Page 13 of Star Bright
“That too, but I mean we fly on our own wings.”
She whipped around to stare at him, her hair flinging on the cold breeze. “Wings? But you don’t… Uh, not that I was checking out your shoulders. Or maybe you tuck them away somewhere else.” An odd wash of red brightened her cheeks. “Never mind. I’m being rude.”
“Some beings who have different shapes or souls have different practices and taboos about how they present themselves. But draklings just…are.”
“Different shapes? Wait, are you saying you’re a shapeshifter?” She shook her head. “Aliens are one thing but… Okay, now I’m being silly. If aliens exist, then you being able to sprout wings shouldn’t be that hard to wrap my head around.”
Watching her process was fascinating—and it made him feel a little less alone in his own mental struggles. “Maybe at least as hard as how I wrapped myself around the occasional obstacles when I was old enough to fly.”
She laughed. “Flying under your own power. Wow. That’s a dream Earthers have always had.”
He looked up at the blue sky where some soft puffs of gray had started to gather. “Really? I wonder why.”
“We swim too, even though we can’t breathe water.” She followed his gaze to the sky. “Maybe we just always want what we don’t have.”
He considered. “If your species is inherently curious, that might explain why the Intergalactic Dating Agency set up this outpost on a closed world. Some of you are ready for the stars.”
“Maybe. Well, let’s see if your ship will ever go back there.” She parked in front of a spacious hangar. “Kong said the IDA tries to keep obviously alien equipment to a minimum. Less chance of awkward encounters if the various security measures aren’t enough. And since the outpost was closed and there’re no other ships here, repair can focus on you.”
By “you”, of course she meant his ship. But he knew he needed these next few days to get himself back in working order too.
Inside the hangar, the ship looked surprisingly small. An army of fist-sized reno-bots crawled slowly over the surface, popping in and out of the various rents and dents, and a long, flexible plasteel printer was even more slowly rebuilding the bulkhead. The equipment was clearly intended for minor repairs, not suitable for long-deferred maintenance, not to mention an actual crash landing.
He sighed. “I hope the ship rental insurance coverage didn’t lapse.”
Darcy glanced at him. “Can I say I’m a little disappointed to hear that the space age still needs insurance? Are there also interplanetary lawyers who can sue the rental company for giving you a ship with inadequate radiation shielding?” She shook her head. “These questions are like the least fun version of a choose-your-own-adventure fantasy game ever.”
“The universe beyond your planet isn’t so different,” he noted. “Whether the fantasies or the realities.”
“Yeah. I guess that’s why the universe still needs a dating agency.” She sighed too.
A thick cable of wires twisted from the ship’s crumpled nose, connected to a console. With Darcy at his side, he went over to check the diagnostics.
She peered over his shoulder. “I’ve played some flight simulators, which probably doesn’t count, but I’m guessing a checklist that long isn’t great.”
“It’s not.” But somehow even with all the damage before the crash, the ship had protected them through the years. He turned his attention to another interface connected to the ship’s data and logs. Parts of those were corrupted too, like his own memory. “I need to see if I can contact Skyearth, get in touch with my people.”
“I was reading all the IDA handbooks this morning and making Kong tell me everything. We don’t have official interplanetary embassies on this Earth, just an overseer office staffed by transgalactic authorities who enforce the closed world protections. But we can request that they relay your message. Although Kong says they can be slow to respond.” She wrinkled her nose. “Apparently bureaucracies are the same across the universe too.”
From the console, he paused the repair bots. “I need to retrieve some belongings. When my fledglings wake, I want them to at least have their things around them.” His breath caught painfully. “Since I don’t know what else we’ll have.”
“You have each other.”
That was true, so why did he suddenly feel as if the air had vanished from beneath his wings?
They went to the open hatchway, but Darcy paused at the base. “Do you want me to wait here or…?”
“Do you mind helping me carry a few things?”
“Happy to.”
Still, she hung back a bit as he went through the cramped quarters. Each step brought another hazy memory into clearer focus. From storage, he collected two small coffers inscribed with his fledglings’ names, which he remembered packing full of various necessities and treasures that couldn’t be left behind, even for a short trip. Which had turned out to be not so short. Atsu’s favorite moons-cake would be very stale by now.
When he filled a larger container of extra supplies for himself and the fledglings and nudged it out into the main aisle, Darcy hustled up. “I can take that one out to the hover cart.”
“Thank you.” He found the large, plain satchel in which he always carried his datpad, idents and vouchers, plus a carved sheenwood box where he kept his own private valuables, because draklings loved their treasures.
Without conscious thought, his fingertip found the latch on the lid, and the box unfurled. A tiny hologram flickered to life: projected photons in every hue along the spectrum shimmered into long, flowing hair and the twirling hem of a diaphanous gown, and before his eyes could absorb all the details burned into his memory, the figure blossomed into her beast, even more beautiful and endlessly beloved.
