THE SPACE NAVY AU (18+)

"No, no. The things in the walls. The owls." You realize how silly that sounds, and add defensively, "They only look like owls. And honestly they're not very good at it. I think they might be some sort of ghosts, or they wouldn't need to use moths to do their dirty work. It's not like the moths do anything useful. They just fill you up until you choke on dust. Maybe they're just observing, maybe they just like to watch us struggle. Their motives don't make sense." You make an impatient gesture. "It doesn't matter why they're doing it, we can't let them."

 

Galley's quiet for awhile, thinking about it. Then he says, gently, "Bel, there aren't any of those."

 

"If they don't show up on cameras, they probably are some kind of spirit thing. Too bad we don't have any ghost-botherers aboard. Although I doubt it'd be safe for them to make contact. These things aren't reasonable, Galley. Don't mess with them. Just chase them off if you see them. They don't like water. Whatever you do, do not talk to them."

 

"My sensors, internal and external, span the full psychokinetic spectrum, Commander, plus elecromagnetic, bioelectric, and everything from infrared to ultraviolet to x-ray. All ships have these capacities. I know from ghosts. There are no owl monsters aboard, and only the regular sort of moth."

Bel's tablet picks out a handful of green dots scattered across the recreation areas, with a few video feeds focussing on sleeping or fluttering insects.

 

You pester him to zoom in on the moths, but they're all the little harmless kind that eats cabbage or clothes. No eyespots. No cryptic markings on their backs. You shake your head.

"Nope, not them. Good. And not ghosts... damn. That kind of opens the door to a whole lot of much weirder explanations I'm not qualified to investigate. Other-dimensional beings? Angels?" A convulsive shudder brought on by the word tells you you're right. "Fuck. I always liked angel imagery. But that's when I thought they weren't real. Awful feathery wings..." A bleak laugh escapes you.

 

Galley cuts in urgently. "I just asked the Captain, he says don't worry. He says he's in top of it. Them."

 

"Yeah, I told him, he'll be watching. But he has to sleep sometime. And so do I. You'll watch over us, won't you?"

 

"I'll try," Galley says uncertainly.

 

"Please," you say softly. "I felt good from the dialysis but I'm getting tired again. If I refuse to sleep I'll just get sick faster. Please look out for me."

 

"I will. I'll— there's cameras, I see you, I'm watching. I'll get the Captain up and running. He got here fast last time, didn't he? I'd do it myself. If I could. But I can get him to. So I will. You can sleep."

 

"Thank you, Galley," you say softly.

You're so tired, you feel like just closing your eyes right now, but you make yourself get up and take care of your body. Brush your fangs, drink some water, change into some jammies that don't reek of fear-sweat. You don't have a whole lot of clean laundry left -- stacked in a crate by your pile, rather than tucked away neatly in your sylladex, so awkward -- but you don't suppose you'll be up to changing your clothes for much longer either.

Finally, you fill a bowl with water and set it where you'll be able to reach it. They don't like water. Dust is their weapon, it can be washed away, and you'd think that'd be easy, make them less frightening, but it's so dry in space. It's so dry and you're filling up with black dust.

But Galley is watching. Galley is watching so you can sleep.

With your tablet cradled in your arms, you curl into a ball and close your eyes.

 

Because of the good stretch of sleep you got with Kadros, you don't do so badly with the parade of gruesome disasters that comes through the block. Murfey's taken to setting fires from a staggering amount of raw materials, and trying to burn the eyeballs out of his flesh. Half the greens are lost to a fear of the dark, and refuse to budge from their blindingly bright quarantine blocks unless forcibly dragged. The other half don't want to leave medical bay. In both cases it throws the schedules off, and so keeping everything moving is one long, exhausting brawl. The ochres all the way down to little Carmin are terrifyingly, violently sick, with seizures and strokes and all sorts of wretched side effects of a fever too fierce for their frail bodies to contain.

"Captain," Carmine wails, from across the block. "Captain, where are you, you promised!"

You hurry over to her side, panting with the strain, and lean against the side of her cot.

"There, dear, there you are, you're doing fine," you sooth her, reaching out to rub her horns. She turns sparkling-bright red eyes on you and reaches out— her fingertips are so hot against your fins, and you flinch away. You mean to, that is. Her whole face twists into a vengeful snarl and her palms clamp flat against the sides of your head.

"What—?" You manage, and then pain hits you like a meteor strike. Everything but screaming becomes a distant, irrelevant impossibility.

 

The alarm you set on your tablet wakes you before your next dialysis shift. Aside from a bit of a headache, you feel good. Energized. Ravenously hungry, which makes you nervous for a little while -- is this how the bite instinct gets you? -- but a breakfast of protein bars and self-reheat noodle bowls does eventually satisfy you. You take a shower, brush your fangs, and sort of regret that there isn't a mirror in your little ablution corner. You know it would be more likely to upset most people than comfort them to watch the progress of the dark spores under their skin, darkening their tongue, filling the sclera of their eyes... but you would rather know.

Dressed in clean fatigues and with your hair neatly braided back, you sit down to do some stretches while you wait for your escort. "Evening, Galley," you say to the space around you -- to your tablet, you suppose. "How have things been going? I hope I didn't miss any excitement."

It takes him a moment too long to answer. Just like that, your calm is broken. Panic sets your heart racketing. You see movement at the ventilation grate near the ceiling, and though you know the mesh is too fine for even moths to get through, you scoop up your bowl of water and throw it at the grate anyway. You catch a glimpse of white, of big dark eyes, a fluttering that's subtly unbirdlike, and then it's gone.

 

"I'm here!" Galley cuts in. "Bel. Bel. It's okay, I didn't go anywhere!" A hoarse, nervous laugh. "I mean, obviously."

 

"Are you okay?" you demand. "Tell me you're okay."

 

"Yes! Bel, I'm fine, nothing happened to me— or you, I was watching. I was even watching the fucking moths!"

 

Your shoulders slump. You wait for your pulse to slow, but the panic isn't leaving you. There is dread just out of sight beyond the corners of your eyes.

"Everyone's okay?" you press. "Erskin? Lainey? Murfey?"

 

"I— uh—yyyyyyynnno." It sounds like it pains him to admit that. "Gawker is fine! Just tired. She's sleeping right now. Murfey has had to be fitted with soft cuffs to prevent more serious self-mutilation. And exploding any other filtration devices. He took out two under the impression they're what's seeded him with unwanted sensory organs. One's been replaced already. The other should be completed and installed in two point three hours. The, uh. The Captain. Is. Uhhhhh. Expected to recover fully. From a psionic attack by an infected rustblood. She's in more critical condition but the odds are good she'll pull through as well."

 

And there it is.

It clicks into place like you were expecting it. "I'm not the target. He is." Your voice comes out strangled. "Without him the whole crew will fall apart. Oh, I bet it's been driving them nuts how he hasn't been alone for a moment since this started. Too busy being the only decent captain in the fleet." A sobbing laugh. "Why didn't you tell me, Galley? Why didn't you tell me they got him?"

 

"No one— they— it wasn't moths!" Galley protests. "Or angels or ghosts or anything, Bel, calm down! It was just some scared girl operating off her own set of crazy shit. Everyone's starting to freak out, now, the injury rates are going to go up because we've got more trolls fighting, it's normal— don't you go losing your shit on me too, Bel, come on, please! You've been doing so good."