******
Reece strolled the length of the flight deck, observing the activities of the deck crew. About a dozen of them performed various tasks—from maintenance of craft to housekeeping the deck.
He also saw a couple of them operating tow beam lifts, using the emitters to move craft from the parking area to the hangar deck for storage. Another group moved fallen cargo containers with portable tow lifts. Apparently, the cargo had been stacked so high that it tipped over from the last battle—tumbling onto the floor.
As Reece watched, one of the containers came crashing down to the ground, breaking open and spilling its contents—some kind of black liquid. The senior officer began cursing profusely at the technician who fouled up.
Reece noticed that the deck crew uniforms all seemed to bear the same orange and brown color scheme—with nothing to differentiate their personnel duties. The only thing that visibly separated the uniforms was a rank insignia on the sleeves.
He reckoned with the limited number of crew, that each of them were probably tasked with multiple duty ratings—the price for being part of a pirate ship. At least the reward might make the extra work worth it—provided they survived to see the plunder.
Reece scanned the crew’s faces until he came upon one he recognized, the Chief Mechanic, Ralph. He was surrounded by a group of his men, while working on a shuttle.
“Hey, Chief!” he called to him. “Where can I find Eddie?”
Ralph either did not hear him or purposely ignored him. He continued working on the shuttle, burying his head deep inside a compartment.
Reece heard and felt the low vibration of a tow beam. He turned to look and could see a Z-40 being set down on the deck—it had to be Cronin.
He walked over, just as the cockpit door at the bottom opened and the pilot dropped down out of it.
“Wanker?” Reece called to him.
“Reece,” Cronin said as he took off his helmet and handed it to one of the deck crew.
He came up and they clapped hands.
“Nice to see you, Reece.”
“Same. Thanks for your help back there with the Flytrap.”
“Ehhh,” Cronin said. “Just take it off the tab I owe you. You’ve saved me plenty of times before. Have you seen Eddie yet?”
“No, mate, not yet. Have you?”
“I tried earlier—but I’m not going back down there alone.”
“Why?” Reece asked. “What happened?”
“That doctor,” Cronin said then whistled. “Whatever you do, don’t get sick on this boat. Wait till we’re at a port or planetside—the guy’s totally spacial.”
Reece suddenly got worried for Eddie. “We better go check on him.”
They walked to the elevator, but as they stepped inside it, they heard a familiar voice behind them.
“Hey there, deckers,” Mac said loudly. “Tell your chief that he’ll be happy to know that his steed is healthy—and well fed, too. I also left something for him on the cabin floor—tell him it’s a special gift that reminds me of ’im.”
They turned around to see Mac standing outside his shuttle.
He inspected a cigar that he held and then wiped something off of it before puffing on it. He looked up and spotted Reece and Cronin.
“Lads!” He hurried over. “Where’ve you been? Hold that elevator!”
Mac joined them inside. Cronin touched the panel and the doors closed.
“Nice to see you, mate!” Mac said to Reece. “I got worried that I’d have to command what was left of this bunch.”
“Not likely, Mac,” Reece said. “This bunch could never take orders from a drunken Irishman blowing smoke. Where’d you come back from?”
Mac puffed, filling the elevator compartment with cigar smoke.
“Special mission, laddy,” he began with a grin. “This drunk Irishman had to courier a Martian diplomat—not to mention I saved the ship earlier!”
“You didn’t save it alone,” Cronin corrected.
“Diplomat? What’s going on?” Reece asked.
They exited the elevator and walked the corridors toward the infirmary. Along the way, Mac explained everything he knew about the Martian diplomat and the amnesty they would be offering the crew.
“Can you believe it, Reece?” Cronin began. “That A.I. cargo—in exchange for amnesty and free living? Maybe Tash didn’t die for nothing.”
“Ahhh, it’s not all great,” Mac lamented. “We won’t really be free. Hell, I won’t even be able to smoke a cigar without getting fined.”
Reece felt uneasy. The pilots did not know about Chorus—all they knew was it was a machine relic that they happened to steal.
None of them knew about what Chorus had told him—that her capture by any of the governments could put humanity in peril… well, at least according to her.
Reece had to talk to Julius privately about all of this and find out what his plan was. In the meantime, he did not think the other pilots should know any more than they already did—not yet anyway.
“Yeah,” Reece said. “I guess we got real lucky on this one. Too bad Tash didn’t get to see this day.”
