The wistful image of my cosy sleeping tank evaporated in the harsh glare of Aalyxh's discovery. "Intruders? Can you locate them?"

"It's vague, just a sensation, similar to a sentient being asleep and dreaming. Definitely not the brainwave pattern of one of the crew, though." She swayed back and forth in her seat with closed eyes.

I'd always had a hard time to imagine how Aalyxh's telepathy worked. My friend's ability had freaked me out as a kid, and it took ages to get used to it. Even after sailing the backwaters of the galaxy together, I shied away from allowing her access to my own brainstems.  "Any idea where they are sleeping?"

"No, the snippet was too faint and disappeared before I could tag it. Is it possible someone sneaked aboard on Tyrin?"

Someone, not something. Aalyxh was very clear with her beliefs and semantics. If something was able to think, they had a right to be called someone.

"You heard Hijac, they cleaned up after Ben and me. Do you want me to call them?"

I hated to keep my crew from their well-earned rest, but Hrrovr thumbed the comm. "All hands'ss to the bridge."

It didn't take long for Hijac and Ben to return. The latter wore the sleeves of his coverall knotted around his waist and showed off a breast covered by a thin growth of curly hair, too sparse to qualify as a pelt. "Cap, what's the emergency?"  He scratched a tangle of his chest curls.

"Aalyxh receives foreign brainwaves. Guess we must search the ship for an intruder."

A hint of sour doubt engulfed me. "I sterilised the cargo bay and the entrance hatch after loading the freight. And I incinerated your suits and face masks."

I didn't doubt Hijac's thoroughness, but neither had I reason to mistrust Aalyxh's gift. "I know. Is it possible someone entered undetected during or after the loading?"

"Hardly. But we better check now, before we run into trouble." With this, the karjkan snatched a scanner and left the bridge, headed for the cargo hold.

Ben wrestled his arms into the sleeves of his garment while staggering back and forth to compensate for the Topsy's wild movements. As soon as he succeeded, he braced himself against the nav console, ran a hand through his head pelt, and addressed the pilot. "Any suggestions concerning the intruder's species? Can you give us an estimation of their size at least?"

The jingling of Hrrovr's scales supported Ben's question. But Aalyxh only opened one eye halfway to stare at her male colleagues. "Don't you figure I'd have told you if I had more information? Besides, brainwaves don't correlate with body size. Otherwise, the two of you would have to be considered intelligent."

"Hum." Ben ignored the jibe. "Nothing like a wild comet chase for breakfast. Let me repeat: We're searching for active, intelligent brain cells, probably in a body, while our ship plays rollercoaster in a storm of magnitude eight. Easy peasy."

"Yes. Though I'm not sure about the body or about intelligence. I'd call it more a sentient awareness." Aalyxh massaged her temples. "I'll inform you if I establish a stable mind contact."

Hrrovr and Ben exchanged desperate glances before they left the bridge, fighting against the Topsy's unpredictable motions. As bad as I felt for them, I was glad I could stay in my chair, bolted securely to the deck.

We gave up two hundred clicks later. The search had been in vain, Aalyxh had lost the contact with the ghostly intruder, and Ben the contents of his stomach. Hijac smelled like a candy store, an unmistakable statement he had enough of being expected to clean up after his crewmates just because he was octopedal and surefooted.

Hrrovr scratched his cyan belly scales and hissed an rrss'h'ss obscenity involving halluc'ssinations'ss. Number one's anger made me feel obliged to support our resident telepath. "Hey, everyone can have a bad day. I wouldn't call it hallucinating. It might have been an echo, a reflection of the ion hail on the hull."

Aalyxh sent me a four-eyed glare that almost made me drop the attempt to cover for her. Then I realised she wasn't angry, but doubtful. That seemed almost worse. I drew a breath through cramped gills. "Time to get some rest. I'll hold the fortification with Jac. The others, go listen to the song of vacuum."

No-one complained, and even Aalyxh swallowed her usual stubbornness. I wondered if she still was convinced she had received brainwaves. The sliver of doubt I had recognised in our usually self-confident pilot's eyes made my intestines heave.

Ben, clinging to his seat with a white-knuckled grip, had seen it too. "Go sleep, Lyxh. I'm sure it was an interference—or the curse of that crazy woman on Tyrin. You'll feel better tomorrow."

Was he still mulling over the stupid curse? I was about to scold him, but Aalyxh interrupted me. "I'm fine, Squishy. But yes, I'll wrap myself into my comforter for a few clicks. So should you, to judge by that interesting grey shade of your skin. Night, everyone."

Hrrovr's neck-scales jingled before he left, and I nodded. "I'm fine, and I'll call you if an intruder pops up on the bridge. Don't worry, mate."

Alone with Hijac, I sighed. "So, Ben believes in a curse, Aalyxh sees ghosts, and Hrrovr worries I'm so exhausted I will go into forced hibernation. Translate your thoughts for me. I'm too tired to solve the puzzle of your scents."

