Naina sighed deeply as she was washing the rest of the washing liquids out of her hair in the showers. She glanced towards the bubble bath once more with longing in her eyes. She closed her eyes and shook her head.
"Nah, I need to get a move on. I need to get the stupid converter and get out of here before my luck runs out," she mumbled and grabbed a towel. As she was using it to dry herself, the door suddenly creaked slightly open. A person quickly ran inside and closed the door behind them, without even noticing that Naina was there.
A sudden yelp left Naina's lips, and she jumped backwards, back to the showers and almost fell on the floor, the towel flying straight into the bathtub in the process.
The person turned around, and instantly Naina noticed her pupilless purple eyes. Another elf. Based on her eyes, this time from a neighboring planet in the next sector, Nellaya. She was young, probably much younger than Naina. She had a terrified expression, and she looked like she would fall apart the second someone talked to her.
The new person almost screamed, but caught herself in time and pressed both of her hands on her mouth and just made a muffled sound. She shook her head furiously and looked like she would have a panic attack right there and then.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry..." she said and kept repeating it over and over again. She fell to her knees on the floor and started sobbing.
Naina wasn't afraid anymore, and walked slowly towards her, speaking in a soft, hushed tone, "Shh. I'm not angry, you just surprised me. Are you in trouble? What are you doing here? Why are you so afraid?"
The newcomer looked straight into Naina's eyes and tears formed in her eyes. "They're going to kill me!" she blurted out. "They're going to send me back to the Blackjoints. They're going to send me back to... back to..." she said, but apparently couldn't finish her sentence.
"Blackjoints?" Naina said quietly. "This is a Valkyrie station. The last thing you should be afraid of here, are Blackjoints. And aren't you a Nellayan? Why are the Blackjoints after a Nellayan?"
Somehow it seemed like the newcomer saw Naina properly for the first time, and her eyes flew wide open. "You're an elf too!" she said, surprised. "Quenstarian! How...?" was all she managed.
"I just came here to fix my ship," Naina answered gently. "Now, can you explain to me why you ran here and why the Blackjoints are after you? And who are you hiding from here? Surely not Blackjoints in a Valkyrie station?"
"They're posing as a father and son, and they say I'm the boy's mother. They're actually mercenaries and the boy is actually a Zheng," she said and took a deep breath.
"Daew! A Zheng!" Naina swore. "I saw those people earlier! They did say they were looking for the boy's mother," she said and scratched her left ear tip. "Quera. Start the Peepers. Run a silent scan on the lowest frequency and modulate the polarity to look like a normal hyperdrive," Naina said.
"Yes, Captain Melcey," Quera answered immediately. "Running scan."
"Send me the data and immediately notify me if there's a beta-type life-form on this station," Naina said.
"Of course, Captain Melcey," Quera said.
"Now, you," Naina said and turned to the newcomer, offered her hand and helped her up.
She got to her feet. She was slightly taller than Naina. She had a shoulder-length dark indigo hair, her features were delicate, and her eyes slightly leaner and longer than Naina's. She looked at Naina properly for the first time, and instantly blushed wildly and turned her eyes down.
Naina raised her eyebrow, looked down and realized. "Oh, I'm naked," she just said. "Eh, sorry about that. I was just coming from the showers, and you surprised me," she added and grabbed her underwear and started pulling it on her.
After Naina had almost gotten into her overalls, her wrist beeped.
"Captain Melcey," Quera announced, "there's a positive hit on a beta-type entity on the station. I cannot locate it with the... the Peepers, as you call them."
"That's alright, Quera," Naina said. "That's enough. That tells me enough what I need to know." She pinched the bridge of her nose and took a deep breath. "Okay. You. How did you arrive? Do you have a way out of the station?" she asked the other elf.
"I... I have my ship..." she said in a shaky voice. "But it's been disabled, the hyperdrive is locked, and I don't have any charts around these parts of space. Even if I could get to my ship, could somehow get it to running, I wouldn't know where to go."
Naina considered this for a short while, then she grabbed the other elf by her hands and looked into her eyes. "I know. I can get you out of here, if you think you can reach your ship. I have the charts for light-years around, even all the way back to sector twelve, if you're going home," she said.
"I can get your ship working and unlocked. My whip computer is... very capable," she said. "If you give me your ship codes, I can get it running. I can get it unlocked and enable the hyperdrive. But I cannot get you to your ship..." she said and stopped.
"Or... can I?" she said and scratched the tip of her ear. "Quera. Can you upload the beta-type entity's signature to my backup scanner?" Naina asked. "And can you re-program the scanner with no need to bring it to the ship?"
"Uploading in progress, Captain Melcey," Quera answered. "As for field programming... I'm not sure. We have never tried this, Captain Melcey. You need to put the scanner to download mode, while it's still connected. That's a risky procedure while you're there, Captain Melcey."
Naina nodded. "I know," she said. "Listen. I need to sit down for a while, and I might need your help," she continued. "I have a backup scanner, but it's... in a hard-to-reach place. It activates automatically if the primary shuts down, but when it's running, the backup is on standby. I need you to turn it on without taking it out."
"I will try," the elf said. "uh... where is it?" she asked.
"Well, there's the problem," Naina said and opened her overalls. She saw the elf blushing wildly. "Ah, no, nowhere there. It's under my left should blade, on my back," she said, and the other elf visibly relaxed.
Naina dropped the upper part of her overall down to her waist, sat down, gathered her hair, and pulled it away from her shoulder. A shiny white plate was just slightly towards the middle of her back, just below her left shoulder blade. Naina grabbed a weird tool from her pocket and offered it towards the other elf.
"You need to tap the connectors in a sequence that I'm going to tell you as you move. When I say open, you press the middle of the plate down, and then push it slightly upwards. It will make a slight click and there should be a blue light somewhere when it does that. Let me know when you're ready," Naina said and bowed her head downward.
The other elf grabbed the tool, turned it in her hands, took a deep breath, stepped closer to Naina, and said, "Ok, let's do this."
ns 15.158.61.21da2
