They'd stowed away aboard a galactic ship. They were very sick, feverish, shaking, and all alone. They had no family, and the few friends they'd had died of the coughing sickness that was common among those that lived in the slums that smelled of acrid soot. They spotted the owner of the ship, but dizzy from illness, had collapsed. They expected to be spaced, now, and was surprised to wake up alive. -- Anon Guest
Bubba had one goal. I am not going to die on this stink planet. As circumstance would have it, amidst sickness, fees, fines, and the general grindstone of Planet Fiskal... there were few chances to actually do that.
The number of chances was just one. A Galactic trading ship in a poorly-guarded port. An open door in the dead of night. Exhausted and sick, Bubba took that one chance. They couldn't even stifle the cough that meant that they were doomed to a slow, expensive, and painful death. They were sure to get caught. Yet they were not caught.
Nobody stopped Bubba as they crossed the expanse of the landing/takeoff zone. Nobody was alerted by their wracking bark of a cough. Nobody yelled for Bubba to stop. No alarms went off. Not as Bubba crept through the fences, nor as they lurked and tried to stifle their battle with a plegm uprising. Not even as Bubba raced as fast as they could into the alien ship to find a space to hide themselves. Somewhere far away from the trader's habitation. Somewhere, they hoped, that they would not be found. Without food. Without water. Without any kind of protection but the clothes they came with. No alarms sounded even as the Galactic who ran the ship set everything up for launch. Not even when the engines started and the pressures of launch almost made Bubba pass out.
Hunger and cold eventually drew Bubba out of their hiding place. Step by trembling step, weak and coughing, Bubba checked every corner, expecting excruciating death at every turn. Choking every cough into silence. Dreading every unstoppable noise that came from them and their movements. If the Galactic tortured and killed them, then at least they weren't dying on Fiskal. Goal accomplished. Everything after this was just butter. All the same, Bubba would have much preferred to last longer than this.
One last corner, and Bubba the stowaway met eye to eye with the Galactic pilot. A moment of vertiginous panic, and another bout of gasping coughs, and Bubba passed out. They expected to die. They expected to be tossed out of an airlock, to feel their blood boiling and their lungs burst from the inside before they died...
Instead they woke in a very clean room with a mask on their face. Surrounded by beeps and a hissing noise not associated with escaping air. There was a weird taste in Bubba's mouth, but not dryness. That was because the weird taste was from the mist in the mask. Bubba, still shocked that they were alive, looked around. This was... a very small hospital bay. There was a screen showing peaceful and beauteous scenery within easy view.
"Good morning," said a pleasant and musical voice, and some text faded in over the scenery. Bubba couldn't read it, but they guessed those were the same words in GalStand. "You are safe. You are currently experiencing medical intervention. Please do not attempt to run from this place. You will not be attacked."
This sounded like an unnervingly specific denial. Bubba had a lifetime of not trusting public announcements on Fiskal. Any assurance was only there to make sure the next pack of victims behaved until the Brute Forces came to administer pain and black-bag anyone who was left. Except... if the crew of this ship wanted to do that, an airlock was much easier than canned assurance.
That resulting hesitation was enough time for the Galactic to arrive. The alien was a lizard of mottled hues and colourful spines, and therefore Bubba had no idea how to read them. Bubba flinched on instinct.
"All being well," cooed the lizard. "Is good. You safe, you much safe. Self helping you." Carefully, and using GalSimple, the lizard explained what they were doing. Changing the nutrient bags for the intravenous drip plugged into Bubba's arm, looking at the mediscanner results, and asking permission to touch. This with the last nugget of information, "Scanning saying we not toxic for each other."
By then, Bubba was moderately certain that this lizard person from outer space was not going to kill them. "Okay..." they managed. And, because curiosity was gnawing at them, they added, "Can I touch you too?"
Mutual permission achieved, Bubba cautiously ran gentle fingers over the pebbled scales, and felt a gentle hand against their own skin. This... this was the first gentle touch Bubba had known since they were very small indeed. Everything else after a certain age was with an aim to control.
"You seeing?" said the lizard. "Self no meaning harm. You being free from Deregger space. All being good now."
"Free," Bubba murmured. They were not going to die on Fiskal. They were going to live, and live well.
[Image (c) Can Stock Photo / Celine_Bisson]
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