Fighty strikes the floor in frustration. 'How can there be no pods left? The crew are all dead… How could they eject them?'

‘Speculation:’ the data buddy glows as it speculates. ‘Escape pods were ejected prior to death of crew.’

'Well, yes. Unless the boarding party ejected them. Maybe to stop the crew escaping,' we think aloud.

‘Speculation: Affirmative, given new data regarding presence of a boarding party.’

Stealy brings Buddy level with our eyes. 'You didn't know about the boarding party?'

‘Unable to interface with global system,’ it responds.

‘[091, 090, 087...],’ continues the ship’s countdown overhead. We need to get out of here.

'What do we do now?'

‘Insufficient context to question,’ the buddy says.

'We're about to hit another ship,’ we explain. ‘We're on a Mixcyxli starship called the Shaxixi...something... and we're about to squirt all our fluids out so we sail in the opposite direction, and hopefully crash into the attacking ship.'

‘Suggestion:’ the buddy says. ‘Proceed to escape pod bay on opposite side of Speculation: the Shaxixith’th.’

‘There are more pods?’

‘Speculation: positive. Information: Mixcyxli vessels are commonly bilaterally symmetrical.’

We’re already moving, hurrying back out into the corridors of the ship. ‘You could have said that before,’ we tell the device. ‘Can you make such suggestions promptly in future?’

‘Affirmative,’ Buddy says.

We make our way deeper into the stricken ship along a wide corridor, where dead mixcycla lie in pools of blood. But after a moment we hear footsteps behind us. We can tell it’s one of the intruders because the sounds alternate bipedally, so we camouflage ourselves against the wall. A lone Ghutarn rounds the corner in its chitinous black armour, holding a weapon before it. We’re hoping it just passes by, but it pauses in front of us, looking around.

At exactly that moment – exactly the wrong moment, Buddy says, ‘Information:’

We don’t wait to hear the information.

The Ghutarn swivels towards us, and Fighty springs up before it and strikes it hard in its visor. It flies back against the opposite wall, and we hurry after it, where Mighty deals it a heavy blow, hopefully finishing it off.

‘Can you stay quiet when we’re trying to hide?’ we ask Buddy.

‘Affirmative,’ it says.

Cheeky takes the device from Feely, and Chokey has to intercept before Cheeky throws it down the corridor.

‘What was the information you had?’

‘Current rate of travel is insufficient to reach destination while safe egress using escape pod remains viable.’

‘[040, 037, 036...]’

‘You mean we’re too slow,’ we tell it, and turn away from the dead Ghutarn just as Stealy is investigating its possessions.

At the far end of the corridor another group of Ghutarn hurry past. They must be preparing to depart the ship too, we think, suddenly envious of their bipedal nature.

‘Now would be a good time for suggestions,’ we tell Buddy. ‘We don’t want to die here.’ The other end of the corridor is so far away. And we’re so slow. Some of our arms start wrestling each other in frustration.

‘Suggestion: Increase rate of travel,’ Buddy says helpfully.

For the first time since we awoke here, we wish we were back in the sea. But we don’t have time to dwell on the thought, as another Ghutarn runs past the end of the corridor.

It looks in our direction and levels its weapon.

‘Huh,’ we say, as we realise we aren’t camouflaged any more.

Two more Ghutarn join the first, and they open fire in our direction, sending bright shafts of energy lancing down the corridor. Then they break into a charge. The shots sizzle the air overhead, just missing us. We spot the weapon dropped by the first Ghutarn when Fighty hit it, and Stealy reaches out for it as the armoured figures storm closer.

‘Suggestion:’ Buddy says. ‘Brace for imp-’

And then everything is lurches sideways.

The whole corridor seems to ring, and everything in it is flung violently against the wall to our right. Sneaky and Cheeky and Mighty are stretched painfully, but their suckers on the floor prevent us being likewise splattered into the wall. The ship groans and the corridor ahead of us seems to fold upward, blossoming with fire.

Squ'thetha Rf’thatha’s plan must have worked. We’ve struck the attacker’s ship. But the whole point of the plan was to allow us to escape in a pod – and we aren’t in a pod.

The air begins to shriek, and a dreadful wind arises.

If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

‘What’s happening? Why is the wind inside the ship?’ we shout.

‘Information: Hull section breach has occurred. Suggestion: Seek refuge…’

And then it’s too noisy to hear what Buddy is saying. The tangle of bodies start sliding down the corridor, and Chokey grabs onto a Ghutarn leg. We remember the blue-skinned creatures inside the chitinous black suits, and our other arms cling to the body too as it slides along. We pull ourselves up over the chest and start wrestling with the helmet. Pokey finds a button which allows us to move it, and Chokey pulls it off. The Ghutarn within seems quite dead and we pull ourselves onto its face, then start squishing ourselves down past its neck, into the chest of the suit, while Chokey and Feely pull the helmet back into place over us, shutting out the wind and the shrieking and grinding of the breaking corridor beyond.

