[Danny]

hmmm... *wonders whether that is counted, but decides that he really wants to post more, so it'll do...* Okay, just this once...

i'm afriad that this gets pretty narrative for a while, now. i don't manage to develop Ulven's character much over the next couple of chapters. sorry.

CHAPTER 11

Quiss slept for most of the time. I was quite worried about him; merely being beaten by a couple of sligs doesn’t normally cause someone to withdraw almost completely. I formed the conclusion that Quiss’s master must have been particularly cruel, and mistreated Quiss badly. On the occasions when Quiss was awake and comparatively lucid, I attempted to broach the issue, but I had to be careful not to trigger a relapse or anything, so I got very little information out of him, only that his master had slaves whose sole duty was to whip other slaves.

I fared only slightly better with Rixx. He was evasive when it came to talking about their master, and I got the impression that he had been particularly mistreated, and had suppressed the memory. The most information I got out of him came on our third day, when the others were all away doing various things, and Rixx was lying half-asleep.

“Rixx?”

“Hmm?”

“You know your master?”

“Who?”

“The Colonel at the Barracks, remember?”

“Who? Oh yeah, the guy with the Rack, yeah?”

“The Rack?”

“You know, those things for stretching people. He’d put someone on it, put manacles around their wrists and tail, or ankles,” he paused, “then get someone to turn the wheel.”

“What? When you’d disobeyed him?”

He was silent for a while, then sat up and opened his eyes. “No.” I thought at first that he was being sarcastic, but then I looked into his eyes, and saw that he was deadly serious. Neither of us said anything for a long while, then he lay back down and closed his eyes. After a few minutes, I heard his snoring, and decided to leave him alone.

It was just after this that I first discovered our Neighbour. I’d left Rixx to sleep, and decided to explore all the way to the Command Deck. I took some food, so that I wouldn’t have to return, although I had a sneaking suspicion that I’d be able to find another crate when I needed it, and set off over the crates.

I was almost at the bow end of the Hold, when I fell down between two crates that I’d been trying to jump between. I didn’t hurt myself badly, but I was winded for a second, and lay there, recovering. As I lay there, my eyes became accustomed to the darkness, and I noticed a dark shape huddled opposite me, in a corner. I froze. The shape didn’t move. I tentatively rose to a crouch, and moved slowly over to the shape.

Most of it was buried beneath a pile of rags, but I could see a head and what looked like two arms beneath the rags. I couldn’t make out the shape of the head in the darkness, but judging by the state of its rags, this creature was a drifter, just like the rest of us. I was thankful that its eyes appeared closed.

I wondered what I should do. I could awaken the creature, and try and talk to it, but there was always the risk that it might see me as a threat. Besides, I didn’t anticipate diplomacy being one of my strong points. I decided that it would be best to bring some support. Yan, for all his cynicism, would probably be the best for the job, as he was generally quite open-minded about other species, and knew several languages, in case whatever it was didn’t speak the same language as us.

I climbed back on top of the crate I had fallen off. I looked round, looking for landmarks, but couldn’t see any, so I left the pile of food I’d carried with me to serve as a marker, and set off back to our home crate, keeping an eye out for Yan.

It wasn’t long before I saw Yan. He was moving away from our home crate, to my right. I thought about calling his name, but decided I didn’t want to run the risk of being overheard by crewmembers, so I gave chase silently. Before long, he stopped to look around, saw me, and waited. When I caught up with him, he seemed puzzled by the urgent expression on my face.

“What’s the matter?”

I paused to get my breath back. “We’re… We aren’t alone in this hold. And I don’t mean the crew, I mean I’ve found another stowaway.”

“We’d better get Vint.”

“No, I thought it would be better if just the two of us went. We wouldn’t want to intimidate him.”

“What is he?”

“I’m not sure; it was dark. He seems to be a drifter, like us, but he was asleep, so I don’t know if we even speak the same language. That’s why I found you, you seem to know a few languages.”

“Well, a few.” He set off in the direction I’d come from. “This way?”

I nodded, and followed. We moved in silence, which was lucky, in a way, because if we’d made much sound, we would probably have been killed. We were about halfway to the place where I’d found the stranger, when I heard footsteps from one of the overhead gangways. I looked, and saw mudokon feet crossing the Hold on the gangway. I almost called out, thinking that it was one of us, but I stopped when I realised that none of us wore shoes, and none of us carried torches. I nudged Yan, but he’d already seen them. We froze, waiting until they’d passed. They were some way away before I relaxed slightly. Unfortunately, as I took a step forward, my foot slipped out from under me, and I fell to the ground with a thud. The footsteps paused, then began to come faster, approaching us. One of the mudokons leaned over the handrail of the gangway, holding a machine gun, shining his torch over the edge. He began to spray the crates around us with bullets, when his companion pulled to gun away from him. Yan had dived for cover, but I had been frozen with fear.

