Living on a starship forced anyone to get used to being in a confined space, but the Hurricane was too small for her.

Pirra had felt agitated for most of the trip - partly a result of instinct, and partly the result of personality. Alexander seemed concerned about her, and it only grated on her more. It wasn't his fault, and it was quite caring, but it was still bothering her.

Trying not to show it was taxing. She forced herself to be deliberate in each action, to focus on the moment. But when there was little to do in the moment, that became difficult in its own way.

And the most annoying part was that there was something else bothering her, but she just didn't want to talk about it.

Digging into her bag, she took out a small stone from a pouch. She didn't want Alexander to see that she had it and folded her wing drapes around her body.

He glanced at her out of the corner of his eye. He knew when she was hiding something, but he said nothing, for which she was grateful. The hardest part of their marriage had been unlearning aspects of their own behaviour that did not mesh. Humans seemed more open in general than her kind, who had higher expectations of privacy.

Going into the central corridor, she began pacing - or the equivalent, in zero-g, simply pushing herself one way down the hall and then back the other way. They had gone through the dashgate only an hour before and it would be another seventeen before they even arrived at this third colony.

The ship was vibrating again, but at least not as much as it had been during the first dash, and even if she could only feel it when she touched a surface, the sound was alway there. The Executive Officer had taken the time before they entered to try and attune the ship better to the gate. It was newer, though already showing some signs of worse maintenance than the first.

Urle had figured that within ten years it'd be far worse than the first one, and it all just made her wonder how these colonies ever hoped to grow without caring for their own infrastructure.

Now the rattling of everything was grating on her. It reminded her of a steep cliff starting to collapse.

"Too many things compounding," she said softly, opening her hand to look at the stone.

It was only five centimeters long, pierced with smooth holes not quite large enough for a finger to go in.

It was silent in her hand, but given a good wind it would have sung.

A heavy clunk caused her to look up. Closing her hand around the stone, she saw the Chief Science Officer as he came around the corner. She came to attention and saluted him.

The electronic face on Cenz's suit turned to a polite smile. "At ease, Lieutenant. I see I am not the only one out for a walk," he said cheerfully.

"It helps a bit," she replied neutrally, letting her salute drop. It would have been overly-formal even on-duty, but she'd felt caught.

Perhaps Cenz knew that. "I can leave you to your walk if you wish," he said.

She struggled with the desire to say yes. Cenz was possibly the nicest and most innocent being she had ever known, and adored conversation. To walk away from him now felt like being mean to a child.

"It's fine. How are you, sir? I hope this leg of the journey is not bothering you as much as the last."

"The last was quite unpleasant," he admitted. "But only that - this leg is only . . . well, annoying. I cannot actually quantify this, but I think I feel the vibrations far more than the rest of you and it makes all of me want to hide in their shells."

She knew only a little about the biology of his species; a hundred or so individual polyps that cooperated with complex neural nets they built between chunks of calcified rock that were constructed over long periods of time. Each polyp was only somewhat intelligent, but when many combined they formed an impressive intellect.

He started to move along again and she kept pace. Even here, it was incredible how easily he seemed to move; on the Hurricane they were functionally in zero-gravity. But to move that water-filled suit in the artificial gravity of a place like the Craton had to require massive strength.

"May I ask you a question, sir?" she asked.

"Of course," he replied. "And please - you can drop any title or formality. They're one of the few aspects of being on the Craton that I dislike. There is no hierarchy among polyps." He chuckled, and she gave a smile.

It occurred to her that they had both become so used to being around humans that they were both faking their mannerisms to each other.

"Is it true that on your homeworld your species are not anything like a humanoid or biped?"

"Your information is accurate," he replied. They reached the end of the corridor and turned to float back down the other way. "We are something more like crawling masses on our homeworld - it works well for moving over reefs in the shallow seas we come from. However, we may form our sections as we like, and while early contact had us being in such forms, we realized that being more humanoid would help us relate with such species better."

"Was it hard to learn to become . . . a biped?" she asked.

He considered a moment, his screen appearing thoughtful. "In a way. It is somewhat like the strength-training a species might undergo before moving onto a higher-gravity world. We don't usually break ourselves up, but there's no reason we can't, if we're careful. So I spent a few years breaking myself into smaller pieces and then rearranging them into something like a humanoid."

"A few years?"

"I know it sounds like a lot, but while I was doing that I was also getting an education on living among other species - so it was not as boring as it sounds." He laughed again, and for a moment she saw specks of light in the water around his face screen. The polyps were lighting up in different colors - perhaps that was his own kind's form of a laugh.

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

"Still, that sounds like a lot of effort."

"I won't lie - it was! But it was worth it. Because now I can walk and talk face-to-face with beings such as yourself, or the Captain."

"Does it become awkward among your own kind?"

"Not really - we have no defined shapes. They will know from looking that I took this form, and surely figure out why. But if anything, it will only lead to some more questions!" He looked down to her hand. "May I ask you a question now, Pirra?"

"It only seems fair, sir."

"Just Cenz, if you please. What is that you're holding?"

She hadn't realized he'd noticed it. With how clunky his suit looked, and how his face screen only showed forward, it was easy to imagine he didn't see well.

"Oh, it's . . . it's a singing stone," she said.

