Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“Jester!” Fjord yells, leaning into the corridor to the engine room. “What is that noise?”
There’s a clattering, and then Jester’s oil smeared face appears. “Coupler’s come loose.”
“Do we gotta stop?”
Jester’s voice echoes as she disappears again. “How far out are we?”
With mild concern, Fjord hurries over to the comm. “Beau, how far out?”
“About two hours.”
Waving a screwdriver, Jester shrugs. “Oh, that’s no worries.”
“You sure? Pumat’s expecting us, we can’t afford to stall.” Leaning against the wall, Fjord valiantly ignores the flower that Jester had not so subtly painted to look like a penis right at his eye level. It seems like the kind of thing she’d do on purpose, but you never can tell with Jester.
“Technically it’s not even that important.”
Fjord pinches the bridge of his nose, but nods. “Do your thing Jester. Just get us there.”
“We’re gonna need a new compression coil though.”
“What?”
“It got jammed and blew out the coupler.”
“Jester, we can’t afford a new compression coil right now.”
“Well sure but if the compression coil busts we’re dead in the water.”
“Just-“ Fjord makes a vague motion with his hands, “Do what you can.”
“Okay, but if we get stranded you’re not allowed to blame me.”

“I’m sorry Fjord, I just can’t take it.”
“That’s bullshit.” Beau retorts flatly, arms folded.
Fjord winces at Beau’s bluntness, but it’s not as though he hadn’t been thinking it.
Shaking his head sadly, Pumat replaces the bar. “It’s just too risky. Empire’s crawling all over this place.”
“Come on, Pumat, we really stuck our necks out here.”
“Hmm. Tell you what, I might know someone who could use this.”
The thought of having to lug this cargo even further is unappealing, but much more appealing than having no buyer at all.
“Yeah?”
“I have a friend, Nila. She’s out on Savalier. They need stuff like this, and they can pay.”
“Savalier?” Beau scoffs. “You gotta be fucking with us.”
“I’m serious. Most trading vessels are too big, they’d be caught immediately. But a ship like yours?”
Shaking his head, Fjord sighs. “Shadycreek’s Iron Shepherd territory.”
“So maybe you’d have to go around. If anyone can do it, you guys can.”
The bell over the door in the other room chimes. Pumat prime glances over as one of his clones heads out.
“Look. You guys are my best customers. But even if I bought this stuff from you, I just wouldn’t be able to shift it, not covered in the Empire sigil like that. You’ll have to find another buyer, be it Nila, or whoever.”
Beau seems to be working herself up for another outburst, but Fjord puts one hand on her arm.
“If they’re settlers, how can they afford this?”
Pumat smiles, “Moss.”
“Moss?” Beau explodes, fixing to punch something. “You want us to tangle with the Shepherds for gorram moss?”
“They ferment it. Turn it into fuel. It’s good stuff, burns cleaner than anything.”
“Burns clean?” Fjord asks. Now that, that caught his attention. Jester was always complaining about the state of the filters, and how annoying they were to clean out. She’d certainly be pleased. Not to mention cleaner fuel fetched a higher price on the market, especially on the core planets where they were all fussy about that sort of thing.

Jester sits on the edge of the aft thruster of the Balleater, surveying the crowd. Munching on a slightly greasy donut, she plays at making up stories for people, full of drama and intrigue. Technically she’s supposed to be scouting for passengers, but so far she hasn’t seen anyone promising. Too boring, or too shady. She’s just licking the remaining icing from her hands when she notices something interesting. A pink haired firbolg, looking up at the Balleater with interest.
“You should come with us.”
“Oh?” They ask, turning on her what is quite possibly the most placid expression she’s ever seen on anyone awake.
“Sure. Seems to me you’re not so worried about destination. We got the best ship, and the best crew.”
They nod slowly, looking at Jester with surprisingly sharp eyes.
“So, what do you think? You coming with us?”
“That seems like the thing to do.”
Jester grins brightly, holding out one still slightly sticky hand. “I’m Jester, she/her.”
Caduceus’ hand completely envelops her smaller one. “Caduceus he/him.”
“So, where are your things?”
“This is everything.”
“Oh!” She eyes his one shoulder bag with some scepticism, but shrugs. “I suppose that makes things easier. Yasha!” With surprising volume, she turns and yells towards the ship.
“Yes Jester.” The metal of the ramp clangs under Yasha’s combat boots as she comes down to meet them.
“We have a passenger. Could you show him his room?”
“Just him?”
“So far.”
“Captain’ll be back soon.”
“Right.” Determined now, she looks back out at the crowd.

