“I ain’t doin’ it,” protests Guriko.

I rub my forehead. I could really go for some of that stimulant juice right about now. All the more reason to get this crab into the cockpit.

“Remember what we talked about,” I say, placing a hand to his expansive back and pushing forward just a bit. He doesn’t budge. “Just close your eyes and breathe deep and slow. You can do this.”

“No I damn well can’t.”

A quiet shnick issues from behind me and to the right. I glance back at Tiberia.

“My dart’s regenerated,” she observes. “So get into the cockpit and fly the ship, Mr. Guriko, or I’ll murder you.”

I hiss through my teeth at her. Guriko shifts from foot to foot, pressing back against my hand.

“You can’t shoot that through my armor.”

“I can shoot it through your face,” she corrects.

“Don’t threaten your crewmate,” I growl, turning fully to face her.

“We have to dock into the station, it’s where the path is leading us,” she says, bringing up her hand to clutch at her locks. “The voices are getting louder the longer we take.”

“Just get in the damn cockpit,” says Kirron, lifting his re-abled arm gun and pointing it at Guriko.“Now.”

“What did I just say about threatening crewmates?” I snap. The centaur ignores me.

Reiiko throws Kirron a narrow-eyed glare and huffs before turning her attention back to the crab-hulk. “Guri! I order you to—“

“I said I ain’t doin’ it.”

“Guriko, once you get down there, you have access to all the ship’s systems,” I remind him.

“I don’t—“

“And there’s a lot you can do with that. Like use the food synthesizer in the galley to create any dish you can imagine.”

There’s a brief silence as the crab-man goes statue-still.

“A—any dish?”

“As long as we keep the ship fed, yes. And you know where we can feed the ship?”

“The station,” grumbles Guriko.

“That’s right. So why don’t we just hop down into the water and get this over with? It’ll be easier every time you do it.”

But he just shakes his head over and over again, sputtering.

“Look, Guriko, I can only keep these assholes in check for so long,” I sigh, waving a hand at Kirron and Tiberia. “You know what I mean?” I push against his back again, but only end up straining my wrist a bit.

A cool hand comes down on my shoulder, and I turn to meet the steady gaze of Mr. Brisby.

“Leave me alone with him a moment,” he says. “Please.”

“Er, alright,” I hedge. “You heard him, boys and brats. Shove out.”

Tiberia turns on her heel and marches off. Right behind her, I herd a scowling Kirron and Reiiko out onto the central deck. The door seals shut behind us. About five minutes later, the dim biolume glow of the chamber walls suddenly erupts into an array of melting colors. The ship’s heart rate speeds up, and we lurch forward—the inertial dampeners just enough to keep us from hurtling into the walls. The door peels open once more, and the butler emerges.

“Thank you, Mr. Brisby,” chirps Tiberia.

“Uh, yeah. Thank you,” I add. “How did you do it?”

“I had a word with him,” answers Mr. Brisby uselessly. Shaking my head, I decide to let it go for now.

“Alright, let’s get on with it.” The others trail after me as I return to the bridge, stepping past the now-sealed cockpit and up to the captain’s chair

Here goes everything.

It looks more like a giant black flower of flesh than any kind of seat, its “petals” pulsating subtly. As I step within their reach they yearn towards me, enveloping my body as if hungry for it. For half a heartbeat I begin to panic as the muscular petals curl around me, close over my face. For half a heartbeat, the world goes dark. Then a cool tingling sensation flows across my skin. Suddenly I can see stars and the spiny helix of Serpentis Station, the whirling violets of Stone Sister. I can hear the songs of quasars. I can smell space. And, as if all that isn’t distracting enough, there’s the view of the station itself.

I’ve been told a thing or two about the place. Mostly that it’s what you’d get if a creepy space circus had sex with a creepy space mall and had a creepy space baby. But from the outside, from this vantage point, it’s beautiful. A marvel of mostly-human engineering. For a few moments, I forget what I was doing.

“G—Guriko?”

Though I’d meant to speak out loud, my lips don’t move. Instead, my voice seems to emanate from my mind, to echo inside it.

