Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The first time Tommy had ever seen a body was back home.

Not… home, home. But home in the sense of the planet. Earth. Y’know, where the grass is green and seventy-one percent of the planet is made up of water that nobody can even drink. That Earth.

It had been an open casket funeral for someone he only vaguely remembered. He remembered when it was his turn to walk up from the line of grieving family and friends to say his goodbyes. The body hadn’t looked like a body, they had just looked like they were asleep. Their eyes were closed and expression peaceful, and Tommy had half expected them to jump out of the casket with a laugh and a “gotcha!” and then everyone would’ve had a great laugh over it.

That… hadn’t happened.

Point was, the person hadn’t looked dead– just peaceful. 

Not like this body.

“Warning: Containment Breach,” droned the automated voice as Tommy slowly unwound his hands from around the creature's neck. They trembled violently, and he wasn’t getting enough air. His hands were stained a deep indigo, and it smelled like the salt of the ocean back home.

Back home. Earth.

Sirens wailed throughout the inside of the ship, and lights that adorned the walls painted the cold, metal room in a deep red. It reminded Tommy of some of the action movies he used to watch back home.

“Warning: Containment Breach.” 

He wasn’t getting enough air. Tommy gasped, and threw himself away from the body. He scrambled back on hands and knees until he hit the wall and stared.

“Warning: Containment Breach.”

The body lay in the middle of the lab, limbs splayed into unnatural angles from where Tommy had broken them and their neck...

Tommy wound his bloody fingers into his hair, and shuddered when his hands brushed against the small, metal plates that were situated behind his ears. He blinked his eyes hard, forcing himself to count to ten. His vision flickered, the blue hue temporarily disappearing before activating again.

“War–in– tainm– Breach.”

Tommy wanted to laugh, but he found it stuck inside his throat along with the thousand other emotions that found themselves clogged there at the moment. Of course the aliens not only had to abduct and experiment on him, but they had to give him a faulty translator as well.

The ship shuddered and Tommy flinched, throwing his arms over his head and curling himself into a ball. The body jolted, the syringe fell from the black and white alien’s limp hand and clattered to the metal ground. Tommy kicked himself away from it, the glowing green substance inside the syringe made his stomach flip and churn. They had almost put that in him.

Tommy wanted to scream, but it was stuck. Everything was stuck. He couldn’t breathe. He wanted to go home.

“Warning: Containment Breach.”

There was a distant clanging, and something in his brain registered it as footsteps. Tommy froze. There were more of them, he’d forgotten. He pushed himself underneath a nearby desk, and he heard the door slide open from behind him.

Silence. The aliens were likely taking in the broken straps on the bed, the shattered glass tubes along the floor, the drip, drip, drip of some mysterious liquid the scientist had been messing with before Tommy had broken himself free. The body. Tommy heard one step forward, saw their black tail swing from side to side from his hiding place. Their legs were tall, at least twice the size of Tommy’s own, and their boots were tall as well, with small, sharp hooks made for gripping that tapped against the metal floor.

“Warning: Containment Breach.”

The alien turned slightly, facing the others that came with them.

“Tell the captain we’re going into emergency lockdown,” the voice translated into Tommy’s ear. “Subject nineteen has escaped. I want weapons ready to kill, this is a level twenty threat.”

The sirens and the mechanical voice stopped. Tommy held his breath as the ship fell into silence, and he heard the click of a weapon being activated. It thrummed against the silence, igniting the air with powerful electric bursts that even Tommy could feel from underneath the desk. The aliens moved further into the room, and Tommy counted three of them.

The other two aliens were far shorter than the black and white one, and they followed the tall one around like little henchmen. Not that they weren't tall either, all three easily stood a few good feet over Tommy. Long, sharp horns sprouted from their heads, and their rabbit-like ears stood straight, on alert. If Tommy’s sense of biology was accurate from having been around the tall fucks for forever, he would have to make an educated guess that the tallest one there was a female. 

The alien on the far right, who was more grey than the others, thrashed his tail as he stepped over the body and muttered something that Tommy’s translator couldn’t pick up. He reached for his side, and produced what looked like a really long skip-rope. He swung the end, and the tip sparked angrily in the air.

Tommy grit his teeth and exhaled slowly. He hadn’t come this far just to be killed by some tall, rabbit looking fucks and their stupid taser skip-ropes. He wanted to go home. Determination sparked in his chest and his heart pounded in his ears. He pulled himself into a crouch.  

The alien’s ears flicked in his direction, and Tommy froze. All three spun around, weapons pointed and activated, but they hadn’t spotted him under the desk. One of them, the grey one, trembled.

Tommy had taken on one by himself easily. Their arms had snapped under Tommy’s hands like sticks, and the sickening noise replayed in his ears like a broken record. Tommy pushed it to the back of his mind. It had taken some effort, weakened and malnourished as he was, but he had eventually overpowered the alien. If he played this right, he reckoned he could take on three more.

Six pairs of glowing eyes landed on Tommy when he shifted again. Their twin pupils constricted as Tommy made eye-contact, and their leader’s eyes sparked violet. She stepped forward, and Tommy flinched back. He bared his teeth in what he hoped was an intimidating gesture, and judging by the two smaller aliens' reaction, he was somewhat successful.

A soft tink broke the silence between them, and the tall alien looked down, her violet eyes landing on the syringe. She nudged it again with her boot, the green liquid sloshing around the sides of the syringe and making Tommy’s stomach roll once more.

The alien grinned, the expression was unsettling with her thin, razor sharp teeth and inhuman eyes. She picked it up and rolled it between her hands. Sharp claws clicked against the glass syringe as she examined it. She looked back at Tommy, then raised her arm to her mouth and spoke into the communicator.

“Threat has been reduced to a level ten. Tell the captain to forgo the emergency lockdown. We can handle it from here.”

The leader waved a hand, and the violent sparking that came from her henchmen’s weapons was lowered. They both stepped forward, Tommy scrambled back.

“Hey!” Tommy shouted, and they faltered in their steps, if only slightly. Their leader tilted her head, ears flicking. “Listen, you tall fucks better stay the hell away from me! Want me to kill you guys too? I’ll do it! Just watch!” He heaved out a breath, then sucked it back in, his chest shuddering nearly as bad as his hands as he pushed himself out from under the desk. Tommy lowered himself and sneered as the grey one stepped back.

The leader leaned her body forward so they were closer to Tommy’s eye-level. The condescending motion sparked a righteous anger in his chest and Tommy growled at them.

If they wanted him to act like a fucking animal, then he would act like a fucking animal.

“Human,” the leader began, raising a clawed hand towards him as though that would calm his fury. “We do not mean to cause you any harm.”

“You just came in here to kill me!” Tommy’s voice pitched high as he gestured wildly to the still activated jump ropes the other two fucks were holding. They stepped closer at his shouting, brandishing the weapons.

“We cannot afford to take risks,” the alien said. She side-eyed the henchmen, who were winding the weapons in the air. The lightning crackled with each swing, and Tommy couldn’t help but flinch. “You have a choice, human.”

Tommy’s eyes snapped back to the leader, who now towered over him as she stood to her full height. “Walk back to your chamber with dignity, or be carried with shame.”

Tommy glanced wildly between the three, taking an uneasy step backward as the two advanced. His hip glanced off the side of the desk and Tommy glanced down, spotting a rock looking thing that may have just been used as a paperweight. He glanced back up at the trio of aliens, meeting the leader's eyes.

They narrowed.

Tommy reached for the rock.

The alien shouted, and the ropes snapped forward, attaching themselves around Tommy’s neck and torso, pinning his arms to his sides.

He screamed as electricity raced up and down his body, and his muscles seized. He toppled over, hitting the floor with a heavy bang.

The ropes solidified as he struggled, turning into immovable rods that held him at length from the aliens. Shock after shock hit him relentlessly until he couldn’t catch his breath and he had nothing left to scream.

Eventually, the attack stopped, and Tommy was left gasping for breath as the edges of his vision spotted and began to black out. 

“Like I said, human,” The leader spoke somewhere off to the side, but Tommy could no longer care. All he could feel was the fire racing through his body as the last of the shocks ran their course. The air around him shifted as the aliens used the rods to lift him up. “I cannot afford to take risks. A human alone is dangerous, but a human with a tool?” The tall alien leaned into his sight and grinned, a mimic that she had probably picked up from god knew how many other humans they had experimented with. “Now that, that is deadly.”

The electricity left Tommy jittery, his muscles still pulled painfully tight and he could already feel the burns on his skin from where the tasers had connected. The alien moved away, and Tommy’s vision doubled, then went out.

The red beacon blinked on the screen as it crossed a white-dotted border; a tiny blip against the vast expanse of space, at least, as much of it as the screen could capture. It flashed against the darkness, disturbing the sleepy peace that had fallen over the small communications room.

There was a grumble, and something shifted, green lights attached to a near translucent body pulsed dully in time to a steady heartbeat as he slept. The air crackled, then a voice sounded over a speaker.

“Is anyone watching that beacon?”

Another grumble, another shift.

“Hello? Is anyone awake here?”

“No,” grunted the phantlus, but he reached for his communicator anyway. 

“Useless children, the lot of you. Wilbur, I know it’s your shift. I thought I told you to rest the last cycle–”

“I’m up, mom,” Wilbur spoke into the communicator, blinking heavily against the wet sleep that had gathered in the corners of his eyes and trilling deep in his throat as he stretched his fins.

“Sometimes I wonder what happened to the respect you two used to show me all that time ago.”

“I think we lost it sometime after the part where you picked us up and before we realized you were just an anxious ball of feathers disguised as a captain.” A new voice joined the call, Technoblade's monotonous tone causing Wilbur to close his eyes and tilt his head back dramatically.

There was an airy sigh over the speaker accompanied by a low whistle. “Oh, I mourn.”

The blinking red light forced Wilbur’s eyes open once more, and he studied the screen. His fins flared as he tilted his head curiously.

“Wilbur, the screen,” Philza's reminder came, just like Wilbur knew it would.

“Yeah, I’m looking at it.” He enlarged the screen, tapping a claw against the beacon and drawing up the ship’s information. Wilbur leaned back in his seat as he read the data. His tail swayed, the tip just brushing against the cool floor. “Looks like another enderian science vessel got too close to the border again,” he sighed, already drawing up the communications screen. “Man, these guys just can’t take a hint,” he grumbled.

“Jealous?” Technoblade poked at him from over the call, and Wilbur hissed.

“It’s restricted starspace. Shut up. I need to send a message.” Wilbur swiped the disconnect button on his comm before Technoblade could jab back at him, then turned back to the screen. He sighed again, and pressed the transmission recorder.

“SC.Starborne, this is the SC.SBI. You are entering restricted starspace. Please respond immediately or disengage your thrusters. This is a warning.”

Chapter Text

Tap. Tap. Tap.

“Cut that out.”

Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap.

“Wilbur, I said knock it off,” Technoblade grunted over the comm, and Wilbur moved his claws closer to the mic as he continued to tap them against the table, just to spite him.

“Wilbur!”

“Boys,” Philza warned, and Wilbur let out an airy hiss.

“I don’t like it.”

He could practically see Philza cocking his head to the side as the avrania asked, “what’s wrong?”

Wilbur eyed the holographic screen, the red beacon already redirecting its course from the outlined border. “The enderians. They’re up to something, I can smell it.” Wilbur’s fins flicked irritatedly as he zoomed in closer to the ship and re-read the message that had been sent back to them. “Permission from the Galactic Federation themselves? I thought the GF were the ones who restricted this galaxy in the first place.”

“You forget that Senator Qerilov is also the head of the Federation,” Technoblade grunted. “Of course he’s gonna be more lenient towards his own species.”

Wilbur narrowed his eyes and huffed. “I still don’t like it.”

“I don’t like it either, Wilbur,” Philza spoke calmly. “But as of now, there’s nothing we can do about it. All we can do for now is finish our contract and report back to the Federation.”

“How much longer are we on the clock for anyways?” Technoblade asked, then grunted as something metal tinkered from his end of the comm, followed by a short hoglin curse. “Would love to get that shoat back on board sometime soon.”

Philza laughed, a soft thing that sounded to Wilbur like a whistling breeze. “Not much longer, a naps worth at most if you want to take a rest.”

“And leave you in the captain's helm all by yourself? Yeah right, you might do something stupid.”

Wilbur redirected his attention back to the screen, letting the budding argument between Philza and Technoblade filter into white noise. He stared at the SC.Starborne as it glided smoothly towards the dotted border, dancing just along its edge as it made its way further from their scanners.

Something flickered out of the corner of his vision, and Wilbur’s eyes snapped to it. He zoomed out, hoping to catch it again, but it was almost as if it vanished as quickly as it had appeared.

Wilbur leaned back, flicking his tail in unison to the beacon’s soft blinks. 

Something wasn’t right, and he wasn’t going to let them out of his sight if he could help it.

“Chambers” was really just a fancy word for prison cells. 

Tommy groaned and flexed his still trembling hand. It had been about an hour since he’d woken back up, and the jitters still hadn’t left him alone. He was beginning to think they had actually done some serious damage this time.

The cell they put him in was small, just big enough for him to stand with his back slouched if he didn’t want to scrape his head against the solid, metal-like ceiling, and the width was about double his arm length. So, considering his circumstances, it wasn’t the worst. At least he wasn’t in a dog kennel or some shit like that.

From what he could see, there was an entire wing dedicated to these cells, each one lining the sides of the wall from floor to ceiling until they reached the locked doors at the end of the hall, each one containing an empty sleeping bag and not much else. There was once a time where Tommy wouldn’t wake up to the deafening silence of the hall, but instead the angry shouts and cries of other humans trapped in the same way as he was.

That had been a long time ago. Now it was just him and…

“Hey,” Tommy rasped. He coughed, then cleared his throat before trying again. “Hey, you still alive?”

Silence. Tommy groaned. Of course he was going to be difficult. 

Figuring he’d rested for long enough, Tommy gathered whatever meager energy he still had left and dragged himself towards the front of his cell. The small spaces between the fancy looking bars of the door were his only view to the outside, the rest of his cell painted a boring white that had his head throbbing if he stared at it for too long.

Thankful that the aliens had decided to leave the bars uncharged tonight, (seriously, what was their deal with electricity?) Tommy grasped them with both hands and peered up and across the hall. 

“Hey!”

The hall was dark, likely because they were trying to simulate their sleep cycle or whatever. Tommy huffed, all it was really doing was getting in the way. The low light just made it more difficult to see if there was anyone in the other cage.

Tommy squinted, but he still couldn’t make anything out. “Come on, man,” Tommy all but begged, “please say something, do something. Please?”

Silence. Then, something shifted.

Tommy sighed in relief as a pair of eyes peered at him from over the ledge of his cage. They were exhausted looking, but alive. He blinked slowly.

“I’m fine,” Tommy called back, and the other human stared. He seemed to find whatever he was looking for in Tommy, because he nodded, then went back to his corner in the cage, out of Tommy’s sight.

Tommy dropped his hands from the bars and cradled his head. 

There had been twenty humans on this ship. Twenty. Now it was just Tommy, and the other guy who’d been there since he could remember. Always watching, never saying a word. He could hardly wrap his head around it. 

Subject One, they called him. Tommy could only guess it was because they got to him first. He’d been the longest survivor, at least, that’s what the other humans told him when he first woke up here, confused and frightened out of his mind.

Now if he thought back, Tommy couldn’t remember what he’d been doing before he was taken, or where he’d been, for that matter. If Tommy strained, he could remember going to bed the night before everything changed… but that was it.

The person who had once occupied the cell next to him had said that was what the surgery was for. To make them forget… and…

Tommy’s hand brushed the place behind his ear, his fingers ghosting the edges of the metal platings that were wired into him. It had hurt, at first. But now they were just… there. Forever, probably. Whatever they had done to drill them into his head, Tommy had to grudgingly admit it was done well. Besides shaving off the hair along the sides of his head. Now he reckoned his hair looked pretty dumb right about now.

He dropped his hands before he could let them wander too far. It was still weird, running his hands where there had once been an untamable nest of long, golden locks. Now all that remained was hair that had been either trimmed too short for his liking, or removed completely to make room for the plates.

At least it was growing back.

The floor was digging into his elbows, and Tommy winced as he shifted to his side. He cast a sideways glance to the corner of his cell, where his strange looking sleeping bag lay. It was strapped to the floor to keep him from floating around when they weren’t moving, and while Tommy wasn’t pretentious when it came to bedding, it wasn’t the most comfortable thing he’d slept in. The fabric was all wrong, and sometimes it would scratch at his skin if he moved a certain way. He’d much rather his bed back at home.

Home. Earth.

Tommy sighed. Like he was ever going to go back there. They were probably too far away by now, or something. It would just be Tommy’s luck to find out they were already somehow a lifespan away from the little blue planet, trapped forever on this stupid research vessel or whatever those tall, rabbit-eared freaks called it.

Tommy glanced back at the alien sleeping bag. He should probably get some rest. He never knew when those stupid scientists would return, and besides, it was better than the cold, metal floor.

Grunting, Tommy pushed himself onto his knees. His arms and sides twinged in pain from his burns, but the jitters seemed to have finally left, which was a relief. Tommy grabbed one of the bars to steady himself, preparing to push himself to his feet.

“Hey,” Tommy called out, “Goodnight, One.”

There was a shuffle, then two quiet knocks against the other cage sounded. An acknowledgement. 

Tommy nodded to himself, then on the count of three, he pulled himself up with a pained groan and shuffled his way over to the bag.

He was out before his head hit the metaphorical pillow.

Tommy awoke to a scream.

There was a clatter, a bang, the familiar sound of angry sparks, and then Tommy was shooting upright, suddenly wide awake.

The hall was crowded with aliens. They stood in a half circle with their backs to him, a crackling weapon in each hand and a wary tension woven between their muscles. 

There was another scream, one that wasn’t familiar in the way that he recognized the voice, but in the way that it was human.

Tommy shoved himself out of the bag and stumbled forward. He grabbed the bars to his door, watching in horror as One threw himself at an alien, their static screeches piercing the air as One’s fingers dug into their eyes.

One alien, a white one with grey spots, stumbled away from the fighting, indirectly stepping closer to Tommy’s reach. He saw the alien reach for their rope, saw the electricity build with each swing as they took aim at One, who was currently taking on two other aliens who were trying to pry him off the other. 

Tommy snapped his hand out from the bars and grabbed the limb closest to him and yanked.

The alien shrieked in pain and Tommy tightened his grip on their tail. They stumbled back into the bars of his cage with a yank, and Tommy made a grab for the sparking weapon. The silver surface felt more like a smooth metal than an actual rope, and he tried twisting it out of the alien's grasp. The alien cursed something that Tommy’s translator couldn’t pick up and swiped back, their claws raking across his forearm and causing a well of blood to spring forth.

Tommy yelped, the sudden pain distracting him long enough for the alien to swing their fist into the side of his head.