They soon reached the infirmary and walked into a room filled with occupied beds. The hospital appeared to be separated into two sections. The far side lacked any overhead lighting, with only a few standup lamps to provide some inadequate illumination. Reece could see signs of a crude, perhaps abrupt expansion into a another room—with a broken section of wall and some debris delineating the two sections.
Medical personnel traveled among the bunks, administering care to the patients. Reece led the trio through the row of beds, trying to find Eddie’s face among them. He caught sight of Laina standing next to an operating table on the dark side of the hospital. A group of medics were working on a patient—it was Daryl.
“More light! More light!” the doctor yelled.
A nurse with a handheld lamp moved it closer to the table.
As Reece approached, he could swear he saw something on the doctor’s shoulder. Although the dim light made it difficult to see, it appeared to be a colorful and feathered bird of some kind—a parrot?
Just as he got close enough to make out the details, he felt a sudden hand on his shoulder. He whirled around to find Eddie standing behind him.
He had some scratches on his face and a black patch on one eye, but he looked much better than Reece expected.
“How you feeling?” Cronin asked him first.
Eddie gave a shrug and pointed at his eye patch. “Still have one eye at least—could be worse.”
“Patch!” Mac blurted out. “That’s your new name.”
Eddie gave him a confused look. “What’re you talking about, Mac?”
“I’m not Mac. I’m Stogie.”
“You need to lay off the booze, Mac,” Cronin said.
“Aye, I guess now that Reece is back I’m going to have to. I’m trying to come up with call signs for you lads.”
He gave Reece and Cronin each a long look.
“Don’t have a name for you two yet.”
A familiar voice interrupted them, “Who put you in charge of naming us, wanker?”
Taffy walked up to them. He was wearing a fancy-looking flight jacket and a big smile on his face.
“Where’ve you been?” Cronin asked.
“Playing my lucky hand,” Taffy said. He tugged his jacket. “Won this on the last game. I heard that you gents might be down here.”
Reece wandered away from the pilots as they conversed, turning his attention back to the doctor and Laina.
As he approached the operating table, he managed a better look at what was on the doctor’s shoulder.
Orange beak, white checkered face, with bands of red, yellow, and green feathers going down its back and ending at its tail.
Apparently, his earlier observation was correct—it was a parrot, or at least parrot-like. The bird’s claws did not look sh
arp and seemed to have blunt, finger-like extrusions that it used to keep perched on the doctor’s shoulder.
There was also something unusual about its behavior. The doctor was directing the medics to work on the patient and then would stop and turn his head, putting his ear to its beak.
The parrot would then appear to whisper to him, and then he would continue working on the patient—as if the bird was telling him what to do.
“Are you seeing this too?” he heard Eddie whisper to him.
Reece looked over—Eddie had wandered away from the other pilots to join him.
“Let’s get closer,” Reece said, and they got right behind the doctor.
The parrot turned its head completely around, and to their surprise, it spoke to them.
“Hello, Reece. Hello, Eddie,” it said.
Reece recognized the voice: Chorus. Despite the obvious oddity of it, what came to the forefront of his mind was how strange it was that her voice did not squawk like a parrot.
“I am helping Doctor Lankey,” she continued. “To repair—to heal, Daryl. He is gravely injured.”
Lankey suddenly threw something metal against a wall and began to flail his arms. Chorus had to jump off him, somehow managing to gracefully land on the ground in front of the group.
“God damn it! You don’t want to live?” Lankey yelled, apparently addressing Daryl’s unconscious body. “Well, then, fuck you! I don’t have time for this …”
“Please excuse me,” Chorus said, then flew away, perching herself back onto the doctor’s shoulder. Reece could see her beak against Lankey’s ear, as if whispering to him. After a few moments, the doctor calmed down and went back to work on Daryl.
“What now, little parrot?” Lankey asked, jerking his head quickly toward the bird. His eyes were wide and appeared bloodshot as they stared intently at Chorus. To say the doctor was neurotic seemed an understatement.
“Just keep calm and continue doing what you’re doing, Doctor,” Chorus said to him. “You won’t be able to cure him completely, but you can keep him alive. Nothing else to be done.”
“What? Preserve him?” Lankey said. “Like taxidermy? You are a cruel one, little parrot.”
“Why are you a parrot?” Reece asked.