“Yes, Captain?” The voice is at once Guriko’s and not, lacking his mannerisms and overlaid with the ghost of another, whispering and strange.

“Can you open a channel with station traffic?”

“Yes, Captain. Channel open.”

I clear my throat. “Aherm, uh—Serpentis Station? This is the captain of the Arowana, requesting permission to dock.”

Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.

There’s a moment’s silence, and then a flat voice issues from everywhere and nowhere.

“Full service?”

“Yes?”

“That will be 167 credits per station-standard hour. In addition, you currently owe Serpentis Station 1,346 credits for unauthorized waste disposal within shielded space. Projectile weapons are not permitted on station grounds and possession of same will result in further fines. Do you accept terms and charges?”

“Unauthorized waste? I don’t know wha—oh.” The crew.

“Guriko,” I call out through the ship’s link between us. “How many credits do we have to our name?”

“The Arowana’s account is in possession of 36,668 credits,” says the voice that is at once Guri and the ship itself.

I sigh. Could be worse, could be better. I’d hoped for whatever fortune the Arch Duke promised the crew for the Lotus Sister job, but of course he wouldn’t have paid in credits. Too traceable. So what did he pay with, then, and did they ever get their hands on it?

“Yes,” I say, shelving the thought as I project my words back out to Serpentis. “We accept the charges.”

Another brief silence.

“Very well. Please proceed to docking valve WA-326.”

“Will do. Uh…thank you? Arowana out.”

“Guri, close the channel and take us in.”

“Yes, Captain.”

The ship closes in on the station, and it’s as if I’m the one drifting through the vacuum, though my skin is pleasantly warm and rich air flows into my lungs.

“And Guriko?”

“Yes, Captain?”

“If there’s enough slurry left in the tank, go ahead and whip something up in the galley before you disengage. Whatever you want. You’ve earned it.”

~*~

Somehow everything in the universe seems just a little bit brighter with a belly full of bao, lo mein, honey ginger duck and crab rangoons.

“What?” Says Guri through a mouthful of relative-stuffed wonton, glancing up from his plate to meet Kirron’s incredulous look. “They’re d’licious.”

“Crabs eat other crabs in the wild. It’s perfectly ordinary.” Tiberia chimes in between bites. “Mr. Guriko, if you don’t make more of these soon, I’ll—“

I glare at her, and she pauses, reconsidering.

“I’ll be very sad.”

“Good murder-bunny. Alright.” Clapping my hands together, I rise from my seat at the table. “Time to find our next friend. Or Artifact. Or whatever the yellow brick road has in store for us here.”

“Glowing path,” corrects Tiberia. I wave my hand at her to shut up.

Reiiko sniffs. “I still don’t see why I can’t stay aboard the ship. I’m tired. I’m drained. I—“

“Can’t be trusted,” I finish for her.“We already have Brisby and Guriko staying behind to watch over Arowana. Now get up off your shapely ass. We have a den of vipers to explore.”

She really must be tired, because the insults I’m expecting never come—instead she just gives me a look nasty enough to put out the sun. Then she finishes off her stimulant juice as daintily as she can manage and stands with the rest of us.

I adjust my hair and tail color to match the muted blacks and grays we’ve all changed into. Kirron, Tiberia, Brisby and I still have our tracker chip collars on, as we haven’t been able to figure out how to unlock the damn things. But they only feed back to the Arowana, so I figure it’s a problem for another day. Leaving the ship to feast on a steady supply of nutrient-slurry, Kirron, Tiberia, Reiiko and I step out into the glittering unknown.

From the outside, Serpentis is a helix. From the inside it’s like wandering the petrified innerds of two behemoth serpents, joined together by hundreds of bridges. A great spine runs down each of its spiraling bodies, with every adjoining set of ribs another level.

“Custom genital augments!” Shouts a holospeaker leaning against a darkly gaudy storefront. His bulging crotch flashes magenta and crimson.“Safe, sexy, sensual! Walk-ins welcome!”