Tommy went down, the blue tint in his vision flickering wildly as he was slammed into the hard, unforgiving floor. His translator fizzed angrily in his ears as it tried to reorient itself, and Tommy shook his head as it began to pound.

The shouts from the aliens mixed together in his mind as a jumbled mess of semi-coherent words and sharp barks and growls laced with a ringing static that Tommy couldn’t make heads or tails of. He pressed a hand against one of the translator's panels, willing the angry glitches to go away so he could focus on getting back up.

Another scream from One had Tommy’s head shooting back up despite how it made the world around him tilt and swirl. This time it hadn’t been a scream out of defiance or anger, but of pain.

Tommy saw One pinned to the ground, one of the aliens had finally gotten one of their metal ropes around his neck and were using it to hold him down. It reminded Tommy of those long metal catch poles that the people back home would use to control a wild animal, and the sight of it on One made his stomach turn.

One struggled, gripping the pole with one hand while swiping at another alien with the other. He kicked out wildly, but they were just out of reach. The alien toggled something, and One screamed, his muscles locking and spasming. Another rope locked his legs in place, and then another held down his arm.

Tommy shoved himself to his feet and lunged for the door. “Let him go!” He screamed, “ONE!”

The white alien shoved their weapon between the bars of his cage and Tommy ran into it full force. Fiery pain exploded in his chest as he was thrown towards the back of his cage, and his body hit the back wall with a heavy bang. Tommy slumped forward, the blue tint flickering wildly before shutting down completely.

He watched, body paralyzed and throbbing as the alien fiddled with something next to the door before the spaces between the bars shimmered then solidified. The silence that followed was heavy, and it buzzed in Tommy’s ears as he was cut off from the rest of the world. Faintly, he could hear the muffled sounds of shouting and static, but eventually they faded, leaving Tommy alone and bleeding in a silence that felt louder than the chaos outside.

Tommy didn’t remember closing his eyes, but when he opened them again, he was in the middle of falling to the side as the world pivoted. He shot out a hand to catch himself, but his arms felt sluggish and numb, so he just ended up falling onto his side anyway. Tommy blinked heavily as a deep groan echoed throughout the halls around him. 

His chest burned, and when he raised a weak hand to poke at it, he hissed as a jolt of pain was sent down his arm. He glanced down, then winced at the blood-stained floor beneath him. That… probably wasn’t good. The alien had swiped him pretty hard there.

He twisted his arm, inspecting the wound. It seemed to have clotted over by now, thankfully, and Tommy breathed a shaky sigh of relief. 

The room shifted again, and Tommy scrambled to hold onto something as the ship groaned. Unfortunately, everything about the stupid room was smooth to the touch, so Tommy was sent sprawling to the other side with a yelp. His hands caught the sleeping bag as he was practically thrown into it, and he gripped it until everything stopped shifting.

He’d been on the ship for a long time now, he knew what turns and flips felt like, and that was a hard one. Not only that, but at least the fuckers gave him the decency of warning him before they pulled stunts like that.

“Hey!” He shouted, glaring at nothing in particular, “what the hell are you guys doing up there?!”

He glanced to where the door was supposed to be, but it remained shut, cutting him off from the rest of the ship. The events of what happened the last time he’d woken up filtered in through his mind, and he shuddered. Leaning against the wall, Tommy hugged his knees as close to his chest as he could without it hurting and lowered his head. The image of One being pinned down by those aliens flashed behind his closed eyes, and he grit his teeth. He didn’t know the guy very well, but he hoped he would be okay, because if he wasn’t…

Tommy didn’t want to think about that for too long. He raised his head and stared at the wall where the door was supposed to be and frowned. Everything about this was fishy, more so than usual. Tommy stared, feeling his eyes already growing heavy as the ship's muffled hum began to lull him back to a fitful rest.

BANG

An explosion rocked the ground beneath him, and Tommy was violently thrown forward with a startled scream. A siren pierced the air, muffled only by the closed door, and Tommy whipped his head up, but all he could see were the white walls that enclosed him. With a surprising amount of energy he didn’t know he still had in him, Tommy scrambled to his feet, trying to find the direction the explosion had come from.

He’d been here a long, long while, but this had never happened before.

Tommy ran to where he thought the door was and began pounding on it. “Hey! You fuckers better let me out, you hear! Hey! What the fuck is going on?!” He switched hands as the pounding began jostling his wounded arm, and began practically throwing himself at the door. “I swear to God if you motherfuckers get me spaced because you forgot about me I’ll haunt your asses for the rest of time!”

Tommy stepped back, readying himself to charge at the door when the wall suddenly dropped. He was greeted by the full, unfiltered blast of the sirens, and it was all he could do to stop from flinching. Tommy paused, staring at the same spotted white alien that had shocked him before. He opened his mouth to shout more profanities at the asshole, but something stopped him.

The alien was breathing harshly, their double-pupiled eyes wide with something Tommy recognized from only having stayed with them for so long and from having caused that expression himself a few times over the course of his stay.

Terror.

The alien’s ears flicked to the side, and their head whipped around, watching something Tommy couldn’t make out from his position in the cage. Tommy stepped back hesitantly.

“What’s happening?” He asked a little harshly, but it grabbed the alien’s attention. Their head snapped back around and they stared at him. A beat of silence passed between them before the alien shook their head and reached for the panel. 

“Araz-” Tommy could hardly make out the word, but the rest of it was cut off by a foreign static that was impossible for him to translate on his own. 

“What?” Tommy said, “my translators broken. Listen, you’re just gonna have to-”

There was a click, and then the bars faded. Tommy stared, speechless. The alien stared back, their hands twitching around the curled weapon attached to their side. They seemed to gather the courage to grab it and point it at Tommy, the tip sparking dangerously, before offering their free hand to Tommy.

“Did- Did you just…?”

The alien waved their hand frantically, gesturing in what Tommy had quickly learned was indeed the universal gesture for “get your ass over here.” They spoke frantically, glancing between Tommy and the exit every few seconds. 

Tommy glanced between the offered hand and the sparking weapon in the other. “Y’know, I’m getting a lot of mixed signals here.” He crossed his arms and glared. “I think I’m good.”

The alien glared and opened their mouth, likely about to shout something that Tommy wouldn’t be able to understand anyway, when their ears suddenly pivoted, and they jumped.

Tommy strained to listen to what they could possibly be hearing, but all he could hear was the wailing of the siren. He narrowed his eyes and snarked, “what, did One get out on you? You guys couldn’t handle another human?”

The alien twisted around to look at him, and oh wow, Tommy didn’t know a furred creature could look so pale. 

Then the alien jumped into the cell with him.

“Woah, hey!” Tommy stumbled back. “What the fuck?!”

His arm was grabbed, and Tommy hissed when their claws dug into the scabbing wound on his arm, drawing up a well of fresh blood. The alien pulled him to the side, out of sight from the door. Tommy wrenched his arm out of their grip with a snarl. He pulled back a fist, aiming right for the alien's head when he heard it.

A soft clicking, followed by a tap, tap, tap of claws against the shiny metal floor outside. Tommy stared into the eyes of the white alien, who shuddered and quickly averted their gaze. They shrunk away from Tommy, curling themselves against the wall and tightly gripping their weapon.

Something breathed outside, a deep sound that was reminiscent of a throaty growl. The footsteps sounded closer to the cage, and Tommy frowned. That was too many footsteps to be a human or a rabbit-alien. Tommy pressed himself against the same wall just as a shadow passed by the entrance. He held his breath, and he could tell the rabbit-alien was doing the same.

The creature outside paused, their form blocking the door entirely and casting a spiky shadow that engulfed the cell. There were a few clicks, a few growls, and then Tommy realized that it was talking.

They stood there for what felt like an eternity, the spiked beast silent, watching, and Tommy’s lungs begged for air. His heart pounded in his ears, broken through only by the siren that still sounded throughout the ship. He felt the alien next to him shudder.

The shadow shifted, then moved on. The heavy clicks against the floor began moving away, and Tommy slowly released his breath. Next to him, he heard the alien do the same. Leaning to the side, Tommy peered outside, hoping to catch a glimpse of the new creature.

His heart almost stopped, and he felt the hairs at the back of his neck stand on end as an involuntary shiver ran down from the top of his spine.

That wasn’t a rabbit-eared alien.

Six legs clacked against the ground, while another two tapped at the bars of the other cells. It moved like a spider, it’s hind body not doing any favors in reminding Tommy of one besides the giant scorpion-looking tail that sat curled against its lower, heavily-plated back.

Indigo-coloured blood trailed from behind it, smearing the floors in a way that made Tommy sick. The scent of salt was heavy in the air outside the cell, and Tommy turned back to the quaking alien, who was watching him with wide eyes. As they leaned over Tommy to peer outside, he spotted their tail lashing nervously out of the corner of his eye.

Suddenly the alien slapped Tommy's arm, and motioned for him to follow with a low hiss.

“What- you- you wanna go out there?” Tommy hissed at the alien under his breath, but all he got was a rush of static as a hand was placed over his mouth. His eyes narrowed, but he slunk after the alien anyway. Did they just shush him?

The floor was slick with alien blood, but Tommy was busy keeping his eyes on the spider-scorpion-arachnid thing behind them as they moved towards the door. The rabbit-alien’s boots clicked against the ground despite their desperate attempts to keep quiet, and their ears were pinned against the back of their head, turned towards the threat behind them.

Miraculously, they managed to reach the other door without garnering the attention of the arachnid, and Tommy breathed a quiet sigh of relief. The alien appeared to be too busy peering into the other cells one at a time. Tommy caught it raising itself higher on its hind legs, stretching itself tall enough to peer into the second row of cages, and Tommy shuddered. Those things were gross.

Rabbit-alien chirped something softly, and they raised their hand towards the control panel next to the door.

The ship shuddered and groaned, throwing them to the ground. The sirens were cut off, and they both tumbled to the floor with a not-so quiet bang.

Tommy looked up just in time to see the arachnid’s head whip in their direction, and he froze as three pairs of snake eyes landed on him. Its mouth opened horizontally, a snake-like tongue whipping out between rows of small, razor-sharp teeth, then it roared.

A furred hand found his arm, and Tommy was dragged up and through the door just as the arachnid alien charged.

All sense of subtlety was thrown out the metaphorical window as Tommy rushed through the tall and narrow halls of the ship, quite literally on the rabbit-alien’s tail. A crash sounded behind them, and Tommy felt the blood drain from his face when he turned and spotted a massive dent in the door they had just escaped from.

Rabbit-alien chirped loudly, speaking in a rushed tone that Tommy couldn’t keep up with. He had a pretty good idea of what they were trying to say though. He scrambled after the alien. “I’m coming!” 

They were halfway down the hall when Rabbit’s ears suddenly flicked back, and the sound of tearing metal echoed around them with an ear-piercing screech. Tommy chanced another glance behind them, and felt his mouth fall open as a blue beam of light began cutting through the door. A second one joined it, and then a third, and Tommy was pulled around a corner just as the door exploded outward.

He could feel the floor beneath him shaking as the chase began, the angry bang, bang, bang of multiple feet drummed in his ears, and with every second the sound drew closer. Tommy’s stomach dropped at the same time he felt his heart spike as when realized they wouldn’t outrun it.

The arachnid rounded the corner, the tight corridor forcing it to shove itself halfway up the wall so it would fit. It gripped the wall with blue tinted claws that definitely hadn’t been glowing before, pulsing in time to a silent heartbeat. Its eyes locked onto Tommy, and it roared.

“Rabbit!” Tommy shouted in warning, backpedaling wildly as the eight-limbed alien leapt forward, crossing the distance in a heartbeat. “Rabbit, do something !”

Tommy was pulled back by the neck of his torn shirt and he stumbled to the floor. The arachnid leapt as Rabbit stepped forward, ears pinned back and horns brandished courageously.

They crashed into each other. Rabbit’s back hit the wall with a bang that echoed in Tommy’s ears and he heard the spider-scorpion hiss something triumphantly. Its blue claws left hissing indents on the otherwise shiny walls and floors, and it pinned Rabbit down with two of them. There was a static filled screech of pain and Tommy jolted back up.

Tommy watched in horror as the spider-scorpion’s tail began to unfurl, revealing a sharp needle the length of Tommy’s arm. It glinted under the ship's flashing emergency lights, and Tommy shouted as the tail was brought down, the needle aimed right where Rabbit’s head was…

There was a sound Tommy had never heard before, a static vwoop that popped his ears, and then Tommy was staring at the punctured wall where a bunch of floating, purple particles drifted into the air where Rabbit’s head had once been.

The arachnid grunted angrily, and tried tugging its tail out of the wall, but it was stuck.

A hand grabbed Tommy’s arm and he screamed, only to blink up at the wide-eyed expression of Rabbit, who was very much still alive. Tommy opened his mouth, but then they were rushing back down the hall as the events replayed over and over in his mind.

“You guys can teleport ?!” Tommy shouted, but it was lost to the sound of tearing metal. The arachnid had broken free.

Rabbit didn’t respond. Instead, they reached for the weapon at their side and spun around, flinging the tip at the approaching alien with a grunt. The weapon struck home, and Tommy continued to gape as the arachnid screamed, limbs spasming as it tried to claw the rope from its face before collapsing, unmoving and smoking.

“Holy shit,” Tommy breathed, and then he was being pulled along again by Rabbit. “What the fuck are those things?”

He didn’t get an answer, of course, and they continued running down the narrow, convoluted passageways of the ship. The distant sounds of fighting sounded through the walls, but with Rabbit’s help, they managed to avoid them all.

An eternity of running seemed to pass by in the blink of an eye, because before Tommy even realized they had stopped, Rabbit was frantically pushing at some control panel that lined the wall next to many others. along the wall. Tommy doubled over, sucking in shaky lungfuls of air as he took in the wide, open room.

“Hey,” he asked between laboured breaths, “where are-”

The door slid open with a near-silent whoosh, and Tommy was gracelessly tossed inside. “Ow! What the hell, man?” He stumbled to his feet, taking in the cramped room, the four strapped chairs and the small control panel next to each.

It took Tommy longer to realize where he’d been thrown than he would have liked to admit.

The alien had crawled in after him, already starting some sequence and booting up the system in the escape pod. 

“Hey, hey! Tommy grabbed their arm, but Rabbit hissed at him and swiped back in warning. “We can’t fucking leave yet, what about One?”

Rabbit was muttering something to themselves, punching holographic buttons and moving around the pod with haste. They moved towards the door.

Tommy lunged after them and yanked their hands away from the controls. Rabbit screeched and shouted something at him, but whatever they were saying, Tommy wasn’t having it. He pulled the rabbit-alien’s body close to his chest and held them in place as they struggled.

“Would you just-” Tommy grunted as the alien kicked themselves free and lunged for the door. Tommy grabbed them again. “Listen to me! We have to go back! I’m not leaving without One!”

They hit the floor, and Rabbit’s weapon clattered to the ground, scattering out of sight. Tommy wrestled himself onto their front, pinning their arms to the floor. Something shifted unnaturally under his weight, and Rabbit screamed. Their feet found his chest and Tommy was launched into the back of the pod, landing heavily against one of the cushioned seats. Tommy groaned, clutching his throbbing arm to his chest.

Rabbit slowly pushed themselves upright, stumbling to the side as they clutched their own arm before tossing a heated glare Tommy’s way. They limped to the door as Tommy pushed himself up, readying to lunge for the exit that Rabbit was currently blocking-

A shadow fell over the doorway, and before Tommy even had a chance to blink, A thin, white needle was sticking itself out of Rabbit’s back, and then they were gone, tossed aside by a giant scorpion tail.

An arachnid lowered itself, its six eyes locking onto Tommy. It growled something, baring its teeth, and Tommy stared, frozen. He blinked again, and everything that had happened in that split second caught up with him, and he stumbled back with a cry.

The arachnid tilted its head, then began pushing itself into the pod, its four front feet digging into the walls with angry hisses. Tommy cowered back, pressing himself as far away as he could, but his back was already against the far wall and he couldn’t move, he couldn’t breathe, that thing had just killed the other alien and now it was going to kill him too.

As the arachnid crept closer, something glimmered in the corner of Tommy’s eye. He turned, and spotted the weapon that Rabbit had dropped during their earlier scuffle. Tommy glanced back at the alien, who hadn’t seemed to notice it yet, it’s eyes locked onto Tommy. It drew back, readying its front claws to tear into him when Tommy dove for the weapon.

The claws connected with the cushions behind him, creating a terrible ripping sound that sent a spike of adrenaline through his heart. He grabbed the rope and swung around just as the alien turned to face him, mouth open wide and tongue lashing between rows of teeth.

The arachnid lunged, and Tommy plunged the end of the weapon into its mouth. It activated with an angry spark. There was a terrible screech that had Tommy dropping the rope to cover his ears and then the alien was stumbling back, uncoordinated feet scratching and slashing at anything in reach as stumbled back out of the pod.

It wasn’t dead yet, though, and with a scream of pent up rage that had been building in him for the last few however many weeks Tommy had been stuck here for, and before he could fully realize what he was doing, Tommy lunged for its unprotected throat.

Tommy’s vision went red as they tumbled out of the pod. He beat into the creature's neck, ripping and tearing until everything was sticky and stunk of mildew and nothing was moving or screaming anymore.

It wasn’t until the creature stopped twitching that he finally stopped. His chest heaved, something inside him twisted painfully tight, and his heart threatened to beat itself free as yellow blood dripped from his forearms.

Tommy collapsed off of the alien, the cuts in his arm had reopened from the fighting, his deep red mixing with the bright yellow, but he couldn’t feel the pain. He stared at the eerily still corpse of the arachnid, feeling a creeping numbness worm its way through his body. 

Something broke through the hazy din that Tommy had pushed to the back of his mind and he blinked. A chirp. The chirp sounded again, and distantly Tommy thought it sounded a little different from the sound the rabbit-aliens usually made. This one was more throaty, a little more echoey, and it made Tommy raise his head in confusion.

From across the room, an unfamiliar pair of glowing green eyes stared back at him.

Chapter Text

Wilbur hadn’t taken his eyes off the holographic screen since he’d first noticed the strange blip. He’d long since tuned out the chatter from Philza and Technoblade on his discarded comm, focused entirely on the screen in front of him. The blip had shown up a second time, closer to the Starborne than before, but it vanished before Wilbur could grab any sort of information on it. 

His breathing hitched. Wilbur reached to the side without looking, fumbling until his claws closed around his breather and he brought it to his mouth. The puff of air lowered his oxygen intake, and he allowed himself to take a deeper, more comfortable breath as his lungs relaxed.

Oxygen was a pain. It was a shame Technoblade and Philza relied on it so much.

The next time Wilbur spotted the mysterious blip on the screen, he was ready. He grabbed it before it could vanish off their radars again, and pulled up its information. It lit up the small communications hub, the small paragraph of text flashing in the dark along with the ship’s projected course.

