given my occupation, of course.


    ¡°Just because it means something different to you doesn¡¯t mean it has to mean anything different for me. Now stop distracting me, guest, I am trying to name you¡­¡± I trailed off before submitting a very obvious name. ¡°Path.¡±


    ¡°Path?¡±


    Something powering up sort of obfuscated her single word response, but I heard it well enough.


    ¡°Yes. Is there a problem, Path? I think it suits you. A path is something that is sort of in the way yet which you have to take. I think that¨C in a perfect world¨C there would be no paths, there would be only teleporters which circumvented any chance for something like a serial highwayman, if that makes sense.¡±


    ¡°...You have just decided to name me ¡®Path¡¯ and then go ahead to say that ¡®in a perfect world¡¯ there would be no paths. Companion¨C Fare, that is a little¨C that is somewhat mean, isn¡¯t it? I suggest you apologize. Now.¡±


    ¡°You can say that was a joke. Anyway, Paths are quite useful and get you were you need to go. So, in reality, I am saying that I view you positively, alright, Path?¡±


    A straight hissing noise filled the air.


    ¡°Path?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s alright, Fare. It¡¯s an alright name.¡±


    I wasn¡¯t necessarily convinced, but there wasn¡¯t any time to dwell on anything like that. Path had gone and put the ship at top speed, and the white star I had seen for a day at this point was steadily coming closer, then bypassing us on the starboard, before going out of sight all together, leaving the bridge, now, in complete darkness. I could only see the many stars from the window, none of which close enough to provide light.


    ¡°I am in the market for a new ship. Do you think that this one could cut it? I hadn¡¯t really gotten the chance to explore, really. All too much action. And, you know. The leg thing.¡±


    ¡°There was more than physical injuries hampering you, companion. Injuries which I am¡­ eager to investigate at a more appropriate time. I know enough to know that this ship is¨C¡±


    ¡°Hot. This ship is very, very hot. If we were to go anywhere besides Gymen, we would end up being attack by The Army, any outlaws in the area, the local police, probably¨C everyone.¡±


    ¡°Only a wasteland that is cold all the time could handle heat of this level, then? Funny, Companion.¡±


    ¡°But it is not a joke.¡±


    ¡°Oh¨C well why not? You should lighten up.¡±


    ¡°Why are you doing this? You show up, ¡®help,¡¯ and then decide that we are now something like a pair. That development is still bothering me. I do not understand it. I do not like it.¡±


    ¡°Companion, it¡¯s very simple. I thought it was implied, really. I am a Pathfinder. I like to find ways around things. And I am not threatened by you and by extension your kind. I go through them simply. I am a Pathfinder, but I have not bothered myself with visiting any planets. I connect systems together. Occasionally they are solar systems¡­ more often they are simply the atoms on a meteor. I don¡¯t very often map out any place that you would go to, really. So, would it be that hard to accept that I am just attempting to build a path¨C a map¨C of you? And you work?¡±


    There was a pause as if she expected me to respond, yet I had been so startled by it all that I did not even so much as nod my head.


    ¡°You have odd habits, companion. Even observing you for only about a day that was clear. So intend to cartograph your brain.¡±


    Silence again.


    ¡°Fare?¡±


    ¡°I see Gymen in the distance. We are¡­ already there. I was so close to making it without incident and saving the Kestrel once more. But, well, Path, that seems to have been not my given hand in this little blackjack of a day. If it even still is the same day. I don¡¯t even know anymore.¡±


    ¡°Ah. So that is Gymen.¡±