Ascending - James Alan Gardner [54]
Lights on the navy ship’s ceiling suddenly grew brighter, and the membrane walls around us made ominous crinkling sounds. “Our hosts are pressurizing the transport bay,” Uclod said. “Any second now, the place’ll be swarming with Security mooks.”
Apparently, a mook was a humorless person wearing olive body armor and brandishing a truncheon or stun-pistol with great officiousness. A troop of such persons clattered into the chamber with bustling self-importance, racing to take up positions around our little chunk of Starbiter and training their weapons upon us in a most aggressive manner.
Their leader (of a gender I could not identify, thanks to the armor and a voice more howl than human) shouted something that did not sound like words. One of the others jumped forward, pistol at the ready; the mook fired directly at our outer wall, and a splooge of noxious green splatted from the gun barrel. The substance must have been some Chemical—the instant it struck our chamber’s membrane, the tissue began hissing and spitting, bubbling up clouds of vile smoke. In less than ten seconds, a ragged hole had burned itself open, letting air from the human ship gust into our little chamber. The air smelled most foul indeed, tainted with a piercing coppery odor that must have been vaporized Zarett flesh.
“Harout!” cried the mookish leader. “How, how, how!”
“What language is that person speaking?” I whispered to Uclod.
“Soldierese,” he replied. “Start with English, then skip any consonants that sound too effeminate.”
“Hout!” shouted the mook. “How!”
“Yeah, yeah,” Uclod said. “We’re coming.”
He took a step toward the gash in the wall. I put my hand on his shoulder to stop him. “Wait—we must do this correctly.”
I glanced around the room and saw what I wanted, lying against one wall: the black Explorer jacket I had brought from Melaquin. Snatching it up, I pushed my arms into it, discovering the fit was very fine indeed. The coat was not so heavy, and not at all tight; it also hung down to the middle of my thighs, quite long enough to cover my digestive bits if and when I finally forced myself to eat opaque foods. I took another moment to straighten the garment and fasten the strip down the front, just as I had seen Explorers do. Then I stepped out through the hole and historically made First Contact.
“Greetings,” I said in a loud clear voice. “I am a sentient citizen of the League of Peoples. I beg your Hospitality.”
For a long moment, nobody spoke. I could see the mooks’ faces through their clear visors; several appeared disconcerted to be confronted by someone dressed as one of their own Explorers. “I come in peace,” I said. “My name is Oar. An oar is an implement used to propel boats.”
Someone gasped at the far end of the room. I turned and saw an unarmored person standing in the doorway.
“Oar? Oar?”
Festina Ramos hurled herself across the floor and wrapped her arms around me.
A Fervent Reunion
I myself am not given to spontaneous displays of emotion (at least not the happy hugging emotions), but I embraced her gladly with all my strength. When you think you have been captured by dire navy villains, then are unexpectedly reunited with your very best friend…well, of course, you are filled with boundless joy. You want to enfold her and squeeze her and say foolish things, thinking all the while what a mistake it was to don a jacket that is now just a stuffy barrier between the two of you.
But it is odd how quickly boundless joy acquires bounds again: suddenly you remember you are being watched by little orange criminals and large-muscled women, by hard-eyed mooks