He was out of his seat and running for the ship’s bridge before he finished reading.

“Are you certain?”

“That is a Morneno battleship,” Wilbur spoke as he strapped himself in his usual seat on the bridge. He made sure the straps were pulled snugly against his scales before glancing up to where Philza was reading over the information Wilbur had hastily brought with him. “That enderian vessel is about to become a gutted heap of scrap once they’re done with it.” Wilbur said as he pulled up his diagnostics screen, mentally running through each check before sending the pre-flight test to the avrania. 

There was a shuffle of feathers and the gentle clack of talons against the floor as Philza turned. “And you brought up their projected course?”

The door next to Wilbur slid open with a gentle hiss, and heavy footsteps made their way inside, thudding against the bridge’s plated floor.

“They’re headed to intercept the enderian vessel,” Wilbur growled as the door hissed shut, “using our technology.”

A heavy, three finger hand landed on Wilbur’s shoulder, and he winced at the unintentional strength behind it. “Ilucens stealth technology is top of the line,” Technoblade said, and Wilbur could feel the deep rumble of his voice against his scales. “Is it really a surprise that the arazmist managed to get their little claws on it?”

Wilbur slapped the hand away and Technoblade chuffed in amusement, lumbering on his hind legs towards the other side of the bridge. 

“Technoblade, I sure hope you fixed that break glitch in the drive,” Philza said as he began pulling up the ship's diagnostics, reading through and correcting the checks Wilbur had done. 

“Oh, ‘fixed’ is a generous word.” Technoblade said as he fell into his seat with a heavy huff. The low-quality leather creaked loudly in protest. “Patch-work might be a better way to describe it.”

Wilbur watched from the sidelines as Philza turned unimpressed eyes towards Technoblade over the glare of his holograph. His golden crest puffed up, sending a cascade of ruffling feathers from his face to his back, where his feathers lengthened and eventually transitioned into a deep shade of black. “Technoblade…”

“It’ll work, it’ll work,” Technoblade waved off Philza’s reasonable concern. “Just don’t push her too hard.”

“Core is stable,” Wilbur announced to Philza, who happily took the distraction with a nod. “...For now.”

“Doubters, all of you,” Technoblade droned as he shook his head. His tusks flashed under the light, one of natural bone, the other carved from metal. 

Philza clacked his beak in disapproval, but continued the checks anyway, readying them for flight. “Heating up the core, everyone stand by,” he said, then he swiped his hand along the screen. 

The metal walls around them suddenly shuddered, and Philza snapped his hands away from the controls. The three of them froze, eyes turned towards the captain's platform. A beat of silence passed through the bridge.

“We’re going to get juiced,” Wilbur bemoaned when they decidedly hadn’t exploded.

“We’re not going to get juiced,” Philza said, ever so confident in Technoblade despite everything. He smoothed his feathers and brought up the checklist once more, running it through another test. “Wilbur, I want those co-ords.”

“Sending,” Wilbur said as Technoblade piped up.

“Yeah, you’re gonna want to be fast about that,” he said, and he waved something from his monitor, sending it to both of them. “They’re already attacking.”

Wilbur expanded the footage on his screen, cursing as he watched the Starborne desperately attempt to evade the pirate ship. It pulled a hard turn that had Wilbur wincing, the bullets from the attacking ship just grazing its side.

“Well there goes our plan for interception,” Philza spoke tightly. His long, taloned fingers flew across his screen, and Wilbur felt the engine beneath them purr to life. “That science vessel won’t be able to outrun them and we won’t catch up in time.”

Wilbur spun his chair around, facing the captain’s loft head-on. “Then we board and grab the survivors.”

Philza’s head snapped towards him, and Wilbur found himself pinned under sharp, blue eyes. “Absolutely not,” Philza said, “Heavens knows what those pirates are after, and what they’ll do to get it. No, ” Philza stressed when Wilbur opened his mouth to argue. “Boarding is too dangerous. We’ll think of something else.”

“And what do you propose?” Wilbur curled his lips, letting just the barest hints of his teeth flash as an unspoken challenge. “As far as we know we’re the only other ship capable of helping this far out in the galaxy. If we just sit here and call for help all those innocent people are going to die!”

“We are not equipped to fight a crew that size,” Philza gestured to his screen with a folded wing. “It would be suicidal!”

“Not if we’re smart about it.” Wilbur unlatched himself from his seat and stood. “If we can save just one person, it’ll be worth it. Just one person, Philza. Please.”

Philza’s eyes snapped to Technoblade, who remained as stone-faced as always. His beady, red eyes bounced between the both of them before settling back on Philza, an unspoken message hidden within them that Wilbur couldn’t hope to translate on his own. He held his breath.

“You know he’s just going to go out there whether you give the order or not,” Technoblade said, and Wilbur exhaled in relief. “Hey, you’re the captain. It ain’t my decision, but you know it’s true.”

Philza looked back to Wilbur, and he straightened the best he could, smoothing out his fins and stilling his tail. He felt the weight of Philza’s scrutiny, saw the way his round pupils constricted as he was eyed carefully, looking for any break in his confidence, a bluff in his unspoken threat.

Philza closed his eyes, reaching a scaled hand to his throat and massaging it. “Fine. We do it together.” 

Wilbur breathed out, and finally allowed himself to relax. He retook his seat, sending Technoblade a subtle nod of thanks. It went unacknowledged, as Technoblade had already turned the other way, putting his back to Wilbur.

Philza turned back to his screens. “Wilbur, you and Techno will breach and search while I prepare the bay for anyone you might bring back. We only have enough room for one extra pod. I do not want you there for any longer than what’s necessary. Is that understood?”

“Understood,” Wilbur and Technoblade chorosed, and it seemed to calm Philza’s nerves somewhat, if his returning rattle meant anything.

“That means if you must leave alone, you leave alone.” Philza swiveled his seat around so he faced both of them. “Aye?”

Technoblade scoffed, his eyes not having left his screen as he began pulling up the weapons control. “Aye. We’ll be fine. Where do you think I came from?”

Wilbur nodded as Philza’s eyes landed on him, giving his own talons a flex. “We’ll be fine. Promise.”

Philza breathed out, closing his eyes momentarily before spinning his chair back around, facing the ship's controls. His tail feathers brushed the floor, the near-silent sound still reaching Wilbur’s ears. “You’ll have to launch yourselves once we cross the distance. You’ll need your suits.” 

“No biggie, you don’t need to mother us Philza, seriously,” Technoblade said. Wilbur heard the zip of his belt being adjusted as Technoblade finally strapped himself in. Philza didn’t seem appeased.

“Hm. You know I would join you both if I could.”

“Eh, don’t lose any feathers over it. It’s better if we have someone back on the ship anyway, in case things go south.”

“Engines are hot and ready,” Wilbur called, meeting his captain’s eyes. “Ready to jump when you are.”

Philza bobbed his head. “Ready.”

Technoblade rolled his head, cracking the bones in his neck. “Let’s go hunting.”

The arazmist worked fast.

By the time Philza had pulled up to the Starborne, they had managed to cut out one of the ship’s engines, and the arazmist ship had docked itself, sitting atop the science vessel like a giant, metal parasyte. Wilbur and Technoblade hadn’t hesitated to leap out of their seats and pull on their helmets as Philza looked for an opening in the ship.

“In and out operation,” Philza had spoken into their communicators after they had launched themselves towards the two ships. “Since they don’t seem to have any control over their remaining thrusters, if they run into one of those rocks or if they mess with the Starborne’s core, the whole thing could blow. It doesn’t matter if you have to retreat alone, I want you both off that ship before anything happens.”

They had entered through a hole in the engine room. A bullet had torn right through the hull of the ship and had pierced the inside. Wilbur could feel the heat through his suit from the dying engine as they carefully floated through, avoiding the scattered debris that had probably once been a part of the still-sparking engine. Said engine’s core flickered dangerously next to them, coloured a hot-yellow despite being exposed to the open vacuum of space. 

“Don’t touch the walls too much,” Technoblade grunted over the comm. “We’ll have to check ourselves for radiation once we get back.”

Wilbur clicked in response, eyeing the room for any potential casualties as they moved by. 

They hadn’t found any, to Wilbur’s relief. He pushed himself forward and met with Technoblade at the back of the room where he was already fighting with one of the airlocked doors. Wilbur touched the back of his boots, activating their magnetic grab and letting himself fall to the floor with a thump that he felt in his legs.

“You’ve been slacking on your workouts, Techno,” Wilbur snarked at him, which he received a growl for, much to his delight.

“Keep talking and we’ll see about that, runt.” Technoblade snagged a nearby piece of floating debris and stuck it into the door. With a heavy grunt, Technoblade threw his weight into the long piece of metal and slowly, the door began prying open. Using his other hand to hold it steady, he quickly ushered Wilbur through.

The rush of air escaping through the open door was harsh against Wilbur’s ears, but it was quickly stopped as Technoblade slid inside, letting the door fall shut behind them. Their boots clicked against the smooth floors, and Wilbur immediately felt the artificial gravity’s weight. It sat on his shoulders a little heavier than what he was used to, and he rolled his arms and stretched his fins, hoping to relieve the pressure. He spotted Technoblade bringing up the screen attached to his arm, so he did the same.

“We’re in. Oxygen levels are normal and stabilized,” Technoblade started, then glanced up when Wilbur shot him a look. “Well, for normal people anyway. Gravity is…” Technoblade paused, then gave an appreciative huff. “They have a drum on here? Damn, that’s fancy.”

“Yes,” Philza spoke through their comms. “From what information I’ve managed to gather, it’s still spinning, but I’m not sure for how much longer, or what remains of its structural integrity.”

Technoblade hummed. “Either way, it’s stable for now. The artificial gravity is being regulated at a… surprisingly high level for enderians.” Technoblade lowered his arm, casting a look around their new surroundings. It wasn’t much to look at. The walls were a blinding white, and the bright lights had forced Wilbur to turn on the shades around his eyes. It would do the mission no good if he couldn’t see properly. “Maybe it’s a good thing you decided to stay back, Philza. This wouldn’t be too fun on your bones, even with your supplements.” Wilbur spotted Technoblade shooting him a look as well, but he shook him off. He would be fine.

“Hm, then it’s a good thing I am of more help out here. I'll see what I can do about slowing the Starborne’s course. Remember, be quick about it,” Philza’s voice crackled in their ears. “I do not want you two to lose your lives at the risk of saving someone who cannot be rescued.” There was a pause, then pointedly, “Wilbur.”

Wilbur groaned. “What? I-”

“Come back safe.”

Wilbur huffed, snapping his mouth shut with a click.

“Yeah, we got you the first time,” Technoblade said. “Hey, we’ll be back before you know it, and if things go to plan, we’ll even have a few tagalongs as well.”

Wilbur heard Philza sigh long and hard over the comm. “I’ll contact the Federation in case the enderians didn’t have the chance to report this and see if they have anyone else stationed nearby. I’ll keep in touch.” 

“Sounds good,” Technoblade said, and then they disconnected from the call. He turned to Wilbur, motioning forward. “After you.”

Wilbur flared his fins, the flexible material in his suit allowing the stretch. “Seriously?” 

Technoblade rolled his head, striding forward. “Suit yourself. Keep your eyes and ears peeled.”

Wilbur ducked behind Technoblade. The hoglin’s wide form made it easy to keep himself small and hidden as they made their way through the eerily empty halls. Wilbur clicked and chirped every so often, letting the sounds bounce back to him, building an internal map of the ship in his mind.

Technoblade stopped, and Wilbur nearly walked into him, having been too focused on his echoing to notice. “Hey!” he hissed up to the hoglin. “What’s the deal?”

Technoblade shushed him. “You hear that?”

Wilbur tilted his head back and forth, then, between the monotonous buzz of the overhead lights and creaking metal around them, the distant sound of clattering feet slowly filtered itself in. “Arazmist,” he muttered, his fins flaring. He had no doubt his lights were flashing in alarm as well, hidden only by the thick covering of his spacesuit.

“You know where?” Technoblade whispered back, and Wilbur chirped an affirmative.

“Keep to your right, they’re hunting.”

Technoblade grunted, and then they were moving again. Wilbur kept his head down, chirping and clicking whenever they reached a particular fork in the path and keeping his ears open as they navigated themselves through the narrow maze of the Starborne. Technoblade’s bulky form provided some sense of security, but Wilbur couldn’t help but glance behind them every so often, the unfamiliar feeling of being the hunted settling uncomfortably at the back of his mind.

A briny scent drifted through the air, and it made Wilbur’s face pinch. Technoblade seemed to have smelt it too, as he stopped suddenly, turning his head so a single eye met Wilburs. 

“We might be too late,” Technoblade said, and there was no sadness in his voice, no hint of sorrow. It was cold, factual, and it made Wilbur’s lips rise.

“We’re not too late,” he hissed, and stormed by Technoblade, ducking underneath one of his arms in order to squeeze himself in front. The hoglin huffed, but otherwise said nothing else. His slow, hulking steps trailed behind Wilbur.

“Hold on.” The footsteps stopped, and Wilbur glanced back, mouth open and ready to snap at him irritatedly because yes they could keep going and no Wilbur didn’t need a break but-

Technoblade stepped closer to the wall, his hand running along the edge of… something. Wilbur moved closer, squinting his eyes to see what Technoblade had spotted, when the hoglin’s hand suddenly stopped, and a door shimmered into place. They glanced at each other, and then Technoblade was at the controls. Wilbur would have laughed at the sight of the massive hoglin huddled over such a small panel if it weren’t for the sudden nerves that made themselves known at the base of his fins. He glanced down either end of the hall, listening closely.

A sudden hiss had Wilbur snapping his head back to the door, and he watched with growing anticipation as it smoothly slid open. Technoblade turned to him, lowering his head and brandishing his tusks. 

“Stay behind me,” he warned, and then Technoblade was pushing himself through the narrow doorway with Wilbur at his heels. The room was dark, and Wilbur removed  the shades from his eyes so he could see a little easier. Technoblade’s head swivelled, his eyes not used to the dark. Wilbur squeezed by him anyway, much to Technoblade’s audible exasperation.

“It’s a lab,” Wilbur said more to himself than anyone else. “Hello?” he chirped, letting the sound echo and bounce throughout the room. It came back to him broken and messy, as if a windstorm had suddenly formed and flipped everything in the room on itself. “Is anyone here? We’re here to help.”

“Anything?” Technoblade asked, and Wilbur lowered his head. 

“No, not that I…” Wilbur trailed off, his eyes catching on something that sparkled against the low light. Wilbur tilted his head and leaned closer to inspect, ignoring Technoblade’s confused grunts.

It was a shard of glass, no longer than the length of his claws. Wilbur reached out, flicking the piece gently and watching it skitter across the floor to where Wilbur spotted more broken glass gathered at the base of a counter. Strange liquids and other presumed experiments dripped off its edge, pooling onto the floor. Wilbur would have winced in sympathy, if he hadn’t noticed the odd looking seat next to him. 

Wilbur stood and made his way over. It lay horizontal to the ground, and a puffy-looking cushion that reminded him of Technoblade’s pillows sat on one end. He heard said hoglin step closer, peering at the seat from over Wilbur’s shoulder. His eyes fell on the black straps on either side, and he gripped them tightly.

“Looks like they were busy,” Technoblade said, “though whoever or whatever they were experimenting on was even busier.”

Wilbur glanced up at him. “What do you mean?” 

Technoblade pointed to one of the straps in Wilbur’s hands. “There, that’s broken, isn’t it? Whatever it was, it got free.”

He was right. Wilbur examined the strap more closely, noting how they seemed strained at the edges, as if whatever had been held down had fought back valiantly until the straps couldn’t hold it anymore. 

“You think whatever it was is still out there?” Wilbur asked as Technoblade began moving around the room again, checking under desks and around corners. He seemed to have found something, because he paused, then stooped down to pick something up from the floor.

“Dunno,” Technoblade grunted as he began making his way back to Wilbur. “Since the lab is still in such a shape, I would assume this all happened recently.” The item was deposited into Wilbur’s smaller claws, and Wilbur blinked as he recognized it as a data pad. The oval-shaped device sat far more comfortably in his hands than it would for Technoblade, and Wilbur winced at the webbed cracks that covered the screen. He pressed a button, hoping that it would turn on.

The room was suddenly awash with a flickering, orange glow as a small holograph was projected to life, and Wilbur gaped at the sudden influx of information. He exchanged a glance with Technoblade, who seemed just as shocked as him.

“You think they’d be more secure with their stuff,” Technoblade said, but Wilbur ignored the comment, already parsing his way through the data until he came across an image.

It was a rough sketch, and lines pointed to different parts of the creature's body accompanied with stilted, single-sentence notes. It resembled something more akin to a map than a picture with the way they had the creature's limbs cut into different parts, but Wilbur found it didn’t really matter, given what he was looking at. 

Given Technoblade’s sudden silence, Wilbur figured he was in about the same state as him. 

Wilbur’s eyes roved up and down the holograph before they settled at the top. The stark lettering of the label drew in his eyes as he read and reread it, not quite able to believe what he was looking at. But it made sense, in some way. The galaxy that they were currently in, the way the Starborne danced along the edge of the border. They hadn’t just been passing through the restricted area. They were coming back from it.

Gaihenite, read the holograph, clear as water, and then just beneath it, in small lettering that seemed almost foreign to Wilbur but fit it just so perfectly; Human.

It was unprecedented, the amount of information he saw on the screen. It was new, it was… it was historic! The last time they had gotten any new information on humans was when they were first discovered. It was…

“Human,” Wilbur breathed, and as his heart skipped a beat, he felt a familiar spark dance in his chest. This was the new species, that was their word, what they called themselves. It wasn’t a new word in the slightest of course, the galaxy had already known of them since before Wilbur had been born, but this, this was new. To have all this information just sitting in his hands-

Technoblade’s hand slapped itself over the pad, cutting out the light and casting them back into darkness. “Oh no, absolutely not.”

“Wha- Technoblade!” Wilbur snatched the pad away from him and brought it back up, unable to tear his eyes away from the screen. “Aren’t you seeing this? This is incredible!”

“Oh I see it all right,” Technoblade stepped closer, and Wilbur stepped back, hiding the pad behind his back. “I see that look in your eyes, the one you always get whenever this is brought up in some way. Think about it,” Technoblade gestured around him, to the messy lab and the broken straps, and Wilbur felt his stomach sink. “How do you think they got that information? What do you think they had to do to get that information?”

Wilbur glanced at the pad. It felt heavier in his hands than before. 

“Wherever that thing is, it’s loose, and angry. We’re getting off this ship.” Technoblade raised an arm, presumably to call Philza, but Wilbur beat him to it, slapping a hand over his comm and staring the hoglin in the eyes.