“What other spirit animal would you find on a pirate ship!” Lankey answered loudly.
The stoic expressions around the table told the story of a medical staff that was used to the doctor’s crazy outbursts.
“Continue your work, Doctor,” Chorus said. “I will return shortly.”
Chorus’ parrot form jumped off Lankey’s shoulder and perched itself on the handle of a nearby tray table. She then faced the two pilots, turning her orange beak to them.
“This parrot is the only way to get him to listen to my advice. The others, except for Laina, cannot see or hear me.”
“But why a parrot?” Reece whispered. “Why not as a woman?”
“I originally appeared to him in my human form,” she explained. “But he would ignore me and would not listen to my directions.
I then observed that he would talk to an imaginary guide—he called it his spirit animal and it was a parrot. So I took the form of a parrot and masqueraded as his imaginary guide so that he would listen.”
“Makes perfect sense.” Reece chuckled.
“It does not make perfect sense to me. He also refuses to leave this hospital because he believes his spirit guide won’t go with him. Why would he think that and see things that are not really there?”
“He’s just spacial, Chorus,” Reece said.
“I don’t understand—please explain. What does that mean?”
“It means he’s crazy,” Eddie offered. “Although, with everything I’ve seen these past couple of days, I might be going spacial too.”
“So he has damage to his brain,” Chorus said. “Perhaps with your help we can repair it?”
“I don’t think so, doll,” Eddie said. “I’m a pilot—I’ve never done brain surgery, even when I had two eyes.”
Reece said, “All humans are a little crazy, Chorus. Some more than others.”
“But that is not normal,” Chorus persisted. “I must do something to fix it—to help him.”
The two pilots exchanged looks. Reece did not like the way this conversation was going.
“People can’t be fixed like that, Chorus,” Reece said. “We’re not machines.”
There was a pause.
“I am sorry,” she said. “I know that you are not machines. And I understand now.”
At that moment, Laina walked toward the two pilots and parrot, a grave expression on her face.
“So how’s Daryl doing?” Reece asked her.
“I don’t know.” Laina shook her head, frowning. “But the doctor’s babbling seems to belie any optimism. Why don’t you ask the parrot?”
“Even if he lives, he will not regain consciousness,” Chorus said. “There is damage to his brain and these facilities do not have the necessary technology to repair it. All the doctor can do is slow the progression of damage.”
“I know I came a little late to the game,” Eddie said, “but who is this Daryl guy exactly?”
“He’s the captain’s brother,” Reece said.
“Julius’ brother?” Eddie asked. “And he’s not down here with him? I guess they must not be amiable.”
Reece and Laina exchanged looks.
“He doesn’t know it’s his brother,” Reece said.
He then explained to Eddie how they met Daryl, their crash landing on Fiji, and their subsequent escape.
“I’m still not getting it,” Eddie said. “Why hasn’t anyone told the captain?”
“He can’t know,” Laina said. “He can never know.”
“Why, Laina?” Reece asked.
Laina grabbed them both by the arm and they walked to a far corner of the room. Chorus followed, flying across the room and landing on the ground near their feet.
“It’s complicated,” Laina began. “But if Julius knows about him and his condition, it could undermine the mission. Chorus, explain it to them.”
“There is a way I can save him,” Chorus said. “But only by using the remainder of my nanobots—thereby sacrificing my ability to produce nanoforms and protect myself. The nanobots are my only defense against my brother—”
“Wait.” Reece cut her off. “I heard you mention that before. What is this brother talk?”
“His name is Daniel Chin,” she said. “Like me, he is Majesty’s offspring. We share many of the same abilities and knowledge. However, his goal is different than mine. He wishes to destroy mankind and replace your population with machinekind.
“I must avoid contact with him, or risk surrendering to him what he needs to accomplish this goal.”
“And what is it you have that he can use?” Reece asked.
“Data. Pieces of information that he can use to create a map that can lead him to a special place—a machine moon capable of creating an army of nanobots. He would have an unlimited supply of them.”
“So as you can see,” Laina jumped in. “Julius can’t know—ever. He’ll abort the whole mission if he finds out and we can’t allow that to happen.”
“Uhhh,” Eddie sounded. “What exactly is the mission?”
Laina looked around them, then gave Daryl’s table a quick look.
“Too many ears here,” she said. “Let’s go to my quarters and I’ll explain it all there.”