“VRerotica! Highly realistic! Full sensory immersion! Experience the impossible today!” declares another, her four luminous breasts jiggling with every syllable. The solid occupants of the level are as gaudy as the holographic ones—though they seem to favor masks and veils—and I’m beginning to regret our wardrobe choices. I’d made the call hoping the drab fits would help us fade into the background…and managed to accomplish the exact opposite.

Of course.

“Alright, Tibs,” I call over to the bunny girl, practically shouting to be heard over all the hawkers. “Which way’s the path taking us?”

“Up,” she says, pointing with her nub-arm, which has fingers now. “Near the Eyes. I can’t tell which yet.”

“Oh, you mean the only parts of the station aside from command that aren’t open to the public?” snorts Kirron. “Wonderful. Why wouldn’t it be?”

Finding ourselves a hyperlift, we take it all the way to the top—watching through its translucent walls as level after level zips by like a rapid-fire peep show of fever dreams. By the time the lift comes to the stop, my head’s reeling with after-images of pink dragon elephants, writhing holograms and shoppers perusing from the backs of cybernetic diamond snakes.

Stumbling out onto the top level of our side of the helix, we find ourselves in another world entirely. A towering space like a tapered dome, its openness is broken by tiers, stairs, balconies and walkways that climb ever upward until they disappear into a glittering mist. Suspended in all that, two massive silver orbs loom over all. The Eyes.

“Well, Tiberia? How’s it looking? Are we in the right snake, or do we need to cross the bridge?”

Her eyes go all glassy and wide for a moment and then refocus.

“There,” she says, indicating the orb to our right. “The path leads there.”

Almost as one, Kirron and I sigh.

“Anyone have any idea which House that is?” I glance between the others only for my doubt to be confirmed in their expressions. Everyone knows that each Eye of Serpentis is held by a great family. But other than the Illisiri—the wealthiest clan of the wealthiest caste—few know which ones hold which. Given the station’s status as an independent entity unbound by Consensus Law, it’s generally assumed they’re home base for families of the crime variety.

It takes us a long time to figure out where the main entrance to the orb even is. We waste most of it wandering the maze of walkways trying to get to the few obvious doors we can pick out, only to find that none of the walks we can access actually lead there. In the end Kirron figures it out, but only after following Tiberia’s glassy-eyed stare as she clings to the railing, peering down at the orb’s main pillar of support.

“The pillar’s the main entrance,” he says, gesturing. As we watch, a masked figure slips past an invisible barrier several paces from its base and seemingly disappears. “They’ve got a holofield set up around it.”

“If that is the case, they’ll have it set so that only their own people may pass,” says Reiiko, eyeing me smugly. “Can your stealth skill get you through that?”

“Won’t know until I try,” I say, turning on a heel to head back the way we came.

“Really?” Kirron scathes. “That’s the plan? Just hope you can stealth your way through? What if it auto-kills anyone who passes unauthorized? What if it sets off an alarm? What if—“

I stop and wheel around to glare at him.

“You got a better idea, Prongs?”

He doesn’t, so we do my thing.

As we near the barrier, the others crowd in close—hiding me from view while I engage Stealth Mode. We couldn’t wait long enough for all of us to fully regenerate our Sai, so I only have about seventy to work with.

It’ll have to do.

Invisible now, I approach the barrier, coming to a halt just a few steps from where I think it begins. I take a deep breath, and then the next step. Nothing happens, so I keep walking. Then, halfway through the third step, everything goes wrong.

It starts with a pain I can only describe as someone punching my soul straight through the gut. All the air goes out of me. All the power goes out of me.

Red glyphs blare at the edges of my darkened vision. For the first time, the butler voice in my head has an edge of emotion to it.

That emotion?

Panic.

Alert: Massive Sai Drain

Sai Pool: 0/95

Stealth Mode Disengaged

Realizing my eyes are closed, I pry them open. A broad figure parts the well-dressed crowd forming around me. Then that same figure swallows up most of my view, their own gray eyes flashing from behind their jade owl mask.

“Alert the Cats,” they say to someone hovering just behind them, their voice a gritty baritone. Through the semi-translucent stone, I can just make out the edges of a grin forming across their face. “Tell them we have something they need.”