“Wherever they are, they’re scared,” Wilbur said, “We can-”

“No,” Technoblade wrenched his arm from Wilbur, who growled in frustration. “Wilbur, you're getting it into your head again. What in Netharr’s sake is it going to take for you to listen for once?! That thing,” Technoblade jabbed a finger at the pad, “is going to try to kill us before we even have a chance to blink. It’s probably already killed off whatever is remaining of the crew, if they haven’t already sacrificed themselves to kill it first. We’re not its friends, and it will never see us that way. Not after what’s been done to it.”

Technoblade stepped away, bringing the comm to his face once again. “Hey, Philza? We’ve got a situation here.”

Wilbur looked down to the pad, and with a sigh, he turned it off. In a way, Technoblade was right. They weren’t here to study, they were here to help. Wilbur stowed away his bubbling excitement and stuffed the pad in a hidden pocket at his side, next to his weapons pouch. After taking one final look around the destroyed lab, he flipped on his shades and joined Technoblade at the entrance to the room, who seemed to have already ended the call with Philza.

“We’re headed for an asteroid field,” Technoblade said in lieu of greeting. “Philza wants us off now.”

Wilbur thrashed his tail. “How long do we have?”

“Not long… unless some sort of outside factor decides to interfere, then I’d count less than that.” Technoblade grumbled. Wilbur glared, ready to retort, but Technoblade beat him to it. “If we hurry, we can make it to the bridge, see if the captain is alive at least. Philza will be meeting us there with the ship.”

Wilbur huffed, but otherwise didn’t bother arguing. So long as they completed the objective they set out to do, Wilbur reminded himself, that was all that mattered. His hand drifted to the pocket where the pad sat as Technoblade began leading them down the hall once more. At least he got something out of this, whether they came out of this mission successfully or not.

He was so distracted by his thoughts, Wilbur hadn’t noticed the sound of clattering feet until it was nearly too late. He lunged forward, grabbing Technoblade by the arm in warning just as an arazmist rounded the corner. 

Both parties froze, the arazmist seemingly caught off guard from having spotted Technoblade and Wilbur, who was currently using the hoglin to hide himself from view. He crawled onto Technoblade’s back and peered over his shoulder, trying to look as small as possible.

A forked tongue licked the air, and then the arazmist’s eyes narrowed. “Intruders,” they hissed, taking a single step forward. Technoblade dropped onto his front legs, and the heavy bang gave the arazmist pause. “What are you doing here?”

“You know,” Technoblade said, “we could ask you the same thing.” He tilted his head so the special plates that covered his tusks glinted in the overhead lights, bobbing them in a challenge Wilbur had long since learned to always back down from. Wilbur’s fins flared as the arazmist took another step closer, albeit a little more cautiously.

“Techno…” Wilbur warned.

There was a deep thrum that came from somewhere on the arazmist, and Wilbur’s eyes were drawn to a tank that sat strapped on its back. The machine flickered, then sprung to life as blue vein-like lights shot throughout the shell of the arazmist, eventually leading to the spiked claws that now dug into the floor with an angry hiss. Their tail unravelled itself, and Wilbur watched the needle with a wary eye, digging his claws into Technoblade as yet another warning that was currently going unheeded. He knew the arazmists were developing new tech, but he didn’t know they would be weapons.

A low growl rumbled beneath Wilbur, rippling through the Technoblade’s thick suit and jarring his scales. 

“I not know where you come from,” the arazmist hissed, “but you take this chance and leave.”

“Techno, maybe we should-'' Wilbur was interrupted by a loud slam as Technoblade brought his fist down, carving a small crater in the metal floor. Wilbur quickly took the opportunity to scramble off of Technoblade’s back.

“If you think we’re stupid enough to turn our backs on you, you’ve got another thing coming,” Techoblade said, his words laced with a heavy growl. “Step aside, we’re headed for the bridge.”

Wilbur’s eyes bounced between the two, far larger species. The arazmist easily towered over Technoblade while the hoglin was lowered onto four legs, but it was Technoblade’s sheer mass and display of strength that seemed to make the arazmist hesitate. 

“Bridge under lockdown,” the arazmist hissed. “We take orders and we follow. Do not get in our way!”

“Orders from who?” Wilbur asked, but the arazmist wasn’t having it.

“No more questions!” They screamed, and Wilbur jolted back. Technoblade lowered himself further, his tusks just grazing the floor as his muscles tensed. “We fight for galaxy, protect it! Get out of our way!”

“Yeah, no. Sorry pal, but we’ve got a crew to save,” Technoblade grunted. The arazmist screamed wordlessly, tail thrashing.

“Fine!” they screeched, and then they lunged. Their claws were outstretched, the spark of blue lighting dancing at their tips and streaking through the air as they jumped at Technoblade, ready to tear through his suit and sink into his skin.

Techoblade was faster. He charged, moving before Wilbur could blink and raising his tusks to meet the arazmist mid-air. They pierced the arazmist’s shell with a sickening crack. The arazmist screeched, and their tail thrashed, taking aim at Technoblade’s head.

Technoblade grabbed the tail. A second fist grabbed the arazmist, pulling them off yellow-stained tusks and they screamed again. Technoblade brought both hands down, pummeling the arazmist into the floor with a heavy bang. A blue-streaked claw caught onto Technoblade’s shoulder, but he merely grunted, shrugging off the attack.

Wilbur’s attention was drawn away from the fighting when he heard another screech, and he whipped his head around.

Another arazmist stood at the other end of the hall, tail thrashing and blue energy already gathering at its claws. Wilbur swallowed.

“Oh,” he said dumbly as their eyes locked onto him, and they screeched.

“Wilbur!” He heard Technoblade yell, followed by a pained grunt. “Run! ”

Wilbur’s eyes snapped to Technoblade who was currently wrestling with the arazmist’s tail, just barely managing to keep the tip from impaling itself into his shoulder. Technoblade’s eyes met his, and he shouted again, “I said run! ”

Wilbur bared his teeth and turned tail just as he heard a second set of clattering claws round the corner. 

Techoblade was strong, he’d seen him fight before. He could handle an arazmist, stars, Technoblade could handle a whole army of arazmist on his own. He would be okay.

He would be okay.

Himself, on the other hand…

Wilbur yelped as something was sent flying over his head. It crashed onto the ground in front of him, and Wilbur didn’t have time to fully acknowledge that the pursuing arazmist had just thrown a piece of the ceiling at him as he scrambled around it and kept running. 

Wilbur felt for one of his pockets, and his claws closed around one of his trappers. He pulled the small orb out of his pocket and whirled around, stumbling and catching himself when he saw the arazmist leap for him from above.

He threw the trapper and it struck the arazmist on the face. It exploded into a hissing web that trapped them in place. The arazmist screeched as the acid from the webs dug into their body, filling the hall with the ugly smell of burning flesh and bone.

Wilbur didn’t hesitate to turn and run again, leaving the sounds of snapping webs and agonised screeching behind. He rounded the next corner, and then nearly fell on his face as he came across another arazmist.

He froze, panting, before realizing the other arazmist wasn’t moving, or even glowing, for that matter. He stepped closer and nudged it with his foot before leaping back.

They were dead. Wilbur gave it a wide berth as he stepped around it for good measure, keeping a wary eye on it until he was on the other side. He could still hear the angry screeching from his pursuer, but the sight of the arazmist corpse made him pause.

Had one of the enderians taken it out? Or…

Wilbur shook his head and moved on, forcing his burning legs back into a run. His body wasn’t cut out for this. Not for the first time, Wilbur wished more people had installed water tanks in their ships.

There was an angry screech of metal behind him, and Wilbur tossed another trapper behind him without looking. Hopefully that would slow the arazmist down until he could contact someone and find an escape.

Each corridor Wilbur turned down looked just the same as the last; endless white halls filled with blinding lights and no doors in sight. Wilbur didn’t have Technoblade’s eyesight, and he sure as death wasn’t going to take the time and check each wall for one. Wilbur stumbled around a corner, tossing yet another trapper behind him when an angry screech sounded. 

“How big is this ship?!” Wilbur gasped out. He couldn’t outrun an arazmist forever, and he had no idea where Technoblade was, or where he even was for that matter.

Wilbur had just passed another turn when he stumbled to a halt, fins flaring as he caught himself against the wall. A sign hung overhead, one that he’d nearly missed in his panic. He took the turn, tossing another trapper to block the path towards the hangar.

Okay. This could work.

Wilbur stumbled into the room and pounded at the panel until the door shut behind him. It sealed him inside with a hiss, and Wilbur slumped against the wall, trembling. 

He didn’t think he’d run that fast since… well…

Wilbur lifted his communicator and tapped Technoblade’s name. “Techno?” he called quietly, trying his best to keep his voice down as it bounced and echoed throughout the hangar. “Do you copy?”

White static answered his calls, and Wilbur sighed, lowering his arm to take in the room. It was smaller than he was expecting from such a large science vessel, and rows of escape pods lined the far wall outside the small entrance he currently found himself in. Wilbur made to take a step further when he noticed something from the corner of his eye. He adjusted his lenses, but it was just as bright in the hangar as it was out in the halls. He squinted, hoping to make it out. Was something on the ground?

Wilbur glanced back to his screen, but Technoblade hadn’t answered his ping yet. He swiped along the hoglin’s information, bringing up his vitals. Wilbur slumped in relief when he saw Technoblade’s hearts were still beating. Perhaps a little faster than normal, but otherwise Technoblade was managing.

Wilbur lowered his arm and brought his attention back to the strange shadow on the other end of the room. He chirped, stepping closer, and then froze as the image came back to him, along with the heavy scent of arazmist blood.

Something shifted, and Wilbur reached for a trapper, letting out another chirp as he slowly inched towards the nearest pod, which happened to already be open. 

The arazmist was dead, that much was clear, but as he began moving closer, the details sharpened and cleared in his eyes. The arazmist was laid on its back, its tail and limbs hanging stiffly in the air. The soft, unarmoured skin of the arazmist’s neck had been torn open and beaten into a bloody pulp. The thick, yellow liquid stained the otherwise clean floor. Wilbur’s stomach twisted at the sight, and he quickly averted his gaze.

He froze when instead he was met with a pair of unfamiliar, wild blue eyes staring back at him from behind the corpse.

An eternity seemed to pass in that brief moment, as Wilbur stared into those alien eyes. They stared back, unblinking, seemingly almost as surprised as he was. Then they narrowed, and the creature stumbled to their feet, and Wilbur only had a moment to connect the dots before he scrambled back, lowering his head and raising his fins until he was as visible as possible. 

“Woah, woah! Not a threat, not a threat!” Wilbur shouted as the human – human, there was a human right there! – took a step forward. They bared their teeth, and they were smaller and blunter than Wilbur’s, but it was the splash of yellow across their features that made him wary. Their arms were stained as well, and Wilbur’s eyes were drawn to the odd colour that was mixed in with the arazmist blood. Was it red? 

The human paused, and tilted their head. Their chest heaved and their limbs trembled, but otherwise they stopped moving. They sucked in a breath and barked something, but Wilbur’s translator merely fizzed an empty sound in his ears. Were they… were they trying to talk to him?

Wilbur tilted his head. “I- I don’t know what-”

The ear-piercing screech of tearing metal interrupted him, and Wilbur jumped, spinning back to the hangar’s entrance. He internally cursed himself for stupidly turning his back on the human, and then cursed aloud as a smoking, angry arazmist burst into the room. Their head whipped in Wilbur’s direction, and they screamed in wordless rage.

Wilbur glanced between the human and the arazmist, and felt his fins flatten.

He was so dead.

Chapter Text

The new alien was fucking weird.

Which was a lot coming from Tommy, but up until this point, he thought the only other creatures that existed this far out were the rabbit fuckers. Well, those guys and the giant, angry arachnids, but he didn’t know if those guys really counted.

The new guy, some salamander-looking asshole who stood on gangly legs was currently hunched over themselves in what looked like a pretty painful crouch. Like this, their head only reached Tommy’s chest despite their incredibly long and skinny body, which Tommy had no doubt would tower over him if they stood straight. Chirps and chitters flew out of Salamander’s mouth as though their life depended on it. Maybe it did, Hell if Tommy knew, he’d never seen one of these guys before. Maybe it was some weird type of alien bluff. The guy didn’t seem all that threatening anyway.

They wore some kind of alien spacesuit with big goggles that covered their face, and some weird grey material covered them from head to twitchy tail that flexed and flicked as something underneath pushed it around. Tommy thought it looked a little bit like fins, but the longer he stared at it the more it creeped him out, so he brought his attention back to the bigger threat in the room: the giant, angry arachnid that was currently roaring at them with all the ferociousness of a rageful… well, space-arachnid.

Tommy was so dead.

His body still felt numb and jittery, and his vision was beginning to fuzz around the edges. He was so tired, and his chest and arm ached fiercely. The ground swayed beneath him, and it took every ounce of strength Tommy had left in him to stay standing and not give in to the increasingly comfortable looking floor.  

Salamander cowered and warbled, which was a new noise, and they glanced back at Tommy. He returned their stare with a blank look. What the hell were they expecting him to do?

The arachnid roared again, and before Tommy even had a chance to blink, it was charging for them. Tommy stumbled back in shock, bracing himself for the inevitable jaw that was going to find itself wrapped around his head, but… it never came. Instead, there was a chirp, and then a startled yelp.

Tommy’s eyes snapped open just in time to watch as a small ball flew towards the oncoming arachnid, and gaped as whatever it was exploded upon impact. Purple coloured webs shot outward and entangled the arachnid mid-charge and brought it crashing to the floor. It screeched, slashing at the webs with its claws and tail almost desperately.

It wasn’t held down for long. Tommy watched with dawning horror as the arachnid twisted and folded around itself in a way that almost looked unnatural as it fought itself free. Its tail was just cutting the last few strands holding it down when Salamander threw another one of the web-grenades, and then turned to Tommy.

Tommy stepped back. He raised his arms, bracing for a web-grenade to be thrown his way and trapped under its hold. He would struggle, only to eventually be eaten alive by the arachnid that would eventually fight itself free as Salamander made their great escape…

Tommy was surprised when none of those things happened, and instead Salamander bobbed their head, and the sail-shaped fin on their back flipped up and down. They let out a low warble, tucking their hands to their chest and doing the head-jerk again.

Tommy blinked at the sails, and then at Salamander, who stood tensed like they were ready to turn tail and run at any second. 

Tommy slowly lowered his arms. “Wh- What are you? Some kind of rescue?” A hysterical laugh bubbled in his chest.

Salamander warbled again, but their tone was a little sharper. They jerked their head to the side, gesturing to one of the many escape pods that Rabbit had tried to take them through earlier. Their tail lashed as the arachnid gave another scream of anger before settling in Tommy’s direction. In his growing delirium, Tommy thought it resembled awfully like someone trying to reach out their hand.

Tommy glanced from the Salamander to the arachnid, who was still fighting with the webs. Half of its eyes were set on Tommy, each one promising death once it was freed.

Well, if he went with Salamander, at least he wouldn’t die immediately. But…

Tommy shook his head and stepped back. “I can’t,” he said. Salamander tilted their head and chittered. “I can’t leave, not yet. Not without One.” Tommy gestured to the escape pod, and Salamander followed it with their eyes before snapping back to him. “Go.”

Salamander chittered, and their head jerked between Tommy and the downed arazmist, though judging by the increasingly frequent snapping and angry snarls, it wouldn’t be down for much longer. Their sail-thing flapped, and Tommy’s already boiling impatience bubbled over.

“I said go !” Tommy took a step forward, curling his hands into fists and baring his teeth, and that seemed to do the trick. Salamander took off with a yelp, scuttling across the floor with oddly shaped boots that were probably made to fit claws or something equally ridiculous instead of normal feet.

However, in Salamander’s sudden haste to escape, they had drawn the attention of the now eerily still arachnid. All six eyes locked onto Salamander as they ran by, and ice-cold fear shot down Tommy’s spine. He reached out, a shout of warning on his lips when–

The arachnid lunged, and the last few strands of webs that were holding it down snapped free. Salamander spun around, but it was too late. Tommy watched the way their glowing eyes widened behind their space-goggles, saw how the fins underneath their suit began to flare out in alarm, saw the arachnid’s tail gleam under the too bright, too white lights above them. Salamander tripped. They hit the ground and scrambled back as the stinger was raised high, settling over their head like a needle-shaped guillotine.

No, it wouldn’t happen again. 

Those bastards wouldn’t take another life that had just tried to help Tommy again.

Tommy lunged for the arachnid, the burning pain in his arm and his sides vanishing for a moment as he screamed a war cry. He grabbed on to one of its hind legs and pulled. The arachnid stumbled to the side, caught off guard. Its head whipped around, six snake-eyes glaring at Tommy as its mouth opened with a rageful hiss.

It tried to shake him off, but Tommy held on. He dug his fingers into the nooks in the arachnid’s armour and pulled himself onto its back. Thin, deep cracks matted the arachnid’s body, which made it easy for Tommy to keep a tight grip. The wounds looked fresh, with some looking melted, even to the point of bubbly. He pulled himself along those wounds, steadily making his way along the arachnid's body and towards its head.

The arachnid screeched and thrashed as Tommy’s hands found its throat. Tommy tugged violently, pulling the arachnid away from the frozen Salamander, who hadn’t so much as moved since Tommy had first leapt for the arachnid.

His fingers dug into the soft flesh at its throat, and Tommy tightened his hold. The arachnid stumbled, choking, and then a heavy pressure found itself burrowing its way into Tommy’s thigh. The pressure quickly transformed into a burning, stabbing pain, and Tommy screamed as the stinger ripped itself free.

Tommy whipped himself around just in time to avoid a second sting, and the tail stabbed at the empty air next to him. Before Tommy could think his next actions through, he was grabbing the stinger before it could pull away with both hands and twisting.

Something cracked, and the arachnid screeched. The tail jerked itself back, and Tommy shouted as he was picked up and flung across the room, stinger in hand.

Stars exploded in Tommy’s vision as he hit the floor, and everything whited out for a moment before the sharp reminder in his thigh brought it all crashing back. He thought he might’ve been screaming, judging by the rawness of his throat, but the ringing in his ears made it hard to tell.

Shapes and sounds blended together in a confusing cacophony that Tommy couldn’t hope to piece together, and his body refused to cooperate as a shadow loomed over him. It raised itself on its hind legs, swinging its blue claws up high. Tommy couldn’t move.

This… was it. Tommy breathed out, and closed his eyes. He was so tired.

Something screeched, and the sound was unfamiliar. Then there was a groan, and Tommy’s eyes shot open. The arachnid stumbled to the side, and then it… collapsed. Yellow pooled from around its neck onto the ground, and through his darkening vision, Tommy made out the silhouette of Salamander rising to their feet. Yellow blood dripped from their misshapen hands, and it took Tommy a second to realize they weren’t hands at all, at least, not hands shaped like a human’s or a rabbit-alien’s. They were claws. Long, hooked, and slickened with yellow blood.