“Caleb?” Nott asks, but he’s unresponsive, eyes darting around the crowd constantly. “Caleb, where’s Fumpkin?”
Now that gets his attention. He waves his hands in a complicated gesture and an orange tabby cat materialises, the colour of his fur bright in contrast with the grubby Caleb. Lazily, Frumpkin curls himself around the back of Caleb’s neck.
Scritching Frumpkin’s head, Caleb asks, “Do any of these ships look good?”
“Dunno. We don’t want something too clean, they’d turn us in to the Empire. But too sketchy, and they’ll-“
“Is that a cat?” A bubbly voice interrupts, making them both jump.
They look around in confusion.
“Up here.”
And sure enough, peering down from the stack of crates they’d stopped by, is a blue tiefling. With surprising strength, she lowers herself down and lands beside them in a flurry of skirts.
“Can I pet it?” She gets close, but doesn’t reach out a hand until Caleb nods, bewildered.
“His name is Frumpkin.” He tells the strange tiefling, almost automatically.
“Who are you?” Nott interjects suspiciously, trying to put herself between the tiefling and Caleb, but her height doesn’t help.
“Hi, I’m Jester! She/her.” She says, bright enough to blind. “What are your names?”
“Well…” Nott hedges.
“Where are you headed?”
Blinking at the change of subject, Nott says the first thing that comes into her head. “Nicodranas.”
It’s outside the Empire, but close enough that ships from Zadash might be going there.
“No way! That’s where I’m from!”“Oh?” Nott’s fingers stray towards the flask secured to her hip, but she resists, for now.
“Have you been there before?”
“No, we haven’t.” Caleb offers, in a valiant attempt to be an active part of the conversation.
“Oh you’ll love it. It’s so pretty. And you can come with us! We’re headed that way! I can show you round…”
“You have a ship?”
“Sure. The Balleater, that one there.” She points, “Isn’t she beautiful?”
“Yeah… Beautiful.” Nott and Caleb exchange a concerned glance.
“Well, it’s certainly off the radar.” Caleb murmurs to Nott, trying to be secretive.
“Come on, I’ll show you guys!”

Chapter Text

“We really gonna deal with this Nila character?” Beau asks as they step back out into the slightly humid air.
“Who else?”
“Avanitka?”
Fjord stops dead, and turns to stare at Beau. “Need I remind you last time we tried dealing with Avantika she shot me?”
“You also slept with her.”
“Beau…”
“Twice.” There’s just the slightest hint of a shit eating grin pulling at the corners of Beau’s mouth, and Fjord has to resist the urge to smack her. She’d decimate him anyway.
“Beau! We ain’t dealing with Avantika, she’s trouble.”
“More trouble than the shepherds?”
Shaking his head, Fjord continues wending his way through the crowds.
“What about Bryce then?” Beau insists, keeping up with him easily.
“They can’t afford it. Besides there’s Empire soldiers all over Alfield at the moment, they’ve had to dial back the illicit activities.”
With two long strides, Beau gets in front of Fjord, forcing him to stop. “We really gonna tangle with the shepherds?”
“The idea is, we don’t.”
“Jobs like this never go smooth.”
“You got a better way to move this cargo?”
Finally, Beau subsides. “Fine. But this is a bad idea.”
“I give you my permission to say ‘I told you so’ if it all goes south.”
Yasha is stood on the ramp waiting for them when they return, Molly lounging in a deck chair they procured from god knows where on one side of her. On the other side is the crate they’d expected to be leaving without.
“You can pack that back up, we’re taking it with.” Fjord says, gesturing to it.
Yasha raises one dark eyebrow and glances to Beau. But she says nothing as she turns and begins pushing the crate back up the ramp and into the ship.
“Didn’t go well?” Molly asks, peering at them over the top of their sunglasses.
“Not so much.” Fjord responds as Beau continues forward to help with the crate. “We got passengers?”
“Indeed we do. Three of them, in fact.” Standing gracefully, Molly shakes out their colourful silk robe and ties it to cover their bare chest. “Bring my chair would you darling?” With that they head inside the ship.
Grumbling at being ordered around by the person renting their spare shuttle, Fjord folds the deck chair and tucks it under one arm.

