“Yes, a boring job,” L’iza said, also trying not to appear to have a wondering gaze towards the planet. “One that allows us to be distracted by whatever is happening on that planet.”
“Us?” he said, turning his gaze on the ghostly hologram. “What do you have to be distracted about?”
“So, you are distracted.”
He faced forward again. Score one for his perceptive sentient ship.
Mogha companion, he tried again. I feel you are near. Why do you not answer?
On the bridge of her ship, Dani checked the comm. No answer to her distress message, but as far as she could tell, it was working.
She paused. That voice was in her head again. This time she could sense a maturity about it, something much older than C’hase.
C’hase, she called. He was with her on the bridge for a second, then disappeared with Hedge somewhere.
Yes, Alpha? he responded.
Is there another voice calling you?
There was a pause, then, No, you’re the only one I can hear, Alpha. I can only hear one master companion. Another pause. That I know of.
Having heard him say that before, she hoped she could speak with an older mogha when they found his home. The young pup couldn’t explain a lot of what this link was and why he could talk to her but no one else.
I don’t know who you are, she said to the new voice. But C’hase is my mogha companion.
She waited. No answer.
Satisfied, she returned her attention to the console, requesting a damage report. Several codes showed up on the monitor in front of her, along with schematics of the freighter. Her eyebrows furrowed. The malfunctions on the ship weren’t consistent with the Korthan’s laser fire.
Large blue dots marked a catastrophic engine failure along with numerous smaller blue dots pinpointing maintenance issues. That wasn’t right. She took very good care of her ship.
Red dots marked where they were hit by the Korthan laser fire, damage superficial. Even so, the red dots were nowhere near the blue dots.
Pursing her lips, she drummed her fingers along the console. If the Korthan didn’t cause the crash, what did?
The screen winked out. Blinking, Dani thumped it. Leaning under the console to check the wiring, she paused. Several circuits were completely missing, a wire hanging loose, touching the floor.
Grabbing a torch light, she got on her hands and knees, peering at the motherboard. What maintenance technician would remove so many soldered circuits and wires?
As she went to stand up, she noticed a dark spot under her seat. What the? Why was there a hole under her seat?
She shined the beam of light into the hole. Crudely done, round for the most part, the edges were somewhat jagged. It went entirely through the deck down to the next level. Was it a burrow? What in the stars could burrow a hole through metal? Her first thought was that C’hase must have done it, but it was way too small—
Dani was hit with a strong emotion from C’hase. Jerking upwards, she hit her head on the bottom of her pilot’s chair.
Flipping off the torch light, rubbing the top of her head, she crawled out from under the seat and headed to the rear of the ship, uncertain if the strong emotion was cause for alarm.
There was a commotion near the loading dock, followed by a flapping sound, then C’hase barking and jumping in the air, tail and antennae twirling.
Running, Dani skidded to a halt as she saw something silvery writhe on the deck. Gripping it with his extended fingers, C’hase knelt on his belly, grabbing it between his teeth until it stopped moving.
Look, it’s a fish! He exclaimed, joy tangible. I like fish!
“C’hase, where did you get that?” Dani stared in wide-eyed wonderment.
Hedge gave it to me. He joyously bit it again when it flopped in his fingers, his antennae spinning wildly.
Hedge?
That same reddish-brown chicken clucked next to him, pecking the fish once.
“C’hase,” Dani said. “Where is Hedge now?”
“Oh, he’s over there in his den.” The hellhound nodded towards the docking door, but didn’t look up, his focus clearly on the fish.
In his den?
Dani’s stomach dropped. Heading to the docking door, where C’hase indicated, she held up the torch light, flipping it on. As the beam of light traced along the bulkhead, she had an idea what to look for.
There.
Sure enough, where the bulkhead met the deck, about a foot aft of the docking bay door, there was a hole. Except this hole was a little bigger than the one under her seat on the bridge.
Kneeling next to the hole, Dani directed the beam of light into the small opening.
Tiny winks of light glittered as she waved the torch from right to left, all manner of shiny things sitting in a pile between the inner and outer bulkhead walls. Atop the pile, two beady eyes reflected at her, a squeak of protest resounding as the tan creature tried to cover the pile with his body.
“What is all this?” she exclaimed.
There were wires, panels, a number of buttons from consoles, and those tiny shiny circuits from computer motherboards. Dani’s mouth dropped open. Her ship didn’t have a system malfunction, it had a Hedge malfunction.
The Korthan laser fire didn’t help either—
Hedge likes shiny things, C’hase suddenly said right next to her. Jumping slightly, she looked sharply at him. I’ve been helping him with his collection.
3
“I told you to leave that thing in the lab. Look what it did?” Dani paced, booted feet clanging as she stomped over the deck. She never thought she’d be stranded on a deserted planet because of some weird collecting packrat space rat.
C’hase ducked his head, antennae drooping. “But, he’s my friend.”
And her heart melted. That’s what he called Hedge in the lab too, even though they were in separate cages across the room from each other—
But how could she argue with that?
Whimpering, C’hase laid his head down over her feet. Glancing down, she did a double take. Were his wispy feathers moving on the ends of his antenna?
“C’hase, are you doing that?”
Doing what? he raised his head.
Leaning over to point at one of the feathers, she felt a slight breeze brush across her hand.
Pulling the torch light out of a side pocket of her cargo pants, she shined it in the hole again, Hedge again squeaking in protest as he threw his body over his pile of treasures.
She didn’t notice it before, but she could feel a breeze across her face this time. Switching off the torch, she could still see a beam of light in the creature’s den. Following it with her eyes, she sucked in a breath and held it when it led to a hole that led to the outside world.
She let the breath out. Clearly, the air was breathable or they’d have noticed by now—
Stars. This answered the question about the outside air.
C’hase scooted along the floor, the feathers on the ends of his antennae tickling her face.
Hedge likes to go outside, he said cheerfully as he stood, tail twirling.
Eyes widening as she turned her head towards the hellhound, she said, C’hase, is there anything else important about Hedge we need to know about?
The mogha sat on his haunches, one of his long fingers raising to scratch at the side of his head. No, I don’t think so.