Salamander’s head turned as they were just slipping on their gloves, hiding the claws from view. The world was distorting, mixing together, and by the time Tommy blinked again, the Salamander was hovering over him, reaching for his leg, chittering.

Tommy let himself fall then. As his eyes rolled back and the world faded away, he hoped the salamander-alien would make it quick.

“Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit–”

Wilbur kicked the stinger away from the human, who was staring up at him with a glazed look in their eyes. They blinked slowly, uncomprehendingly, as Wilbur fretted over their leg. A river of red ran down the limb, staining the already dingy-looking clothing they were wearing. The scent of iron was so strong Wilbur could taste it through his suit, and he instinctively clamped his mouth shut. It didn’t make the scent go away, and it sat heavy on his tongue, staining the inside of his mouth until it made him want to gag.

The human took in a shaky breath, their eyes fell shut, and then they went limp. Wilbur wanted to dig his claws into his head. 

The human had just saved his life. And now they were dying. The human, a creature ranked higher than most known species in terms of violence and reckless behavior, had saved Wilbur’s life and was now currently in the process of dying.

What did that mean?!

Did the human just hate arazmists that much? Or had Wilbur just… gotten lucky? Granted, most species did underestimate phantlus in terms of holding their own in a fight but…

Wilbur shook his head. Not now. There was a human – someone – who needed help and Wilbur wasn’t going to let a favour go unpaid. Wilbur reached for the wound on their leg, and praying that human skin worked the same as literally everyone else's, applied pressure. Wilbur ripped apart their clothing with ease, cutting up the pant leg and began to clumsily wrap it around the still-bleeding wound. He watched the human’s shaky breaths as he did so.

“How the fuck are you still alive,” Wilbur hissed under his breath, “how the– shit! ”

Wilbur’s comm rang, and the sound nearly had him jumping out of his scales. He fumbled to accept, ignoring how his gloves were now stained a deep, obvious red. He pushed it to the back of his mind as he answered the call. That was future Wilbur’s problem.

“H-Hello?”

“Oh, Kiitias Kuoltem,” Philza breathed through the other end, the relief nearly palpable in his voice. “Are you alright? I’ve been trying to reach you since Techno called.”

Wilbur glanced between the unconscious human and the arazmist’s corpse. “I- could be worse. Wait, Techno called you? I was trying to reach him earlier.”

“There’s been some kind of interference on the ship,” Philza said, his voice cutting in and out in short, electric bursts. “It likely has something to do with their drive.”

Wilbur frowned. “Drive? What kind of drive interferes with–”

“Not now, listen,” Philza cut in, and Wilbur held back a huff. “You need to get off the ship now. The enderians are going to jump.”

“Jump?” Wilbur’s head shot up, eyes roving the damaged floors of the room. “In this state?”

“They’re getting desperate. Wilbur, are you near any–”

“Wilbur!” Technoblade’s voice blasted through the comm, and for a moment Wilbur thought it would be loud enough to wake the human. It hadn’t. “Where in Netharr are you?”

“I’m in one of their ports,” Wilbur said after his ears had stopped ringing. “There’s already a pod open.”

“Good, get in it, now,” Technoblade huffed. “I found the captain. She’s gonna take the whole thing down. They’ve done something weird to their drive.”

“Okay, but what about you? Where are you?”

There was a grunt from the other end before Technoblade responded. “I’m on the other end of the ship. There’s a second port with more pods stationed there. I’m gonna take one out.”

The ship suddenly groaned and lurched, and Wilbur just barely caught himself from falling over the human. He froze for a moment, unable to breathe until the shaking passed and the lights stopped flickering.

“-ilbur?” The static from the comm was worse than before, and Wilbur whacked the device a few times. “Wilbur, you still there?”

“I’m here. Techno, the survivors–”

“Gone. Sorry, but the pirates got to ‘em before I could. There wasn’t anything I could do.”

“And the Captain?” Wilbur asked, but he already knew the answer.

“She’s staying. Sorry.”

Wilbur lowered his head, his eyes trailing back to the bloody wound on the human’s leg. He watched as their chest rose and fell in short breaths, and despite the guilt that weighed over him, his decision was already made. 

There was still one person he could save.

“Wilbur?” Philza’s soft voice broke the silence, and Wilbur realized he still had to respond.

“I, uh, yeah, I’m on my way.” Wilbur reached for the human, hesitated, then hefted them into his arms. 

They were lighter than he had expected, smaller as well, but Wilbur pushed those thoughts aside as he made clumsy strides towards the open pod. That was something he’d have to think about later.

“Good. Techno’s– launched so– grab him first. You okay to wait until– get to you? Philza asked. Wilbur was already having a hard enough time trying to hear him over the sudden influx of static, but combined with the feedback that was now ringing in his ears it was nearly impossible to make out Philza.

“Yeah, I’m fine,” Wilbur spoke a little more loudly, hoping that Philza could at least hear him from his end. “You’re cutting out, I gotta go!”

With that, Wilbur disconnected from the call. He winced at the future lecture he was probably going to get for hanging up on Philza like that, but once again, that was future Wilbur’s problem.

Right now, he had to figure out how to get off this ship before it blew.

Wilbur stumbled into the pod and hurriedly strapped the human into the closest seat. Their head lolled to the side, and Wilbur hoped they couldn’t get whiplash. They fit snugly into the enderian-designed seats, and after double checking the straps, Wilbur rushed back to the controls and swiftly closed the door.

The ship outside rumbled, and a sudden jolt nearly sent Wilbur sprawling to the floor. He caught himself on the back of another seat, and waited for the tremors to stop before throwing himself towards the helm and quickly strapping himself in.

“Stupid… fucking… enderian buttons!” Wilbur hissed as his claws fumbled against the flat buttons. The ship jolted again, and Wilbur yelped as his face was nearly sent into the hard panel in front of him. 

The force from the jolt seemed to give his claws enough force to finally press the button, and the small cockpit was suddenly awash with a bright, orange glow. Wilbur breathed out in relief, then quickly took control, rushing through the pre-launch checks and diagnostics.

There was a deep groan from outside, then the familiar rumble of a drive being activated deep inside the Starborne. Metal walls creaked and strained around them as Wilbur unlatched the pod and began powering on their thrusters. They were out of time.

After bringing the pod’s velocity up as high as he could, Wilbur reached down and grabbed the control switch next to his seat, curling his claws around it in a death-grip. “This one’s gonna suck!” Wilbur called back in warning, before realizing it was pointless. It was out of habit, more than anything.

He breathed in, out, then brought the switch down.

Wilbur was immediately thrown back as the pod shot out of the Starborne. His fins were crushed against the hard back of the seat, but Wilbur couldn’t move to adjust. A thousand invisible weights pressed against his chest, and the only thing Wilbur could do was grimace and bear it. He eyed the holographic map in front of him, watching as the pod’s red dot slowly began making its way out of the Starborne’s estimated blast zone.

At the halfway mark, Wilbur slowly began pushing up the lever, lessening their speed. Then, once he was able to move his arms again, he brought the power to the front and spun them around just as they passed the blast zone.

He lowered the holographs just in time to see the explosion.

The Starborne jolted forward with the arazmist ship still attached, but it didn’t make it very far. The hind engines exploded in a silent, fiery ball that sent shrapnel flying in every direction. That part Wilbur had expected, and he winced as the burst of white light flared against the pod’s small window. 

The discharge of green light immediately after the first explosion, however, Wilbur had not accounted for. 

It surged outwards in a blinding arc, and Wilbur only had a heartbeat to brace himself before they were hit head-on. The force from the discharge threw them back, the green energy surging through the pod and hitting the lights with an angry crack . Then the lights flickered off, and Wilbur’s heart felt as though it stopped as they lost all power. 

“No, no, no, no, no, no, what was that?! ” Wilbur scrambled for the controls, his claws hitting at the lifeless panel uselessly. “Was that their fucking drive? ”

Wilbur unfastened himself, then nearly floated off with a yelp before realizing his mistake. He quickly activated his boots, stumbling to the floor with a magnetic click. He moved around the panel, occasionally sending glances towards the human, who, if possible, looked even more pale than before.

Wilbur didn’t know what that meant, but he was willing to bet it wasn’t a good sign.

“Come on… there’s gotta be some sort of emergency signal, life support, something …” Wilbur’s eyes combed the cockpit, pressing and examining every inch of the control panel he could, but nothing was working. Eventually he resorted to bringing up his comm, but apparently the green light had affected it too, and it buzzed at him angrily as he thwacked it.

Wilbur sighed, dropping his arm. Without having the means to contact or restore power… All he could really do was wait and hope Philza would find them.

Right…

Wilbur’s eyes drifted back over to the human, whose shallow breathing echoed in the eerie silence of the pod. Wilbur’s fins flared, and he winced at the strain.

“What am I gonna tell them when they see you?” Wilbur asked the silence.

The human said nothing, eyes still closed, still breathing…

…Still bleeding.

Wilbur’s eyes widened. 

“Oh shit,” Wilbur hissed as he rushed over. His hands found the human’s leg, and he pried back the makeshift bandages. Droplets of crimson blood floated into the air, and Wilbur hissed again, closing the bandage and securing it a little more tightly. 

Wilbur stood back up and ran back to the helm, pointedly avoiding the floating droplets around him.

“Please, please, please tell me you guys invented some form of artificial gravity for pods,” Wilbur begged to no one in particular. 

Of course there was no answer, and Wilbur slid back into his seat, ignoring the growing panic that curdled deep in his stomach. “Come on…” Wilbur muttered as he flicked the useless switch next to him. “Come on!”

Wilbur looked up. Outside, the remains of the Starborne floated among the stars. It was destroyed beyond the point of recognition, the entire front half of the ship having broken off and vanished completely. Wilbur blinked as he scanned the space around him. Where… where had the front half gone? Ships didn’t just vanish, even ones that exploded. The Starborne was a massive ship, there was no way an explosion like that would just disintegrate half of it.

Wilbur was frantically scanning the space around them when his eyes fell back to the remaining half of the Starborne, something having caught his eye. He blinked, then squinted.

Was… was the ship still burning?

“What the…” Wilbur leant forward, trying to make out the small glow that sat in the belly of the broken ship. It grew brighter, brighter, and then Wilbur was scrambling to strap himself in as a second explosion was sent rocketing towards them in another burst of green light.

It hit them a little less harder the second time, but it was still strong enough to nearly send Wilbur’s face into the panel. The pod shuddered and groaned, and with an electric crack, the lights flickered to life. Wilbur blinked, stunned, as the holographic dashboard blinked on, displaying and automatically running through a system repair.

Wilbur shot forward in his seat, already grabbing at the information and bringing it to a larger display. “Shit,” he cursed, “it’s all encoded. Computer? Is there a computer on here?”

The screen in front of him flickered, and then a new display was brought up. ‘Yes,’ it read, printed out in bold letters for easy translation. ‘How may I assist you?’

“Okay,” Wilbur’s fins flicked as he enlarged the screen. “Give me a system report.”

The computer buffered, and Wilbur sighed as he waited for it to load, tapping his claws impatiently against the panel. 

‘System analysis complete. Navigation systems: offline. Communication systems: offline. Lighting systems: offline. Emergency lighting: online. Defense Systems: offline. Left Thruster: damaged. Core–’

“Okay, okay! Just… Give me everything that’s working. ”

The computer buffered again, and Wilbur growled. 

‘Emergency life support: online. Core: stable at twenty percent life. Right thruster: online. Manual control: online. System functionality at forty percent capacity. Would you like to send an emergency signal?’

“Yes,” Wilbur groaned into his hand. There was a beat of silence as Wilbur watched the screen pulse softly from between his claws.

‘Critical system error. Could not transmit an emergency signal. Would you like to try again?’

“Why am I not surprised.” Wilbur dismissed the screen with a wave, then carefully brought the pod up to a bearable speed. Without the navigation systems online, Wilbur was hesitant to leave his seat, but he didn’t have much of a choice if he didn’t want to suddenly find himself as the last survivor in the pod.

Not quite comfortable with turning off the magnetic lock on his boots, Wilbur’s feet clicked loudly against the floor as he made his way over to the human, who still remained slumped in their seat, unmoving save for the gentle rise and fall of their chest.

Carefully, Wilbur slowly unwound the bandage around their leg, peering at the wound. He very nearly slumped in relief when he saw it was no longer clotted with floating particles of blood, but now draining as it should be, now that they were moving. Wilbur closed the bandage, securing it tightly before reaching for their other leg and stripping another layer off their clothes. 

As he wrapped another layer around the wound, Wilbur hoped he wasn’t breaking anything sacred by destroying the human’s clothes. It would make a terrible first impression, if the human not only woke up confused, but also incredibly offended.

Wilbur huffed. “Yeah right, since when have any of my first impressions been anything short of terrible? Just my luck.”

After he finished, Wilbur leant back and eyed his work up and down. It wasn’t horrible, and he felt a little proud of his impromptu bandaging. “Huh, maybe Philza was right. Maybe I should look into becoming a doctor. Too late for that though, I suppose.”

The communicator on his arm was still dark, and Wilbur flicked his wrist, hoping to jostle it back to life. It was to no avail, the screen remained black, and he sighed. Whatever that shock had been, it must've drained its life as well.

Wilbur eyed the human, noting the yellow stains on their arms and face. Their skin was pale and almost warm to the touch, and that was enough to give Wilbur a cause for concern. 

“I should see if there’s any water on board,” Wilbur said as he stood from his crouch, carefully stretching his sore fins. “It should help wash out those wounds, in any case. Don’t think it’ll do much to stop the poison at this point, though.”

Wilbur paused, glancing back at the human. “...You’re not adverse to water, are you?”

Turns out, despite enderian’s natural adversity to water, they did have some on board the pod. It had been under tight lock and key, and Wilbur found himself resorting to breaking into the small safe stashed underneath one of the chairs in order to grab a bottle. After testing a small drop on the human’s arm and it decidedly hadn’t left any noticeable burns or rashes, he let the rest of it fall, splashing against the wound on their arm and reopening the bandage so he could splash some on the leg as well.

After the bottle had been drained, Wilbur sat back and sighed, looking over the human. Their breathing was shallow, but not uneven, and they shivered in their sleep. The poison must’ve still been working through their system, despite the quick wash Wilbur had given them.

“How are you still alive?” Wilbur muttered to himself, clinking his claws against the bottle. He had tried to wash off as much blood as he could from his own hands, but it had long since stained. At least he had gotten rid of the smell.

Arazmist were notorious for not just their acts of pirating across the galaxy, but their deadly stingers that held enough poison to kill most species twice over. It was fast-working, painful, and feverous, and it had taken years before the Federation had successfully announced a cure. To see that the human was still breathing was nothing short of a miracle.

Then again, while arazmist were notorious for carrying a deadly poison, humans were notorious for their inexplicable ability to survive almost anything.

He was lucky, Wilbur thought, that the human had managed to tear the stinger off the weakened arazmist. It had given Wilbur the chance to leap onto its back and kill them before any more harm was done. If the human hadn’t managed it… 

“I wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for you,” Wilbur said, watching the bottle roll between his claws. “Heh, a human saved my life. If only Techno could’ve seen it.”

Wilbur frowned, staring long and hard at the bottle. “He probably would’ve killed you. And now we’re stuck here, waiting for them to pick us up. And when they see you…”

He lowered his head, dropping the bottle to rub at his nose. 

“Stars, what am I gonna do?”

Chapter Text

“Okay, let’s try this again.”

Wilbur pushed himself up with a groan, shaking his limbs to try to rid himself of the stiff feeling from having been lying on the cold, hard floor of the pod. He pressed both hands flat against the console as he stared at the floating, orange screen in front of him.

“Computer, transmit an emergency signal.”

The screen flashed briefly, buffering.

‘Critical system error. Could not transmit an emergency signal. Would you like to try again?’

“Fucking– could you be any more useless?!” Wilbur cursed as he lowered himself back onto his stomach, maneuvering around the pilot’s seat and shoving himself back into the console’s wirey mess. “Stupid enderian technology! Accessible, my tail fins. I’d bring this up with the Federation if we weren’t in this situation.”

Wilbur grabbed at one of the wires he’d been messing with and unplugged it. The thin rubber slipped from between his claws, and Wilbur growled. “Depths, I’d bring it up with them right now if I could fucking transmit a message!”

After a few more desperate attempts to grab the fallen wire, Wilbur eventually managed to hook a claw around the slippery thing, and he inserted it into a new plug, all while somehow managing to avoid clipping the other wires with his claws. For once, he was glad he had paid attention to whatever Technoblade was doing when he was working on rewiring the SBI. While Wilbur himself wasn’t necessarily… gifted… in that area, the hoglin had taught him a good thing or two whenever he had the time to watch.

“Okay,” he said as he stood after resetting and reorganising the wires for what felt like the millionth time. “Let’s try this again. Computer, please transmit an emergency signal.”

The orange screen buffered. Wilbur watched it with all the patience of a boiling geyser.

‘Critical system error. Could not transmit an emergency signal. Would you like to try again?’

Wilbur nearly screamed. “What am I doing wrong here?! Fucking–” Wilbur dropped back to the floor and shoved his head back under the console. “I replaced the fried wires, redirected spare power, rebooted the system, what more do you want from me?”

The silence that followed his outburst taunted his rhetorical question. Wilbur huffed, grabbing a few wires and inspecting them closely. A few still had hints of scorch marks along the sides, and while Wilbur had originally deemed those ones fine to use, he removed them anyway with a grumble, and replaced them again using the wires that were meant for the pod’s lighting.

The lights around him dimmed immediately, but the sudden darkness didn’t bother Wilbur. He leaned towards the orange screen. “Computer,” he said tiredly, “transmit an emergency signal.”

The orange screen buffered.

‘Transmitting…’

Wilbur’s heart leapt, and for a brief moment he felt hope begin to build in his chest.

And then it came crashing down the next instant.

‘Radio wire damaged. Could not transmit an emergency signal.’

Wilbur hung his head, letting it thump against the hard panel. “Of course.” Of course his life couldn’t ever be a simple one.

Wilbur lifted his head and stared out the window, watching as they passed by countless stars and distant chunks of floating rock. With the pod set at a slow spin, the remains of the Starborne would pass them by every so often, and Wilbur found the sight no less jarring than when he’d first seen the aftermath of the explosion.

Wilbur hoped that staying in relatively the same place would help Philza find them, if just a little faster, but with every heartbeat that passed by without any sign of his fellow crew, Wilbur couldn’t help the worrying knot that twisted in his stomach. But right now, he couldn’t focus on them. Right now, Wilbur had something that needed to be fixed.

The radio wire wasn’t located anywhere within the pod. If he wanted to fix it… Well, ideally, he would have to stop the pod first… but…

Wilbur turned to the culprit, who hadn’t so much as shifted since Wilbur had first started working on fixing the emergency transmission. Their head hung low to their chest, which continued to rise and fall with labored breaths, and Wilbur winced in sympathy as he stepped closer.

