The Topsy's Curse—the sound of the planet's potential new name left a bitter taste on my tongue. But I knew better than to tell Aalyxh off. She was a born prankster, and the finer points of yuuol humour were harder to grasp than human dad jokes. I stood up. "Right. Who wants to join the exploration team?"

I anticipated the answer before asking, engulfed in a minty cloud of Hijac's enthusiasm. Aalyxh and Ben exchanged glances. "Want to go, Lyxh?"

"We both know you're better at watching out for Kali. I'll stick with Hrrovr and keep an eye on your charging panels."

"Fine, let's suit up, Ben." I knew my human engineer well enough to dismiss the face he pulled. It was only for show—most of the time, he enjoyed planetary missions as much as I and the karjkan did. "Jac, would you prepare the box with the tyrinans?"

I was about to leave, but Aalyxh caught hold of my sleeve. "You can't abandon the hatchlings on this planet, Kali. What if they die?"

"Haven't you heard what Ajs said? They will adapt to the local environment. And we can't let them loose on the ship."

Aalyxh was about to object, but Ajs interrupted her. "Cap Kali is right, it's better to bring them to the planet. There are too many for the ship. We must hurry." The urgency in her words got to the pilot. She shrugged and waved me on.

"I'd invite you to join, Ajs." Our youngest crew member was about to gain my respect, and she seemed to know how to handle our uninvited guests. "But I doubt we have an adequate suit for you."

"If the readings of the atmosphere are correct, I won't need one, Cap Kali."

"Are you sure? I don't want to lose you." To my astonishment, this was the truth. The tyrinan blushed a deep indigo. Equally embarrassed, I hurried to suit up.

Ben and I helped each other prepare while Hijac brought in a box on a carrier. They'd wrapped it in a cooling blanket from the medkit. "I repacked them, I thought it better to not risk waking the third batch too. Let's see how these fare on the planet first."

Although I didn't want to kill the tyrinans, I'd hoped to solve this problem once and for all. But the karjkan was right. "Fine. If we find a way back into charted space, we can still try to deliver the third batch."

The last remark earned me two opposite glances: a desperate one from Ben and an admiring one from Ajs. At least that's how I interpreted his frown, accompanied by a deep sigh, and her lifting of the head and twirling of eyestalks.

Hijac with his indestructible nature offered to pass the lock first to confirm the atmosphere was safe for Ajs. He gave us an all-clear immediately after. "All fine, Captain, the air would be breathable even for you and Ben. Though I suggest you stick with the suits, the plants might shed pollen or spores that don't agree with your lungs."

"What about Ajs?" The young tyrinan had agreed to wear a breathing mask. It was too big and looked funny on her, but she seemed proud to be included.

"She is far more adaptive. From what I learned on Tyrin, the planet will appear like home to her, just with better weather."

I pushed my worries aside and gave the go to leave the safety of the ship and explore this world. Ben carried the crate with the tyrinans while Ajs kept at my side, her eyestalks constantly moving to take in every detail. I headed for the big spire. It seemed the most promising place to find a hint on what happened to the inhabitants of this world.

The building was in good shape, constructed of stone, durable metal, and glass. On the way towards it, we crossed an area covered by vegetation. Hijac had been right: It comprised basic plants resembling mosses or lichens. Ajs pointed out a cluster of meaty purple leaves. The karjkan ran a scan and bagged a few samples, but agreed to move on.

When we reached the main entrance, a slide door whisked open with a rusty moan. Ben examined the installation. "Still supplied with power. The windows might double as solar panels."

"And they left the door open for us." I turned to check the surroundings. "Doesn't look like they fled in a panic. No abandoned individual transport, no litter, no hints at warfare."

Somehow, this observation made me feel better. I followed Hijac into the building, Ben and Ajs on my heels. The triangular geometry of the architecture was unfamiliar, but the organisation of the interior was self-explanatory to a degree. We took the main access way up to the first level and into a triangular room taking up most of the floor, resembling a huge theatre. Rows of curved seats red around a raised podium. The cheerful pastel-coloured tiling supported by a clever lighting system, admitting sunlight through mirrored shafts, gave it an open, airy ambience.

"Wow." Ben set the carrier down with a clunk. "Whoever designed this was due to win a Nobel prize for architecture."

It eluded me what he referred to, but I agreed. The place was impressive and some, although I had no inkling about its original function. Hijac studied the technical installations on the central podium. "This might be a command centre or a council hall. There are screens—"

The karjkan touched a monitor and shrunk back, emitting an odorous cloud of hot metallic surprise. "They are still alive. This is amazing!"