"Aalyxh never was wrong before. I'm concerned." The virtual voice remained even, but a bitter taste signalled the karjkan was more worried than he let on. "At least the storm lessened. A few hundred clicks and we can inspect the hull for the source of the brainwaves."

"What?" A sweet wave of caramel exasperation hit my nose. Hijac hated to repeat a statement. His compound eyes glowed like coals, and I hastened to explain. "I got it, you suggest a living thing might cling to our hull. I'm just surprised. Aren't those stories about vacuum leeches tales for hatchlings?"

"Same as the stories about space squids?" The eye-glow lessened as Hijac relaxed and plunged into one of their favourite subjects. "Since we found that egg of a shi'a, you should know better than calling rare life forms myths."

They had a point. Said space squid had befriended us, or rather Aalyxh, while we guided it to a safe environment where it couldn't interfere with space traffic. I still hated to think about the havoc the so-called mythological being could wreck if provoked and irritated. "So we wait until we're out of the storm and check the hull for mystical leeches. Is that all? What about the curse?"

"Wouldn't know about curses. That's a human thing, perhaps related to yuuol telepathy." A sour whiff told me the karjkan doubted it themselves.

Human lore was full of strange magic. It made for good entertainment when Ben told his weird stories. But until now, I'd never thought they might wrap around a core of truth. "I always took his fairytales as made up. But he seems to believe that curse-thing. I wonder if it's just superstition."

Hijac didn't answer, and the rest of the shift passed in silence. I took the opportunity to adjust my body to the ship's wild movements.

We reached the edge of the storm two long shifts later. Hrrovr's call reached me while I was fast asleep. "Captain?"

I turned over in my tank, trying to find my bearings. Only a fraction of a click ago, I'd enjoyed a sunset on Oola, the waves whispering around me while I watched the stars blinking into existence, wishing for a ship to carry me up there. Then the dream dissolved, and it hit me I was on a ship, amongst the stars, my childhood wishes fulfilled. And also some of my worst fears.

"Captain? We're out of the ss'storm. And we ss'seem to have a problem."

Hrrovr wasn't the type to overdramatise. Him mentioning a problem woke me faster than the poisonous sting of a tichitinker. "On my way."

My skin still glistened wet when I reached the bridge. The earlier heavy motions had lessened to a soft sway. No wonder I'd slept like a baby in its sling. Hrrovr and Aalyxh bowed over nav, discussing. "What's the problem?"

"We left the ss'storm, but we can't locate Ticotan anymore." Hrrovr's scales jittered out of sync. For a moment, I stared at the colourful, iridescent waves running along his muscular limbs in fascinated wonder. Then I realised he was disturbed beyond caring for his imperturbable and stoic appearance. A bad sign.

"It seems hard to misplace a black hole of this size. Do we have sensor troubles?"

"Negative, Captain." Aalyxh had all her eyes open and sent me intent stares. "Hijac is out on the hull, checking for leeches. They say the sensors are functional. I sent Ben to engine and cargo to survey the data hubs."

Obviously, the captain was late to the party. I pressed the comm button. "Jac? Any news?"

"All good, Captain. No energy suckers or other parasites, no major damage. I'm cleaning the dust from our charging panels. According to Ben, they deliver only thirty percent of the intended capacity. Should have done it a while ago."

"Fine, thanks Jac. Take care to come back aboard before you need air." One more time I felt lucky to have a karjkan in the crew. The insectoids evolved on a planet with an unreliable atmosphere and could survive for up to twenty or thirty clicks without breathing in hard vacuum. While genderless, they were also sociable and helpful. I turned back to Aalyxh. "When can we start the engines?"

"Ben insists regeneration will take at least four more shifts. Unless we find an energy source." She rolled her eyes in apology.

"Where are we? Any asteroids we can mine? A nebula?"

An impatient hiss from Hrrovr caught my attention. "That's'ss what I tried to tell you. We don't know where we are. Our charts'ss don't match anything in this'ss ss'sector."

I sucked dry air through my gills. To be lost in space was the nightmare of every space captain. "So... You tell me we're drifting in the middle of nowhere?"

Both Aalyxh and Hrrovr avoided my eyes. The crackle of comm interrupted the awkward silence. Ben's voice had lost its soft, calming quality. "Lyxh? Need you in cargo. I think I know where your brainwaves originate."

We found the human in the hold, leaning against the bulkhead, pale as a frozen comet. His eyes were fixed on the box we brought from Tyrin, the precious cargo of the Tanencha. I'd all but forgotten about it in the rush of the flight from the severills, the black hole, and the more immediate crisis of being lost in space.

The box stood on a cargo sledge, tied down with heavy grapplers. It was sleek, grey, undamaged, and made a soft humming noise. Also, it quivered as if it was about to explode.

(1861 words)