“What do you think you’re doing? Do you think they’ll want goods that are full of bullets?”

The mud with the machine gun sounded angry. “I hate stowaways! We should have a good cleanout sometime!”

The other mud pulled him from the handrail. “It doesn’t matter; they’ll be caught when we reach Carthag, anyway. Then you’ll be off here, and won’t have to worry about them any more.”

“We should just flood the hold with poison gas. That’d get rid of them with no trouble at all!”

The other mudokon gave a short humourless laugh. “I’m sure the guys at Verkat would just love all of that poisoned food, wouldn’t they? Of course, they might fire us, or even imprison us, but that’d just be their way of showing their appreciation…”

“All right, no need for the sarcasm.”

The other mud laughed. “C’mon, let’s get back to the mess and have a drink.”

They began to move off. This time, I waited until the footsteps had died away completely before I relaxed. Yan helped me back onto my feet.

“Close shave there.”

I nodded my agreement. I was more scared than I liked to admit by my near miss. Not wishing to talk about it, I set off again in the direction of the Stranger.

CHAPTER 12

When we reached my marker, I told Yan to sit back for a second, while I leaned my head over the edge. The huddled shape was still there, as unmoving as ever. It struck me that I had no idea if he was even alive, but I ignored that thought, as it didn’t seem that important. I turned back to Yan.

“All right. Follow me.”

I walked round to a place where we could jump down onto a smaller crate before jumping to the ground. I led him round to the Stranger.

“What should I do?”

I thought for a second. “Well, I don’t know. You’ve always seemed to get on better with other species. What do you think?”

Yan hesitantly reached out to the stranger, but then withdrew his hand, and turned to me. “Go and fetch a couple of pieces of food from that stash up there.” He pointed up on top of the crate. “We want to appear as friends.”

“He seems more civilised than that.”

“Civilised or not, he might not speak our language, and giving him a gift of sorts might be the only way to secure his friendship.”

I was dubious, but I did as I was asked. I had not yet reached the top, however, when I heard the Stranger stirring. I took a couple of food items, and dropped them down to Yan. Not wanting to miss it, I watched over the edge as Yan held them out to the Stranger.

The Stranger looked at Yan, then snatched the food from him. His arms were long, and his hands were large and gnarled. He didn’t eat the food, but held it, looking at Yan with what I thought was quite an indignant look in his eye. The light seemed brighter than it had been before, and I thought I could make out the shape of his head. To my surprise, it resembled that of a Glukkon.

Yan tried to talk to him.

“Hello.”

The Glukkon said nothing, but his eyebrows rose slightly. Yan persisted.

“Do you understand me?”

The Glukkon seemed to think for a long while, before replying: “Yes.”

“Ah good, we speak the same language.” He looked up at me. “Come on down, Ulven, he doesn’t bite!”

I climbed down. Yan and the glukkon said nothing while they watched. When I was standing beside Yan, he sat down, and I followed.

“Who are you?”

“I’m Yan, this is Ulven.”

“What do you want? Have you come to get rid of me?”

Yan seemed a little put out by the slight aggression, but hid it well. “We’re not members of the crew, don’t worry. We’re stowaways, like you. We just want to get to know you.”

The glukkon relaxed slightly, but lost none of his suspicion.

I spoke up. “What’s your name?”

He looked at me, as if I’d just accused him of something, then sighed. “Olek.”

“Olek? That’s your name?”

He nodded. Yan looked at him.

“Are you here alone, Olek?”

There was a long pause. “Am now.”

When nothing more was forthcoming, Yan prompted him. “You mean there were others?”

“Dead now. Didn’t make it inside. Bodies falling into sea. Red Water.”

I wanted to know more about him. “Glukkons like you?”

“Mostly mudokons. Some sligs.”

Yan put a hand on Olek’s shoulder. “So you’re alone now, then?”

Olek looked at Yan’s hand on his shoulder, and didn’t respond.

“Would you like to join us? There are six of us.”

“Tired. Hurt.”

I began to stand. “We’ll help you. There’s probably some medical supplies in some of these crates.”

Yan also began to stand, taking Olek by the shoulder.

“Come on, try to stand up.”

Between us, we managed to pull Olek up. He was about a head taller than either of us. Rags hung from his skinny frame like rotting flesh. Unlike most Glukkons, his handfeet were not restricted by his clothing, and he was able to walk quite easily. Getting him up onto the top was a struggle, but after that we had no real trouble getting him to walk back to our home crate. Even in his state, he was able to move almost as fast as we were, especially with us helping him.