“I’ll get that antidote soon,” Wilbur muttered, though whether he was reassuring the unconscious human or himself he wasn’t sure. “I promise. I just need a little more time.”

Wilbur’s eyes fell to the bandage that had long since begun to soak through and he knelt to unpeel it. The wound hadn’t changed much since he’d last checked it, but somehow, somehow, the bleeding in their leg had already begun to slow down. Really, the fact that they could heal faster than expected shouldn’t have surprised Wilbur as much as it did, given that they were a human, and humans were weird.

It was a relief, though. It meant at least Wilbur was doing something right. But even still, the wound was still bleeding, and Wilbur couldn’t properly assess what the internal damage was. So that only really left him with one option, and that was to keep the pod moving and the artificial gravity flowing.

With a resigned sigh, Wilbur rewrapped the bandages and pushed himself up. He adjusted his gloves and helmet, making sure they were sealed tight before making his way towards the airlocked doors. He chanced a glance back, making sure the pod was still on a steady and clear course, or as clear as it could be, before stepping into the chamber. 

The door slid shut behind him. It was quiet, like the chamber itself was holding its breath for him. Wilbur steadied himself, allowing the clicking from his grav boots to serve as a sort of firm reassurance. He was still here. He was still okay. He would fix this.

Wilbur didn’t need to scan the small chamber to know that the enderians hadn’t prepped a tether for the pod like the idiots they were, so he grabbed at the edges of his gloves and felt for the dial underneath his wrists. His claws found them with a click, and with a gentle thrum of energy, the magnets were activated.

“Okay.” Wilbur shook out his wrists as he approached the door. “Just a quick out and in. It’s a quick trip. Don’t think about it, Wilbur, just go. Just go.” Wilbur took a breath, then he brought his hand to the panel. There was a scan, a beep as the space around him depressurized, and then the door was open.

The first thing Wilbur noticed, the first thing that everyone will always notice whether it’s their first time stepping outside or their millionth:

Everything was silent.

He could feel the rumbling of the pod’s engines under his gloves, but it went unheard. His breathing echoed in his ears, yet still somehow quieter than the deafening silence of space. It stretched forever with no end in sight, an overwhelming darkness that even Wilbur’s eyes couldn’t see through, yet held them captive. The stars spun around him in a dizzying spectacle of flashing lights, and Wilbur gripped the sides of the door.

Something beeped behind him, a warning that the door had been open for too long. It was now or never. Wilbur closed his eyes, tightened his grip, and took another steadying breath. Then he swung himself out of the chamber.

His claws scraped uselessly against the hull of the pod, but the magnets in his suit held true. From the corner of his eye, Wilbur watched as the door slid shut, cutting him off from the inside. Wilbur forced himself to shrug it off. He could get back in, it was fine, he just had to focus on moving. Just go.

Slowly, Wilbur lifted a hand and brought it forward, pressing it flush against the hull and then pulling himself forward. He kept his eyes on the pod as he crawled towards its front, focused entirely on sticking to the pod rather than where he was going. The force from the pod’s momentum was hardly felt, but Wilbur didn’t need to remove the magnets to know that he’d be left behind in an instant if he let go. He pressed himself close to the hull, flattening his body as best he could and focused on moving forward as the pod spun itself round, and round.

It was a slow walk, with stars, cosmos, and distant rocks flying around him at dizzying speeds. Wilbur ground his jaw. He couldn’t stay out here for long. There wasn’t anyone inside who had control over the pod, and if they flew into a nearby asteroid field, they were done for.

Wilbur chanced a glance up, hoping to gather the distance left between him and the wire, but instead found himself face to face with an incoming piece of debris. 

“Shit!” Wilbur yelped and without thinking, rolled aside, the small piece of rock harmlessly bouncing off the hull of the pod instead of crushing him dead. 

For a moment, Wilbur was weightless, the fact he wasn’t connected to the pod hardly registering in his mind until it was nearly too late. Instincts kicked in, and Wilbur twisted violently, slamming his hands into the hull. The lights around the wrists of his gloves flickered wildly as he latched back on, a muted shriek in oppressing silence.

He stopped moving.

Wilbur froze, shuddering, keeping his eyes firmly on the pod beneath him as he regained control. His body ached from where he had twisted unnaturally in order to regain his grip, but he couldn’t focus on it now. He lifted his head, grounding himself, breathing deep.

The radio wire sat in front of him, only a few paces away. He hadn’t fallen far.

He could do it.

He lifted a hand, keeping all limbs firmly planted, and slowly brought it forward, waiting until all lights flashed once as the magnet silently clicked in place before moving again.

He kept up the pace, moving at an agonizingly slow crawl, watching out for more debris, until he reached the radio wire.

The wire stood supported by thick, metal beams that Wilbur had to grab on to for support as he pushed himself up to examine it. The wire itself seemed fine, which Wilbur was relieved to see, so he moved to the base of the wire, and searched for a small panel. 

His claws found the square-shaped divot in the hull, and he dug his claws into it. With some strained effort and a grunt, it came open, and then Wilbur was face-to-face with a small cluster of scorched wires and buttons. Wilbur’s head fell in dismay as the damage sunk in.

…This was going to take a while.

The airlock slid open with a hiss, and Wilbur stumbled back into the pod, gasping for air and pressing himself against the wall in an attempt to keep his burning limbs upright. The scene that greeted him was no different than the other six times he’d come and gone, albeit now far darker than before, given Wilbur had ended up using every wire in the lighting system in order to restore the radio wire.

He desperately hoped that this trip had been the last.

“Generator’s fixed,” Wilbur said as he passed the unconscious human. His suit scraped against the floor as he dragged his tail behind him, unable to find the energy to keep it lifted anymore. “Wires are all replaced and functional, and,” Wilbur sighed as he lowered himself into his seat and assumed control over the pod once more, steering them clear from a bigger piece of rock that had been floating a little too close to them for comfort. “I finally found a replacement for the one I dropped last time. I just hope you’re not opposed to the dark.”

Wilbur didn’t know exactly why he kept the human updated despite their lack of consciousness, not to mention the lack of understanding they would have if they could even hear his ramblings. It just made him feel a little less lonely, he supposed.

Wilbur cleared his throat. “So hopefully, this time it’ll work.” He paused, taking in the console and the bundled mess of wires inside it. “...Maybe.”

Shaking his head, Wilbur swiped a hand across the console, powering on the orange screen.

“Computer,” Wilbur said, then steeling himself, “transmit an emergency signal.”

The orange screen pulsed.

‘Transmitting…’

Wilbur held his breath.

‘Transmission is now broadcasting. Please remain calm. Help is on the way.’

“It… It worked.” Wilbur stared slack-jawed at the screen as his mind caught up with the words printed across the screen. He blinked hard, as if they would vanish once he looked away, but they remained there – real, emboldened hope. It worked.

“It worked. It worked!” Wilbur shot out of his seat with a laugh, the trill coming from deep inside his throat and echoing around the pod in short, breathless gasps. His chest and limbs burned, but Wilbur didn’t care. Help was on the way, they were going to be okay.

“You hear that?” Wilbur asked over his shoulder as he slid back into his seat. He twisted a dial, and a low-pitched, pulsing wail sounded throughout the pod. “That’s us. They can hear us now, they’re coming.”

Wilbur turned to the human, and the brief burst of exhilaration that had raced through his veins was quickly doused. Wilbur set his jaw, turning away and focusing on the small beacon that blinked in time with the pod’s wails. “It won’t be much longer now.”

Wilbur reclined his seat and twisted onto his stomach, allowing his fins a bit of reprieve. As he shifted, something dug into his side, and Wilbur’s face pinched, confused. “What the…”

He reached for his pocket, and as his claws rested atop a familiar smooth surface, recognition came rushing back. Wilbur shot up, hastily pulling the data pad from his pocket and held it aloft, examining the glass for any spare damage.

“Well, the outer shell seems unharmed… Maybe…” Hesitantly, Wilbur pressed a claw against the button. The holograph flickered dangerously as it came to life, and its life bar blinked an angry black in the corner of the screen, but it was working. Wilbur let out a small laugh as the holograph stabilized itself and the words cleared. Well, now he had something to do. 

And so, with the wailing transmission echoing throughout the otherwise silent pod, Wilbur began to read.

The summer air was warm, shimmering in the blinding sky. The hillside was swathed with soft grass that bent to the wind's touch, and within it, the cicadas sang, their discordant song echoing across the near-empty hillside.

“Hey, what are you doing all the way out here?”

The earth was cool, and the grass brushed against his exposed skin in gentle waves as a soft breeze gusted by, providing some relief against the ever growing heat of the midday.

“Shouldn’t I be asking you that question?”

Children’s laughter, distant, echoed from further down the hill. He ignored them, as he always did.

There was another laugh, closer, as footsteps drew near, crunching the cool grass until a shadow fell over his face, blotting out the white sun.

“Well, to be fair I asked you first.”

His features were blurred, overshadowed by the overwhelming light, but he could hear the smile in his voice.

He shrugged, carelessly parting the grass around his shoulders. “Iunno.”

“Ah, elusive today, are we?”

The shadow fell, and the sun returned at full force, blinding and hot. The grass shifted as the shadow sat next to him. “Thinking about anything in particular?”

The grass tickled his face, and he fought the urge to sneeze. “No.”

“Really? Well, I’ve been thinking a lot these last few days.”

“Don’t hurt yourself.”

There was a wounded gasp as a hand playfully slapped his leg. “Don’t be rude!”

The feeling lingered, and he shifted as the sun’s heat continued to bore relentlessly down on his exposed skin. “Sorry, sorry. What are you thinking about?”

“Tomorrow, of course. Who here isn’t?”

The wind stilled, but the cicadas continued to sing and the children continued to laugh. The air grew warmer without it, sweltering, like an uncomfortably thick blanket had been placed over his head. 

“You sure you still want to go, kid?”

He still couldn’t see the shadow’s face, but he felt his eyes on him. Searching, patient. He shifted his leg, but the cool grass did nothing to alleviate his growing discomfort. 

“Yeah,” He tried to meet the shadow’s eyes as best he could. “Wouldn’t miss it for the world.” The heat began to burn. It choked him, drying up the air before he could breathe it in. He coughed, and the heat in his leg flared.

“You should get that checked out.”

“Huh?”

“All that. It’s supposed to stay inside you, isn’t it?”

He opened his mouth in confusion, but froze when a metallic tang ran down his tongue. His body was on fire, the grass unable to keep the heat at bay. Something was wrong. His arms felt weak and rubbery, but he managed to get them under himself anyway. Slowly, he pushed himself up into a seat. Trembling, exhausted, burning, Tommy took a strangled breath, and 

looked 

down. 

The sun blinked out.

The world came crashing down in a fiery explosion of white-hot agony. He couldn’t see, everything was black and his leg was on fire. His leg, his leg–

Tommy opened his mouth and screamed. The sound tore into his throat, and he felt it more than heard it over the ringing in his ears as the heat ate away at every inch of his skin, and his leg was on fire, but he couldn’t move. He had to move, he had to get out get out get out– hands scrambled at restraints that held him down, and he cried out when he couldn’t break them. He was trapped, he couldn’t breathe. A cry for help formed at his lips as he opened his mouth to scream again.

Green lights blinked in the corner of his vision, and Tommy whipped his head towards them. They floated within the dark, watching, like two massive eyes. The lights blinked, briefly casting the world back into darkness, and Tommy realized they were eyes. Large, predatory eyes, hidden, waiting. It was going to eat him, he was going to die –

Tommy kicked out at the thing, ignoring the angry, star-bursting flare in his leg as it was jostled. “Get the fuck away!” he screamed. “Don’t fucking touch me! I’ll kill you! I will kill you!”

The lights blinked out, and Tommy was left heaving in the dark. Alone. His eyes bounced around his surroundings, frantic, unseeing. The briefest flash of light caught his eye. Tommy blinked, latching on to the source like a starved man. A window, he thought distantly. It looked like a window.
It was dark outside, with only millions of spinning, little lights outside left to brighten the space. Stars , his muddled, half-fried brain provided after a moment, and Tommy watched them, transfixed. They provided little light wherever he was, and Tommy blinked heavily as slowly but surely, muddied shapes began to solidify in the dark.

He breathed in, and out.

He was… somewhere? Wherever he was, it definitely wasn’t the place he last remembered. He vaguely recognized the layout of the area; a small row of oddly-shaped seats were placed across from him, and a small console sat just underneath the starry window to his right. A closed door sat at his left. One that he didn’t remember walking through. A low wail echoed throughout the space like a whale’s call, quiet enough that he hadn’t noticed it at first, having settled into the back of his mind as white noise.

He breathed in, and out.

A shuffle in the dark was quick to remind Tommy that he wasn’t alone, and he squinted, trying to make it out. It lay underneath the pilot seat near the front, hiding the majority of its form from his view. A sliver of green peered from behind the seat, a fraction of its original size. Watching him, waiting.

Tommy bit back the scream building in his throat and swallowed, shuddering. He would have to conserve as much energy as he could if it decided to attack. Something nagged at the back of his mind though, poking at his brain through the heavy fog that had settled over it. There was something unsettlingly familiar about those eyes, he thought as they blinked open once more, deeming his silence as seemingly safe.

Tommy glared, trying to piece the hazy puzzles of the past together, and when the creature shifted to a crouch, it finally clicked. 

“Salamander?” Tommy croaked, and winced when his voice came out cracked and sore. Salamander froze, and blinked again. A rumble came from them, low and oddly familiar. They moved towards him, and Tommy jolted back. “No, no, stay back. Back!”

Salamander stopped moving. They hunched into themselves, their long body folding over itself as they tucked their claws close to their chest. They watched Tommy, frozen, through their goggles.

“Okay,” Tommy breathed out, long and slow. It turned into a hiss as his leg flared up again, the heat around the wound nearly unbearable. “Shit.” At least he wasn’t trapped with one of those spider-arachnid monsters.

His head thumped back against the headrest, and Tommy winced as his neck twinged at the action. God, everything was sore. Breathing felt like a chore, his head felt like it was set on fire and then stuffed with cotton, and his leg felt no better, if not worse. He just wanted to sleep.

He opened his mouth, dry and cracked. “Where… where am I?”

Salamander rumbled, and Tommy shot them a look. “What the fuck do you want? This is your fault, isn't it?”

That seemed to shut them up, and Salamander shuffled awkwardly in place. The way they crouched with their front claws nearly touching the floor, and how they stared up at Tommy with big, oval eyes gave Tommy the distinct impression of a kicked puppy, but he quickly waved the thought away. There was no way he was going to start comparing a fucking alien to a goddamned dog.

Frankly, Tommy blamed the probable concussion.

“Fuck,” he said eloquently. “What the fuck happened?”

Salamander said nothing, just continued to stare up at him with those big eyes that were only serving to unnerve Tommy at this point. Did the fucker even blink? Tommy glared. “Blink, motherfucker.”

Salamander didn’t blink. Tommy groaned, and let his eyes drift back to the window, watching as the stars spun around them, slow, slow, slow…

He didn’t remember much before he woke up. His memories were muddled, overcast by a stifling fog that he was too exhausted to fight against. If he strained, he remembered the arachnids, Salamander, who’d tried to help him, flashing lights, screaming, a stinger slicing through his leg…

Tommy’s brow pinched. He was forgetting something, something big, but what?

A voice startled him from his hazy thoughts, a weird mix of clicks and tonal shifts that were too foreign to be any sort of human language. Tommy’s eyes shot open, he hadn’t realized he’d closed them, and he found himself near face-to-face with Salamander, who was hovering their snout over his injured leg.

“Fuck!” Tommy shouted, and he kicked out in panic. Salamander yelped and dove out of the way, but they didn’t move fast enough, and Tommy’s foot nicked their shoulder.

The world whited out. Agony, blinding and hot shot through his nerves and Tommy jerked back, a soundless scream trapped in his lungs over the bile building in his stomach. He didn’t know how long he stayed like that: frozen in a world of empty, white pain, but as it finally began to fade and the pod started to swim back into focus, Salamander’s frantic chittering was the first thing that greeted his ringing ears.

“D’you ever shut up?” Tommy groaned, but Salamander either didn’t hear him or ignored him entirely, focused on flipping through some sort of weird, orange device in their hands.

Tommy groaned again. Fuck, this was just his luck, wasn’t it? Getting dumped from one alien spaceship to another, with an equally, if not stranger alien than the last. What the hell did he do in his last life to end up like this?

“Prolly somethin’ fucked up,” he muttered to himself. He raised a trembling hand to his head, grimacing at the pool of sweat he managed to swipe off his forehead. He hadn’t felt this bad before he’d passed out, right? What the hell happened to him? His head throbbed the longer he dwelled on it, and Tommy was suddenly grateful for the darkness that enshrouded him. He couldn’t imagine the migraine he’d be struck with if the lights were on.

A chirp drew him back to the alien hunched over their weird tablet-looking thing, and Tommy glared at them. “What?” 

Salamander glanced between him and the device, then held it aloft, like they were comparing him to whatever was on the screen. Tommy rolled his eyes. Great, another scientist. Maybe if he was lucky he’d die on their operating table before they could glean anything from him this time.

Salamander fumbled with the device, and Tommy watched with mild amusement as they dropped it a few times in what he could only assume was an attempt to hold it with one clawed hand. If nothing else, at least this one was entertaining. The rabbit-fuckers could only get so entertaining after days upon weeks upon months of watching them do the same things over and over again.

Salamander growled lowly, and finally gave up, settling with putting the device on the floor. They glanced between him and the screen once more, flexing their gloved claws. They brought up a hand, and Tommy flinched. Hidden claws flashed under bright lights, spewing a rush of yellow blood into the air, deadly, sharp, and… waving.

Waving?

Tommy breathed, in, and out. He blinked, staring at Salamander’s choppy movement. Their arm jerked from side to side, but it was clear in the way their palm was facing outward and in the way their forearm was held high, that it was supposed to be a wave. A human greeting.

A croon made its way out of the alien, a small sound that sounded ironically alien in their voice, but reminded Tommy an awful lot of all those talking dog videos from back home. The realization hit Tommy like a speeding truck, piercing through the fog and clicking in his mind as he slowly pieced it together.

It was muffled from behind their mask-helmet thing, but the word was there, and Tommy could hear it clear as day.

They were saying ‘Hello’.

Or, at least they were trying to.

Salamander glanced from Tommy to the device again when he made no move to reciprocate. They growled something to themselves, and then tried again. The same, grumbling croon broke Tommy from his shock, and he snapped his mouth shut from when it must’ve fallen open.

“Are… Are you trying to say hello?”

Salamander’s head snapped up at his voice, and they waved again, making the same crooning noise. Tommy laughed, disbelief colouring the broken sound, and Salamander jumped back, the fins under their weird suit flaring up in response.