'Local system identified,' Buddy says.

‘Local… What system?’

‘Information: Local system is a quad-limbed, bilaterally-symmetrical, armoured exo-suit capable of short-range inter-vessel travel. Minor damage registered.'

'Inter-vessel... Can it get us out of here?'

'Affirmative. Question: Do you wish to leave the Shaxixith'th?'

'Yes! Yes yes yes!'

There is a brief pause, then sudden acceleration as the armoured suit starts making a dull roar. 'Local system cracked and accessed,' the data buddy reports unnecessarily. There is another, much heavier, sense of acceleration and we find ourself slipping down to the abdomen of the suit, then down further into the legs. We cling on with Chokey and Mighty to stop ourselves falling any further.

'We can't see! Where are we? Tell us what's happening!'

'Information: We are still aboard the Shaxixith'th, accelerating at maximum-advisable tolerance for this exo-suit while under occupation by a biological organism. Additional information: Now decelerating for vector adjustment. Suggestion: Brace for impact. Information: Now accelerating at maximum-advisable tolerance...'

'Ow! Okay, we get the idea. What's the ship's countdown at?'

'Information: Unable to detect audio countdown due to loss of atmospheric pressure. Extrapolating from previously-registered figures, countdown is at, Speculation: Five. Four. Three...’

'We're going to die,’ is our own speculation, clinging to the dead body in the violent darkness.

'...Zero. Information: Countdown has terminated.'

'Are... are we dead?'

'Speculation: Negative.'

The acceleration slackens significantly, much to our relief. 'Negative! We made it out of the ship in time?'

'Information: Egress from the Shaxixith'th was made two seconds before countdown terminated.'

'Yes!’ We stretch our limbs in triumph, as best we can in the tight confines of the doubly-occupied suit. ‘We're going to live!'

'Speculation: Negative.'

'...What? You said we made it out before the countdown ended!'

'Affirmative. Supplementary information: Suit and occupant will burn up in planetary atmosphere within [1130] seconds.'

'But... but we made it out in time!'

'Information: Countdown only indicated viability of safe egress by escape pod. Maximum thrust produced by this exo-suit is significantly lower. Additional information: egress should have been effected prior to count of [071] to enter stable planetary orbit.'

'What? After all that? Isn't there anything we can do?'

'Speculation: Negative.'

'Then... why can we still feel acceleration?' we ask the data buddy.

'Information: Current acceleration is optimal to maximise survival time, given remaining fuel.'

'Stop. Just stop,' we tell it bitterly. 'We don't want to die wrapped around some dead thing's foot.'

The acceleration dies away to nothing, and we’re able to slither up inside the suit, between it and the deceased occupant, towards the helmet where we might be able to see out.

'Information: At current velocity suit and occupant will begin incineration in planetary atmosphere within [144] seconds,' the data buddy reports.

When we get into the helmet we manoeuvre round in front of the occupant's face. Before us is blackness, studded with tiny points of light, but one edge of the visor is lit with a blueish glow.

'Wow! Space!' we exclaim, marvelling at the stars. 'At least we get to see this before we die.'

We watch the pinpricks of light slide across our view. We don't think we've ever seen stars this bright or numerous before. We wonder if our eyes were different before the Mixcycli got to us.

'Will it be painful?' we ask Buddy.

'Uncertain of cephalopod pain responses,’ it replies. ‘Speculation: positive.'

'Huh. Can we turn? We want to see this planetary atmosphere that’s going to kill us.'

The suit hums to life again, gently this time, and the glow on the side of the visor brightens. Then a vast glowing curve appears, swinging into our field of view and shutting out the stars. It's so bright we can barely look at first, but we make ourself face it, taking it all in.

It's a blue so deep it beckons us, overlaid with fine white streaks and whorls, and soon it fills the sky until there is no space left to see, just this magnificent blue vista, and the debris trail of the falling Shaxixith’th.

'What is this?' we ask the data buddy in wonder, shifting uncomfortably as the temperature within the helmet rises.

It responds with eight words. All of these words refer to the same thing, and we realise just how many ways of saying the same thing we know. Eight gifts from the Mixcycli. Eight spoken languages.

'Earth,' the data buddy tells us.

The temperature spikes faster.

'This isn't so bad. We got to see this,' we tell ourselves. ‘We can die like this.’

Our limbs start recoiling from the inner surfaces of the helmet as they conduct the heat faster and faster.

'It was a pretty great adventure for an octopus. We're ready. We-'

But the data buddy interrupts us.

'Information:' it says, 'We have just been hailed.’

‘Hailed?’

‘Speculation: Occupants of hostile vessel believe the wearer of this suit to be alive, and are coming to rescue him. Retrieval manipulars have been extended. Suggestion: Brace for impact.'