Once they’re in the air, Jester gathers their guests in the kitchen for a debriefing about how things work on the ship.
“We’re going to have to take a little bit of a detour. Empire’s ordered us to take some medical supplies to Savalier. It’ll take us a day or two out of our way, but we should have you all on your way without too much trouble.”
“What kind of medical supplies?” Nott asks from her perch on the kitchen table, leaning forward with badly disguised suspicion.
“Dunno.” Beau interjects helpfully. “Empire says jump.” She gives an exaggerated shrug as if to say ‘what can you do’
Seemingly satisfied for now, Nott nods.
“Is Savalier not dangerous?” Caleb ventures cautiously.
Fjord nods sagely, trying his best to project a ‘calm and collected captain’ kind of demeanour. “It can be, but we’re a small ship. The real danger is Shadycreek Run, and we’ll be keeping clear of that. We’ll be in and out of there in no time.”
For a moment he thinks he might have failed spectacularly, as Caleb’s intelligent eyes pierce into him. But then Caleb just nods, much the way Nott had. The two of them must be very close, there’s much about them that’s similar. Despite one of them being human and the other a goblin.
“Well then, I’ll let you all get settled. Kitchen and common room are open whenever you like, we have sit down meals every evening but the rest is up to you. I’ll have to ask you to stay out of the bridge and cargo hold without an escort.
Caleb fidgets uncomfortably. “There are things in the cargo hold I need to retrieve.”
“That’s no problem!” Jester says cheerily from where she’s perched on the counter top, licking something sticky from her fingers. “I can take you down now if you’d like.”
“That would be much appreciated.”

Sitting on his bunk in his small guest room, Caleb looks about himself. Though it is small, the room is comfortable, and clean. The ship certainly hadn’t looked like much from the outside, but the inside is very well kept. But he’s less concerned about the ship itself than about the people on it. Jester seemed nice enough, but he had yet to get a decent read on the others. It would only take one of them turning on him for everything to fall apart. A clattering from above him startles him enough that Frumpkin leaps from his lap, affronted.
Then Nott drops out of the vent on his ceiling and onto his bed.
“Ah, there you are.” Caleb says, too used to this to be truly shocked. “You found your way into the vents then?”
Nott hops off his bed to shake the dust from her clothing. “They go everywhere! I can get around wherever I want to. Well, apart from the engine room, coz that’s too hot, but anywhere else! They’re not very clean though.” She punctuates that by shaking another clump of thick black dust from her shirt.
“You will be careful though, ja? We do not want to anger our hosts.”
Waving one hand, she scoffs. “They won’t even know I’m there.”
But Caleb knows her well enough to see through the flippant attitude. “Don’t steal anything either.”
She freezes at that. “But-“
“No, Nott. We can go back to running cons once we’re planet side, but it’s just too dangerous on a ship this small.”
She nods reluctantly. “Alright. No stealing.”
“Now, it has been a long day. Perhaps we should get some rest.”
There’s no discussion of whether Nott will go back to the room she was technically assigned. Instead, she curls up at the foot of Caleb’s bed. It’s a small bed for two, but they make it work.