“No, no,” Tommy shook his head, ignoring the sickening spin the room made as he did so. “I-I’m not… okay.” He looked Salamander in the eye, and raised his hand, mimicking their ramrod straight posture as best he could. His arms weren’t cooperating as well as they were supposed to be, and everything that wasn’t on fire felt rubbery and disconnected, but he didn’t care. He was too exhausted and delirious to care. He waved sluggishly.

“Hello.”

Tommy figured if he were in the right state of mind and if he hadn’t previously been captured by aliens for however long he could remember, he would probably be a little more in a state of: ‘Holy shit, I just fucking waved at an alien.’

Actually, that was probably the state Salamander was currently in, judging by how they immediately perked up and waved back with an enthusiastic croon that sounded nothing like a ‘hello’ this time around, but hey, they seemed to have the spirit of it. Tommy snorted, and waved again. “Hello.”

Salamander chittered, and their fins flapped in what Tommy could only assume was happiness. Their tail wagged from side to side, knocking into the cushioned seats behind them, but they didn’t seem to care as their head enthusiastically bobbed up and down. Tommy shrugged, letting his head fall back against the headrest and closing his eyes. A happy alien was better than an angry one, he supposed. Maybe he could actually get in some good rest with this one around.

Or, maybe not. Salamander chirped loudly, and Tommy cracked open an eye to glare at them. “What do you want now?”

Salamander brought up a hand, and slowly brought all four fingers to their palm, forming an oddly-shaped fist. They extended a finger, and, after double checking the device, pointed at Tommy’s leg, crooning.

Tommy groaned. “Yeah, no shit. I know I’m injured, dumbass.”

Salamander’s head tilted at his words, and in a brief spout of delirium, Tommy wondered if he could teach them how to curse instead. At the very least it would give him a good laugh out of this.

Salamander bobbed their head, and pointed at Tommy’s leg again, letting out a trilling cacophony of words that Tommy didn’t even bother with attempting to piece together. He groaned again, and pushed himself upright in his seat so he could get a good look at the injury. He should probably be tending to it anyway.

“Look, you don’t have to keep pointing at it. I know I gotta fix it so would you just fucking let it… go…” Tommy blinked at his leg, his wrapped and cleaned leg , then back up at Salamander, who was still pointing at him. “Did you… Did you bandage this?”

Salamander trilled something, and then pointed their finger at themselves, and bobbed their head. Tommy blinked. “Well, shit.” He reached down and fumbled around the tie that was just barely holding it all together. His pant legs were ruined for sure, cut down into choppy shorts now, but he couldn’t help the small spark of gratitude in his chest. “Thanks, I guess,” he grumbled, focused on trying to loosen the knot so he could tie it properly.

Salamander chirped, and Tommy startled when they stepped closer. 

“No, back!” He kicked out with his good leg, and Salamander stumbled back, eyes wide behind their goggles. Tommy flashed his teeth at them in a silent snarl, and it seemed to have the same effect as it did on the rabbit-fuckers. Salamander jerked, suit fins flaring and doubling over themselves as they frantically widened the space between them.

He waited until Salamander stopped moving, and the pounding of his heart no longer deafened his ears to breathe again. “Stay,” Tommy growled. He turned back to the scrappy mess of bandages. “Just… I can fix it myself.”

The bandages themselves weren’t too shabby for such quick improvisation by an alien, Tommy had seen worse by human standards, so he hardly needed to do anything other than tighten the pressure and retie it properly around his leg. 

“They taught us how to do this in school,” Tommy spoke mostly to himself, if just to keep himself awake to finish the job. His leg flared at the smallest touch, and each tug from the bandages made the edges of his vision fade a little darker. “Don’t remember much about it now, stupid brain fog, but I do remember it was important– shit – that we passed.”

Salamander said nothing as he finished the job with a sharp tug, and with great effort, pushed himself back upright. They watched him with those same wide eyes from across the room, unmoving. Wiping more sweat off his brow, Tommy leant back and met their eyes. “So, if I decide to pass out, you’re not gonna eat me or anything, right? That’d just be a waste, I think.”

Salamander blinked, glancing from him to the device they had left behind in their frantic scrambling. They chirped something quietly.

Tommy huffed, and closed his eyes, unable to keep them open any longer. “Yeah, figured,” he mumbled, letting the temptation of sleep pull him away from the blistering pain of consciousness. Sound faded soon after, leaving behind nothing more than the strange whale call, and a quiet, questioning croon.

Chapter Text

Wilbur had spoken to a human. He had spoken to a human! In human language! With human gestures!

Wilbur was over the moons. He couldn’t believe it. Ages of daydreams, squabbles, debates and bullying had all paid off in this single moment, where he had successfully communicated with a Gaihenite class death worlder. For once in his life Wilbur didn’t regret a single decision he'd made that had led up to this new step in history.

Oh Stars, Depths, and Watchers above, if only Philza and Technoblade had been there to see it. What Wilbur would give to rub it in their faces, in everyone’s faces, that he had been right. Humans weren’t the savage monsters everyone made them out to be. They were so much more.

But... The human still had yet to open their eyes again, and they had gone eerily still. Wilbur quieted, happy trills turning to worried warbles. Shifting in place, Wilbur forced himself to calm down. He wasn't doing any good celebrating early.

He cleared his throat.“Hello?”

Wilbur flicked a fin and glanced between the data pad and the human. He opened and closed his jaw, unsure, and the high of his discovery quickly sank into the pits of his stomach. “Hello?” He tried the sound again, the one that the human had reacted positively to, but the human made no indication that he was heard.

Were they… 

Wilbur shook himself. No. Besides, they had been moving around just fine before! Not to mention Wilbur’s ears were still ringing from when they’d first awakened, having scared the ever-living soul out of him and knocking him from his chair in a panic. Despite what little he’d already known about humans, he hadn’t known they could get that loud, even while they were sick.

Wilbur shuffled closer, eyeing the human’s face warily for any sign of movement, but they were unresponsive. The bandage around their wound had since deepened with colour, and Wilbur grimaced. They must have reopened the wound from all that thrashing. He stepped closer, eyes flicking between the human’s face and their leg until he was close enough to touch. 

Much to his relief, Wilbur noticed that their chest was still moving in time with the weak puffs of air from their mouth. They were alive, but given their fits of consciousness and the subtle rattle in their breathing, Wilbur wasn’t sure for how much longer. Wilbur frowned. That thrashing hadn’t done much help in stopping the poison from spreading either.

On the bright side though… Wilbur redirected his attention back to the bandage around the human’s leg. He admired the tight knot the human had tied themselves before stepping back and swiping the data pad from the floor. 

“Opposable thumbs…” he mused to himself as he swiped along the scattered bits of information on the screen. “What Technoblade wouldn’t give for more hands like those on board.” 

The small paragraph on human greetings wouldn’t be much help now, Wilbur thought bitterly as he swiped it away. Not that there had been much information on that subject to begin with. It would seem the enderians had more interest in human biology rather than their culture or behavior. Nonetheless, Wilbur made a note to revisit the languages section once they were no longer in a life-or-death situation.

Defense Mechanisms, the next page read, and Wilbur swiped through it. He’d already had a taste of that, the reminder coming in the form of a small twinge in his shoulder from where he’d been nicked. 

Physiology, Bone Structure, Oxygen Levels, Muscle Strength, Blood Types, Sleep Cycles… Wilbur rushed through each page, only pausing briefly to read what few words caught his eye, but there was nothing on resistance or medicine that he could find.

How long had they been studying humans to be getting this sort of information? In all his life, Wilbur knew next to nothing about humans, and he’d been obsessed with them for as long as he could remember. He would even be willing to wager that if he’d somehow had access to the Federation’s top level library, there wouldn’t be nearly as much information on the species as there currently was on the data pad in his claws.

…How long had this human been studied for so the enderians could learn this sort of information? 

Wilbur’s eyes drifted up to the human. Their skin was slowly turning an awful, ashen colour. It hadn’t been noticeable before, but the longer the poison remained in their system, the more pallid they grew. 

Wilbur was willing to bet that wasn’t a very good sign.

Wilbur shook his fins and returned to the tablet. The sooner he could get them the cure, the better. But trapped like this, there was nothing he could do. All he could do was read, and see if there was something– anything, that could save them.

The pod around them creaked and groaned as Wilbur buried his snout into the data, lost to his own research. Eventually, a page grabbed his attention, and he stilled his hand long enough to read the paragraph.

“In humans, the immune system is complex, and a mystery to enderians. Humans contain a network of biological processes that protects the body from outside invaders, including different forms of bacteria, fungi, and toxins. Those listed below are the toxins and bacteria that have been proven ineffective against the human immune system.”

The list, Wilbur found as he swiped down to read, was long. Wilbur felt his fins stiffen and the colour in his veins begin to drain when he recognized a few formulas from the list. They had… the enderians had tested these on a live specimen with conscious thought. Each toxin listed, more deadly than the last, had been injected into a conscious being.

And the human had lived.

The implications left Wilbur’s head spinning, the idea that the information within the very data pad he held had been taken through actions that were punishable by exile or worse. Depths, Wilbur could pick out a few names on that list that would strike him dead the moment it entered his system, and to say phantlus were considered tough.

It was no wonder the human had managed to last this long. They were a stubborn creature.

“Arazmist poison… Arazmist poison… come on, they’ve had to have tested this on you before.”

Wilbur scrolled. The list was long, but clipped. Detailing the barest amount of information that Wilbur had to scrape together in order to understand. Still, heartbeats went by and there wasn’t a hint of arazmist poison documented. Tension built around his spine, and his tail lashed as Wilbur neared the end of the page without a sign of the cursed poison.

“Come on, there has to be something!” Wilbur growled, but there wasn’t. The enderians had used every sort of toxin and virus under the sun, yet they hadn’t thought to try arazmist poison. Wilbur flicked his wrist, shooting himself to the bottom of the page, not that there had been much left to scroll through anyway.

Wilbur dropped the pad and rubbed at his snout. “Shit.” He dropped his head, unable to look the dying human in the face. 

His suit was stained. His gloves were splotched a deep red, a metallic smell wafted off them, strong enough that he could almost make it out through his suit. “I just… I thought I could…” Wilbur trailed off, lost in the human's erratic breathing.

The pod groaned, and trembled. Wilbur squeezed his eyes shut, digging his claws into the floor. “Fuck, where are they?!”

Wilbur snapped his head to the ceiling, and bared his teeth at it. “Philza, you tail-biting, feather-huffing ciegath! Where are you!”

The pod rumbled, and lurched. Wilbur yelped, catching himself on his hands before he was sent straight into the floor. As the alarm rang through the pod, and Wilbur shot to his feet, already running for the helm.

He took his seat and spun it around, bringing up the manual navigation and ready to reverse the pod’s thrusters. A shadow fell over him as he worked, and Wilbur looked up. 

His heart stopped.

Scattered pieces of rock floated around them, hitting the sides of the pod and jostling them lightly, but it wasn’t the debris that made Wilbur’s blood run cold. An asteroid, no bigger than the pod itself, barreled into their flight path. Its size blotted out the stars around them, and as everything fell to shadow, Wilbur knew that it was too late to slow down.

Wilbur grit his teeth and regained manual control. He grabbed the stick at his side and yanked, banking the pod to the left. The shadow grew, inevitable, and with mourning horror Wilbur shut his eyes, bracing for impact.

Light seared the inside of his eyes, and Wilbur ducked his head. The pod jolted. The hull rattled and the alarms blared as bang after bang jostled the ship, and Wilbur alongside it.

The world around him exploded, leaving him to do nothing but hold on with everything he had as the bang, screech, tear of metal surrounded him.

And then it stopped. 

The shuddering calmed, the alarms quieted, and Wilbur found himself still breathing.

Slowly, Wilbur pried open an eye. Scattered pieces of broken rock floated among the stars, tapping harmlessly against the glass and overshadowed completely by twin, blinding lights.

Wilbur breathed out and dropped his head against the console, the relief making it heavy. He fumbled with the controls, automatically steering himself around the spotlights.

“Yeah, good to see you too,” he said, ignoring the flickering lights that followed him as he prepared to dock the SBI. 

It was a tight fit, but Wilbur managed to dock the pod in the SBI’s awaiting bay without much trouble. The SBI wasn’t nearly as big as the Starborne had been, but it wasn’t small either, and they made do with what they had.

Wilbur powered down the last few systems left on the pod, and sighed as the SBI’s magnets activated around them and latched onto the hull with a distant thrum. He drooped against his seat and stared up into the empty ceiling, taking the moment to just… breathe.

With a shudder and a quiet bang, they stopped moving. The pod was dropped into silence, the only sound that filled the space came from behind him in weak wheezes and quiet moans. Wilbur pulled himself out of his seat and wade his way towards the back, glancing down at the human as he passed.

Depths, he’d had all that time to figure out what he was going to do with them once the others found out, but he still hadn’t come up with a plan.

Wilbur shook the thought from his mind as he reached the door. He opened the hatch and stepped into the airlock, letting it slide shut behind him. Whatever, he could figure it out later. He just had to focus on one thing at a time, and right now that was getting to the medbay and finding that antidote. He’d figure out how to tell Philza and Techno about the human later.

“Okay,” Wilbur sighed, and brought a hand up to the release hatch. “Let’s see what took you guys so long.” He brought his hand down, and the door slid open. 

“Warning: Core Life systems severely impaired. Coolant systems reaching critical failure. System meltdown imminent.”

Wilbur’s fins pinned themselves to the side of his head as the cacophony of sirens and alarms reached his ears, no longer silenced by the pod’s sealed walls.

“Yeah, I figured,” Wilbur muttered, unsurprised. He released the magnetic lock on his suit as he leapt to the bay’s floor, letting the airlock shut behind him. The click of his boots against the grated floor went unheard over the wailing siren, and Wilbur slammed a hand against the exit terminal, slipping under the door before it had a chance to open entirely so he could escape the horrible noise.

“Warning: system meltdown imminent.”

The engine floor was no better, but at least the sirens were gone. Wilbur spun towards the stairs in the middle of the room, already mapping the quickest route to the medbay in his mind over the distant bangs and hisses from the engines below. He grabbed for the railing, launching himself onto the first step just as the door next to him opened with a hiss and a puff of smoke.

“Wilbur?”

Wilbur sighed, gathered whatever scattered remains of patience he still had in him, and spun around. “Hey Technoblade! How goes the repairs?”

Technoblade coughed as he batted at the smoke around him, a horrible sound that reminded Wilbur of the noises the human had made in the pod. Wilbur was suddenly very grateful he hadn’t removed his helmet yet.

“Fantastic,” Technoblade droned, “why’d you ask?”

“Warning: system meltdown imminent.”

Wilbur waved his head from side to side. “Oh, no reason.”

Technoblade snorted, already making his way towards the next door. “Great. Glad you’re not dead, Wilbur.”

“Oh wow. That’s the nicest thing you’ve ever said to me.”

Technoblade shook his head as he reached the door to the coolant access, placing a hand over the scanner on the wall. “Don’t get your fins in a twist when you brag to Philza about it. Oh, and while you do that, tell him to turn on some fans down here unless he wants to smoke us all out.” The scanner beeped, and the door slid open, releasing a rush of cool fog that poured across the floor at Technoblade’s feet. He blinked down at it. “That’s not a good sign.”

“Oh,” Tehchnoblade added as he stepped into the room. “The medbay is open. You should go get yourself checked before Captain Fretty Feathers gets his talons on you.” And with that, Technoblade disappeared, the door shutting between them before Wilbur could respond.

Wilbur waited a beat, eyes glued to the closed door before the distant bang from inside kicked him back into reality. He scrambled up the rest of the stairs, nearly falling flat on his face when he took them two at a time. He couldn’t afford to dawdle any longer. The human was dying, and he needed to get that antidote now.

He reached the second floor and spun on the pads of his feet, rushing towards the back of the ship where the medbay was located. The sensor at the top of the entrance was quick to read his presence and it slid open in time for Wilbur to run through, just narrowly avoiding the sudden face-plant he would’ve made if Technoblade had left it locked.

The door shut behind him, and suddenly Wilbur was alone again, cut off from the rest of the SBI as the static humming from the lights above droned out any outside noise that could’ve made it through the sealed door.

Wilbur walked towards the nearest counter and untwisted his helmet, setting it aside with care as he moved further into the room. A raised cot sat behind the counter, and on it lay a radiogun, sitting conspicuously under the medbay’s lighting. Wilbur threw his head back in exasperation and grabbed it, popping off the safety cap and letting the small needle glimmer freely.

He brought it to his mouth, parting his jaws to expose the soft flesh underneath. He quickly stuck the gun in and let it do its work as he continued moving around the room, unlocking and rummaging through different desks and drawers as he waited for time to pass.

Lost in the search, Wilbur moved around without thought or reason, opening and closing cabinets and doors with a growing sense of urgency that crawled under his scales and itched at his fins.

Eventually, his eyes landed on the cooler across the room, and Wilbur fought the urge to slap himself, quick to remember the gun that was currently jabbed into his gums. He ran over, unlocking the latch with his free hand and swinging the bottom compartment free. Rows of small, bottled liquids lined the tray, and Wilbur traced a claw over the labels on each lid, reading them carefully.

He was interrupted by a short beep from the gun. Wilbur quickly retracted it from his mouth, lapping at the small well of blood around his teeth as he read the results displayed on the gun’s side.

It flashed a light blue, the words ‘Low rad, safe! ’ dancing happily along the small screen. Wilbur huffed and recapped the gun before stuffing it into the closest drawer. Philza would find it eventually.

He turned his attention back to the bottles, combing through each compartment until he found the antidotes. 

He breathed out a sigh of relief as he came across the bottles of clear anti-araz, the six bottles lining the tray like small glimmers of hope. Wilbur grabbed the closest one, and for once, was grateful for how thorough Philza was when it came to checking and restocking their supplies. 

Wilbur carefully placed it into his pouch and after a brief moment of hesitation, also grabbed a syringe before shutting and securing the cooler. He snagged his helmet on his way out, tucking it under his arm as he made the short trek to the other end of the floor, passing the stairs and the cabin crossroads. 

The door at the far end of the room was already open, and Wilbur was quick to scramble up the second flight of stairs within, loudly knocking against the wall with his tail as he entered the loft. 

“I’m back!” Wilbur shouted over the cacophony he could hear coming from the bridge. “Techno says to turn on the fans in engines!”

If there was a reply, it went unheard over the muffled sirens on the other end of the door. Wilbur shook his fins and sighed, taking a hard left into the communications bay. The room was just as dark as he’d left it, and the screen that had once displayed the Starborne was now eerily dark, leaving nothing but the soft light behind him to light the small hub. He quickly found what he’d come for, however, and grabbed his breather from where it’d fallen to the ground at some point. Likely whenever they’d first jumped for the Starborne. He shoved it into his pouch as well, this time where it belonged. He couldn’t rely on his suit for his supply of DiOxibon forever after all, especially since it was due for some refueling.