I stepped up to the screens and stared at the bright alien script supplementing high-contrast pictures. They showed a hilly landscape from different angles and a series of empty rooms. "Nothing I can make sense of." A candy-scented whiff told me the karjkan was as frustrated as I. "Let's move on."

"Cap Kali?" Ajs had climbed atop the transport box, leaving a trail of blueish goo across its side. "The hatching begins."

I looked around. At least this room was big and offered enough space for the tyrinans. "Ben, stay here and assist Ajs with the—um, the hatching. Hijac and I will hunt for a sign who lived here and where they went. Perhaps it points us towards home."

I still couldn't grasp why we weren't able to locate a familiar star or constellation. In my opinion , it was hardly possible the storm had carried us to another galaxy.

I ignored the human's unhappy face and followed Hijac out of the hall. We climbed a level further and found rooms that might have been workplaces. A few stations we tested responded, but they didn't tell us anything. The next floor was similar, just smaller. It was the following level that caught our attention. It contained a library.

The dense cloud of odours emitted by Hijac made me dizzy. "Hold on, my friend, I see that you're enthusiastic. But let's check for a method to locate known space first, please."

With an affirmative musky puff, the karjkan concentrated on a reading screen. I was drawn to the shelves lining the room, loaded with an impressive collection of triangular books of different sizes and colours. I thumbed through several at random, mesmerised by the flowery font I couldn't read.

Aware this wouldn't solve our problems, I searched for something more informative when a smell like a dish of decaying seafood in a speciality restaurant on Ughduhg assaulted my nose. I tried to suppress my gagging, aware the rotten odour meant the karjkan had figured out a puzzle. "What is it, Jac?"

"They left. They were on the brink of extinction because of an alteration in the atmosphere when the partner planet moved a fraction closer." A few steps brought me to the karjkan's side. They called up a film sequence to illustrate their theory. I didn't understand the subtitles, but the images were clear, including the drawings of chemical components. Was this file a tutorial?

Hijac repeated a key sequence. We followed an animation of tall, bipedal figures with giant heads and huge dark eyes. They observed the neighbouring planet as it altered its orbit. Then the scenery switched. I didn't understand at first, but the karjkan grasped the gist. "Their bodies didn't adapt. They became infertile. So, they developed a way to leave. They even had a clear destination in mind. And that's the bummer: They invented a method to cross half the galaxy."

"In one jump?" This technological trick would be worth a fortune. But before Hijac could elaborate, a heavy bang shook the building. We exchanged worried glances and scurried for the hall where we'd left Ben and Ajs. My intestines twisted into a knot of fearful anticipation.

The hall hadn't changed, with one exception. Hundreds of tiny, luminous tyrinans in all the colours of the rainbow and some that defied my imagination had made the place their home. It now reminded me of the Tanencha's breeding chamber, lacking the brooding mood. "Ben, are you all right? What happened?"

The human was flustered. "I might have touched the wrong button, Cap."

Before I could ask for details, an incoming call interrupted me.
"Kali, what happened? We registered a major explosion in the town's vicinity."

"We felt it, Lyxh. But we're fine." I frowned at Ben. "Although Ben might have triggered this by accident if I'm not mistaken."

"Triggered? How does'ss one trigger an ex'ssploss'sion of this'ss magnitude by accident? That needs'ss the ss'stubby fingers'ss of a human." Hrrovr's hiss was stronger than ever, a clear sign of stress.

Ben's face took on a ruddy colour. "If we're assigning blame, then this is your fault for leaving me alone with explosives in the first place, snakehead."

"Cut it." I had to stop the name-calling before it got worse. "Tell me what happened, Ben."

"Well." He shrugged. "How should I know? The tyrinans swarmed out of their box and covered the whole place with their slime. I just tried to stay out of their way, but I slipped and pulled that baby-blue lever."

For a moment, I wished I could get rid of my helmet and scratch my itching skull plates. "So you pulled that lever—and then?"

"It blew up one of those mountain thingies, Ajs says. She observed it on there." He pointed to a screen showing several regular cones in a barren landscape. I couldn't trace signs of an explosion.

"They look intact, where did it happen?"

Ajs pointed a tentacle to the second cone from the left. "This one puked fire."

"When Ajs called me, I checked." Ben rubbed his neck, an awkward gesture in the suit. "Looked more like the take-off of an ancient solid-fuel rocket than a proper explosion."

"Ben is right." Aalyxh's voice cut in. "I just checked our record. A device took off, crossed the stratosphere into high orbit, and blossomed into a gravitational anomaly."

"What kind of anomaly, Lyxh?"

"No idea, Kali. It looks like a micro wormhole or—"

A loud hiss from Hrrovr interrupted the pilot. "Captain, I have a ss'severill ss'signature incoming. They muss'st have ss'seen the ex'ssplosion."

(1883 words)