"A singing stone . . . oh, yes, from your homeworld. They have quite the significance to some groups there, from what I understand. I hope my question was not rude."

"No, sir- Cenz. You're fine," she said, opening her hand to look at it. "You're right, though. Among some groups on my homeworld, these were quite important."

Cenz was quiet a moment. When he spoke again, her translator turned his voice a little softer. "I am not an expert on your people's cultural history, Pirra, but I understand that there was much sectarian violence on your world until the last few centuries."

She wasn't sure how to reply to that.

"It's not an issue anymore," she finally said.

"Ah," Cenz replied. He seemed uncertain. "That's . . . good to hear."

She put the stone in her pocket. "Thank you for the conversation, Cenz. I think I'm going to return to my cabin."

*******

Brooks entered the bridge. Cenz had taken the watch and seemed distracted reading a tablet. But the being's attention could go in many directions, and he was fully aware of Brooks's arrival.

"Commander," Brooks said, giving him a nod.

"Captain," the being replied. "We are only seven minutes from entry to this system's Kuiper Belt. Our information indicates that the colony of . . . New Vitriol . . . is a mostly-rocky object approximately ten kilometers in diameter. We are not aware of how large the population is, but some of the public records we had access to in the last two colonies suggest Vitriol had initially a population of 300,000 or so - thus New . . . Vitriol will have less than that."

Brooks caught the way the coral hung up on the word. "Is something bothering you, Cenz?"

"Ah, yes sir. This name - Vitriol. It's hard to translate into my language. And even when translated, I'm having trouble understanding it."

Brooks moved to sit. "Ah, yes. Well . . . how would you define the word?"

"Angry critique? But there is an element of the translation that I just do not understand."

"That's because the word implies more than anger - there is an element of intentionally wishing harm in it."

Cenz was silent for a moment, and his face screen went to a strange sort of default blankness. Lights in his suit flashed in confused patterns, and staring at it was dazzling.

"I understand that many species have had wars and conflicts. My own people have become involved in those of the Sapient Union, but I was not directly. In a way, I can understand that these stemmed almost always from material causes - the lack of or desire for something vital to life."

"But cruelty is not something you are able to really understand," Brooks commented.

". . . that's correct, Captain." He was silent a moment before adding; "In some ways I feel it gives me a permanent blind spot when it comes to other species. Your natural evolution has, for some reason, given your species the ability to have these thoughts. And yet . . . mine cannot seem to conceive of them."

Brooks wasn't sure how to reply to that; it was true, though. His species was capable of cruelty; it was some kind of by-product of evolution that served a purpose that was hard for him to justify. And humanity was not alone; most other sapient species had, at least somewhere in their history, shown such behaviours.

None of them were proud of it, but they could not change their pasts. They could only try now to rise above.

"At times your own kind are difficult for us to understand," he finally said. "We're singular minds, not collectives. I suppose, though, I am glad that your kind can't feel it. You're not missing out on much of value."

"Why would they name their colony a term that implies such cruelty?" Cenz asked.

"Anger, I would guess. They felt slighted, and they wanted everyone to know it. It's not a mature thought. But we are formed largely by our environments and conditions. Given certain kinds of conditions, we can turn out to think and act in ways that seem insane - even to others of our own species."

He felt oddly cold, but the only reason he might have felt that would be if Kell was present; yet the sensors confirmed he was in his cabin.

Cenz turned to business. "We're about to come back into realspace in thirty seconds."

Brooks put on the comm. "All personnel, prepare for reversion to realspace."

"I will be very grateful to have this shaking cease," Cenz said.

"Are you feeling all right?"

"Well enough. I might be what you'd call sore for a few days. But hopefully we won't have to leave here immediately, so I can recuperate somewhat."

Brooks knew he'd have to make sure he fully understood the extent of harm that the being had suffered through the trip. Cenz was a dutiful officer, and he was not sure if this trip had given him the equivalent of a headache or broken rib.

Making a note to himself to check on that later, he composed himself for their immediate concern.

With a lurch they re-entered real space.

Brooks glanced to Cenz and saw a placid smile on his face, which reassured him.

Checking that everyone else on board was fine, he then switched to external view and found the colony of New Vitriol.

"I've sent a message, but we're just getting an automated reply," Cenz noted.

Urle entered the bridge, followed by Kell. The compartment was beginning to feel crowded.

"Uknown ship, follow beacon course laid out for you."

It was a message, but not an open channel.

Cenz looked to Brooks for orders.

"Take us in," he ordered.

Kell was staring off, not at the monitors, but just above them.

Urle caught his direction of gaze. "What is it, Kell? You look like you've just seen a Leviathan."

"No," the Ambassador replied. "But I see something. There is a presence here . . ."

"What kind of presence?" Brooks asked. "Is it a danger?"

Kell shook his head. "I believe it is the seer."

"Seer?" Urle asked.

"It's a very old term from the English language," Cenz chipped in. "For a being who is able to 'see' the future."

"Or other things," Kell said.

"Such things are superstition," Urle noted sourly.

"Perhaps," Kell replied.

Brooks arched an eyebrow but said nothing on the topic.

"I want everyone dressed and assembled for disembarkment in ten minutes. We set down in fifteen."