“Wilbur! Is that you?” Philza’s shout greeted him as he stepped out of communications, along with the alarms from a now open bridge. Wilbur breathed out through his nose, stamping down his nerves and smoothing out his fins before popping his head into the bridge.

Philza was surrounded by layers of red. Error after error flickered to life around him, faster than his hands could keep up with. He seemed to be making some sort of progress though, as the alarms quieted a bit when Wilbur stepped into the room. 

“You already visited the medbay?” Philza asked, head buried into another problem that demanded his attention.

“Yeah,” Wilbur said, “I’m clear. Did you turn on those fans Technoblade asked for?”

Philza grumbled something under his breath before answering. “Yeah, will do once I can find some spare power to redirect there. Our systems have gone completely haywire. I’m shocked the core didn’t blow under the stress.”

Wilbur frowned. “Well, we’ve lasted this long with Technoblade as our only engineer. I’m surprised we haven’t blown the core before now.”

“Wilbur,” Philza admonished, but Wilbur could still see the small shake in his wings as he laughed silently.

Wilbur shrugged his fins. “Speaking of, I should head back down. I– Er, left something in the pod. Besides, Techno probably needs help with clearing out all that smoke.” He backed out of the bridge slowly, before turning and stepping through the door.

“Wilbur?” Philza called, and Wilbur froze, cursing himself silently.

He turned, masking his need to bolt for the stairs with an air of indifference and an audible huff. “What?”

Philza didn’t turn, nor did he take his eyes off the growing number of errors on the helm, but Wilbur could still feel their piercing glare. He swallowed. There… there was no way he knew, was there? If the systems were scattered then Philza couldn’t have scanned the pod for lifeforms. He couldn’t know about the human yet, right?  If he knew about the human then… No. No, he was being ridiculous, there was nothing for him to hide from Philza, or Technoblade for that matter. He was fine, and the human was safe here. He just needed to get that antidote to them before it was too late. It was fine. There was no way Philza knew about–

“Are you alright?” 

Wilbur’s heart almost stopped.

“There’s no injuries you’re not telling me about?” Philza continued, and suddenly, Wilbur could breathe again.

“I’m fine. Is that all or would you like me to go into excruciating detail while our life support systems continue to plummet?” Wilbur said, and watched with mild amusement as Philza rushed to cover the error with a wing.

“Not funny,” Philza snapped. “Anyway, I’ve managed to scrape up some spare power for you. Go downstairs and tell Techno there’s a manual way to restart the fans. There should be a panel in one of the vents that you can reach in and work with.”

Wilbur groaned, and without giving Philza a chance to continue the conversation, he quickly left the bridge. Great, more engineering work. At least he managed to get out of there relatively quickly.

He rushed down both sets of stairs, pausing only briefly to check if Technoblade had stuck around to wait for him. Once Wilbur assured himself the coast was clear, he leapt down the last few steps and quickly ran back to the loading bay, ducking under the door before it had a chance to fully open. 

As he shut himself in, Wilbur noticed that it was quiet in the bay now, which was something that he was grateful for. It would seem Philza’s frantic commands had been somewhat successful after all, and yet a small part of Wilbur wondered how far they were from the nearest station, and if they could manage to hold the ship together until they got there.

The pod towered over him as Wilbur walked closer, and he winced at the craters and cracks that lined its hull. It really was some sort of miracle that he’d managed to escape as unscathed as he did.

Wilbur quickly climbed up to the airlock and opened the hatch, reentering the increasingly familiar dark and cramped space. 

The human was still in the same place he’d left them in.

Slumped over themselves, the human’s face was partially obscured from Wilbur’s view. He couldn’t tell if they were breathing. The skin that showed through their dirtied and torn clothing looked nearly as grey as the ship itself, and for a moment Wilbur was too frightened to move, too frightened to discover the horrible truth that maybe he really had been too late.

Then, their fingers twitched. The human shifted. A glassy eye opened, and they peered up at Wilbur from over their shoulder. 

Wilbur moved.

He fumbled for the antidote and the syringe as the human watched passively, the wildfire in their eyes flickering, but not yet gone.

He stuck the syringe into the bottle’s cap, and let it fill itself with the press of a trigger, designed to keep in mind the natural curve in phantlus claws.

“Come on,” Wilbur spoke to the human, though he knew they couldn’t understand him. “Just hang on a little longer.”

The human stared through him. The uncanny sheen to their skin made Wilbur shiver, and he willed the syringe to fill faster.

It stopped. Not bothering to double check if he’d drained every last bit of liquid in the bottle, Wilbur lunged for the human's leg and released the antidote.

There was no reaction. The human blinked slowly, staring through Wilbur as though he wasn’t currently jabbing at their wound with a needle. Their mouth parted, a weak sound escaping through their lips, and then their eyes slipped shut.

Wilbur waited. He slowly removed the syringe and recapped it, watching the human’s chest with nervous anticipation.

The human breathed out, weak and broken. Wilbur waited.

They breathed in. This time, their whole body moved with the breath, and it was full. They breathed out, and though it was still weak, Wilbur noted with near-crushing relief that the rattle was gone. The antidote was working.

He backed away from the human, still watching them intently, but the trembling in his limbs forced him to sit. He’d done it. He’d saved them. He’d saved a human .

He would have to revisit them within the next cycle to administer a second dose of course, the antidote was fast acting, but only in short bursts. For now though, Wilbur took the moment to revel in the fact that he had saved someone, human or not, and that their skirmish at the Starborne hadn’t been for nothing.

“There,” Wilbur said, watching as the human drew in another breath, the next one more steady than the last. “Now we’re even.”

Once he was sure the human was going to be alright, Wilbur stood. Despite how he’d just saved their life, Wilbur wasn’t necessarily looking forward to sticking around for when they would eventually come around. He walked back to the airlock and shut it behind him, activating the lock just to be safe.

He leapt to the floor, and began making his way back to the engine access. Now that he was done here, all he needed to do now was focus on what he was going to tell the others… after they fixed whatever was going on with their ship.

Wilbur slunk under the loading bay’s door, helmet still in hand and syringe tucked safely in his pouch where it wouldn’t be noticed by–

“Hey.”

Wilbur jumped and spun around with a yelp, brandishing his helmet at the unphased face of Technoblade. “Fuck, what now?” Wilbur snapped, desperately trying to calm his startled heart.

Technoblade pushed himself up from where he’d been leaning against the wall and eyed Wilbur critically. “You tell Philza about the fans?”

“What fucking– Yes, I told him.” Wilbur said with shaking fins. “There’s a manual override in one of the vents. I can reach it.”

Technoblade nodded. “Good. Show me.”

Wilbur growled, then spun around and gestured for Technoblade to follow. “Yes of course, Wilbur,” Wilbur said as they walked. “Thank you for asking Philza for me, Wilbur. Your help is much appreciated, Wilbur.”

The vent sat high above the floor next to the engine room, too tall for Wilbur to reach on his own. Without missing a beat, Technoblade dropped onto his haunches directly underneath the vent.

“I don’t sound like that,” Technoblade said as Wilbur pulled himself onto the hoglin’s back, careful not to get his claws tangled around the coarse, red mane that sprouted around Technoblade’s neck and grew down his spine, disappearing underneath his suit.

Wilbur pried open the grates to the vent and stuck his claws in, twisting his arm so he could properly reach the panel. “Whatever keeps you sane, Tech.”

“Brave words comin’ from the guy currently standing on my back.”

With that, the conversation came to an end. Wilbur fiddled with the vent, pulling his arm out every so often so he could see exactly what he was doing, but it was hard to concentrate. His thoughts kept rounding back to the human in the pod, spiraling into dangerous what-if's and hypothetical's that had him catching himself before his imagination took him away. The human wasn't dying, he had saved them, and they weren't going to kill everyone on the ship. Wilbur had done the right thing.

Instead he put all his focus into fixing the fans, and let the companionable silence between himself and Technoblade wash over him. It was then, with his guard dropped, that Technoblade suddenly snorted.

“Remind me to tell you to wash your suit when we’re done here,” Technoblade said. “You’re stinkin’ up the place worse than the smoke.”

“No worse than you do after a mud-bath,” Wilbur said, partially distracted by his work. “Besides, you’re one to talk. Did you even get a chance to change when you got back?”

Technoblade hummed, the sound vibrating underneath Wilbur’s feet and jostling him through his suit. “No. You didn’t run into much trouble on the way out, did you?”

Wilbur glanced down, and froze when he was met with Technoblade’s red eyes glaring up at him. He quickly turned back to the vent, brushing off his pause as an excuse to observe his work. “Hm. Not really. Those trappers really came in handy.”

Wilbur’s heart thundered in his ears. What was he doing?

“You use 'em all?”

Wilbur thought back to the arazmist. He saw the thick, purple threads that had barely held it to the floor as it bided its time, waiting for Wilbur to fall into its trap. The human had lunged for it as the webs snapped, throwing it off course and saving Wilbur’s life by the edge of his tailfins.

“Yeah,” Wilbur said, feeling distant. “I gotta restock. Thanks for the reminder.”

Technoblade flicked an ear. “You’re welcome. Y’know, it’s strange. We’ve run into arazmist pirates plenty before, and they’ve never been this hostile till now.” Technoblade twisted around, meeting Wilbur’s eyes once again. “You think it could be because of the humans?”

Wilbur’s claw slipped and hit the side of the vent with a loud clang. He spluttered, nervous trills dancing in his throat. “W-What? Humans? Where’d you get that idea?”

Technoblade didn’t look impressed. “Uh, from the ship. Y’know, the one we were just on?

Wilbur’s voice caught in his throat, and he hesitated. He turned back to the vent, ignoring Technoblade’s eyes as he tugged at the manual switch until it sparked to life. The fans activated with a bang and a thrum, and Wilbur slid the panel back into place. He slid off of Technoblade’s back, eyes drawn to the floor.

“Wilbur…” Technoblade rose, and his shadow loomed over Wilbur. “Did you…?”

Wilbur squeezed his eyes shut. He fought the urge to dig his claws into his suit and forced himself to stand a little taller. He wasn’t getting out of this, not with Technoblade. It was now or never.

“Listen, Techno, I–”

Technoblade’s suit rang, and Wilbur cut himself off as the hoglin groaned and reached for his comm. “This is SBI Parts and Repairs, you make it, we break it. Technoblade speaking.”

“Is Wilbur with you?” Philza’s voice rang through the other end, and Technoblade glanced up.

“Yeah. Why?”

“Did you two fix the fans?”

Technoblade flicked an ear. “Yeah. Why?” he intoned.

Wilbur could hear Philza’s tired sigh from the other end. “Just come up here, please. We need to talk.”

“You got it, Boss.” Technoblade hung up before Philza could respond. “Guess we should go before he loses any more feathers over this. You good?” he asked.

Wilbur blinked. “Me? Oh, yeah. Let's go.”

Technoblade stared a moment before he shrugged and began walking towards the stairs. “Good,” he said. Wilbur made sure to follow close behind.

Technoblade went up first. The grated stairs creaked under his weight with each step, and as his back was turned, Wilbur stole a glance towards the pod. Once the meeting was over, he would have to come back to check on the human, and if all went well, maybe even get them admitted to the medbay for some proper examination.

“Wilbur!” Technoblade called from the upper floor, snapping him from his thoughts. Wilbur hadn’t realized he’d been staring for that long.

He scrambled after Technoblade, ignoring the questioning look in his eyes as he climbed, leaving the pod and its resting occupant behind. 

He could only hope that the human would be fine on their own until he got back.

Chapter Text

“Okay. So is anyone gonna explain what on Netharr that was?” 

Wilbur and Technoblade stood at the base of the helm’s platform, watching Philza mess around with the ship’s system data. There was a click, a final beep, and then the warnings faded from the screens and the bridge fell into blissful silence. The distant thrum of engines and the occasional groan of metal resounded around them, and Wilbur shuddered at the noise. It wasn’t exactly a comforting sound, after what they’d just been through.

Philza sighed as he closed the screens, dropping his arms and tightly wrapping his wings around them, reforming his cloaked appearance. The floor creaked as he flexed his talons against the grates. “...I don’t know,” he said. “Whatever that light was, it was powerful enough to kill over half our life and shut down the majority of our systems in an instant. I’ve never seen anything like it before.”

“And there’s no way it was natural either,” Technoblade added. “I didn’t get a good look when it happened, but from what I saw that was no normal jump.”

It felt so long ago now, the Starborne’s explosion. Explosions, plural, Wilbur corrected himself. The first one had been expected, any ship that size in that state would tear itself apart in a jump… but…

The second explosion…

“That second explosion, with the green light,” Wilbur began slowly. He breathed out. “It didn’t just rip the Starborne in two. Half of it just… completely vanished.”

“Right, but ships don’t just vanish, Wilbur,” Technoblade said with a snort. “So how are we gonna explain that to the Federation in our report?”

“I don’t know,” Wilbur snapped, “but it happened. I saw it happen.” He turned to Philza. “Maybe it was a new drive, or a weapon or something.”

Philza’s head was bowed in thought, and his talons click, click, clicked against the grated floor. Eventually, he sighed, and his wings drooped. “I don’t know,” he said again, sounding exhausted. Technoblade opened his mouth, likely to say something smartass, but Philza was quick to interrupt. “But we made it out, just thank the Creators for that.”

“Oh goodie. We’re the only survivors of a targeted massacre between two planets that are on the brink of war. One of which not only holds complete control over the Galactic Federation, but also happens to be our boss,” Technoblade said. “Yeah. I’m sure this couldn’t possibly get any worse for us.”

Wilbur frowned. “War? But the arazmist–”

“Were sent by someone, Wilbur,” Technoblade said. “You were there, weren’t you? It really doesn’t take much to figure out who that could be, considering they really only have one ally.”

“Scarliem,” Philza said, but even as he spoke he sounded confused. “What good could Scarliem get out of hiring pirates to attack a science vessel? And one from Ender, no less.”

Technoblade flicked an ear. “Dunno. Weapon research, maybe. SCAR laboratories have been cutting contact with Ender recently due to some sort of conflict. Could have something to do with that.”

“But why attack?” Wilbur asked, “Why would they kill the enderians on board if Scarliem was just after their research?”

“Well, there’s that theory, or ,” Technoblade met Wilbur’s eyes with a chilling glare. “They were after something much more valuable.”

Wilbur’s stomach dropped.

“What do you mean?” Philza asked, and he turned. “Did you two–” he suddenly cut himself off with a gasp, and Wilbur’s head snapped towards the sound. “Wilbur, what happened to you?”

“Hm? What–” Wilbur glanced down at himself, and oh stars he really should have cleaned up before the meeting. “O-Oh, that. That’s a long story.” Wow. He hadn’t realized just how bright the blood was under the bridge’s artificial light.

There was a clang, a heavy beat of wings against the air, and then Philza was landing on their level, stepping closer to investigate. Wilbur stepped back and curled into himself until his head reached Philza’s height. “It’s no big deal, really. I’m not hurt.”

Philza moved methodically under a facade of calm, but Wilbur was able to see through it clear as water. His feathers puffed and his crest flared as he eyed Wilbur’s suit critically, his sharp gaze lingering on the deep stains around Wilbur’s gloves before he swiftly turned to Technoblade, who held out a hand.

“Hey, it ain’t mine either,” Technoblade said before Philza could start throwing accusations at him. “I know I bleed red, but at least it doesn’t smell that bad.”

Philza paused. He turned to Wilbur, then made a face. “Yes… I suppose that is true.” He shook his head, and his crest settled back along his neck. “Are you sure you’re both uninjured? Perhaps a scan would be for the best.” His wings opened partially, ready to herd him and Technoblade both to the medbay when Wilbur stepped aside, out of reach. 

“No, I’m fine. It’s just…”

“Wilbur?” Philza asked. His voice was quiet, coaxing. “What happened?”

“I…” Wilbur shrunk, and fiddled with his claws close to his chest. “I sorta…” How the fuck was he supposed to explain this? Calm. Calm. He needed to be calm. “I might’ve had an encounter.” His eyes flicked up to Philza and Technoblade. The weight of their stares was nearly unbearable. Wilbur took a breath and steeled himself. “...With a human.” He finished quickly.

Philza’s eyes immediately widened as his words sank in, and then his crest flared up again. Technoblade snorted, and scrubbed his cheek with a heavy hand. He shook his head. Wilbur rushed to salvage the situation, despite already feeling his control slipping through his claws like crumbling stone.

“Look, it’s– I just– It’s not like they gave me much of a choice,” Wilbur’s voice cracked, and his fins flared out. Philza and Technoblade were staring, he could see the judgement hidden in their eyes as he cowered beneath them. His fins shook, and Wilbur’s lips curled as he spat back at them, “What was I supposed to do anyway? They were right there and I– the araz–”

Philza lowered his head and tucked his wings back around his body. “Wilbur…”

“The– The ship was about to blow and I couldn’t just–”

He couldn’t have just left them behind. Wilbur flexed his claws, and watched as bits of red flaked off the edges. There had been so much blood.

Technoblade sighed again and he shook his head. Light caught the edges of his prosthetic tusk and it glared against Wilbur’s eyes.

“Look, Wilbur, you did what you had to do. It was best for the human anyway.”

“I know I– wait,” Wilbur cut himself off. He stilled as confusion took its place and he blinked at Technoblade. “What?”

“You didn’t have a choice, that’s not your fault,” Philza said, his voice almost sickeningly soft. Wilbur hated it. “You know we don’t blame you for that.”

Wilbur frowned as he glanced between the two. “I.. guess? But I don’t–”

“It comes with the job,” Technoblade said, eyes bored and looking like he would rather be anywhere else than part of the conversation, but his ears were pricked forward, listening to Wilbur intently. Wilbur swallowed. “Netharr, I don’t know how many arazmist I killed back on that ship alone.”

It took a moment for Wilbur to catch on, but when he did, his brain short-circuited. Oh, he realized, oh no.

“You…” Wilbur licked his lips, choosing his next words carefully. “You would have killed the human, too?”

He had been wrong.

Technoblade grunted an affirmative. “Without hesitation.”

He had been very, very wrong.

“Techno,” Philza chided softly, but he wasn’t disagreeing either. Blood roared in Wilbur’s ears as the realization sunk in heavy and fast. 

He fucked up.

He fucked up and once they found the human, they were going to pay.

“Wilbur?” Philza was talking to him again, and it took everything in Wilbur’s power to pull himself somewhat together. “Are you okay?”

What was he thinking? Stars what was he gonna do? A mistake. He’d made a mistake what was… He frowned. What were they thinking? The human hadn’t done anything wrong. So, why? Why kill an innocent for what? Fear? Misunderstanding? Wilbur’s initial horror melted into something else entirely, something he was familiar with, and he rounded on Technoblade.

“Why?” Wilbur asked, voice rising. “Why would you kill them?” 

“Oh great,” Technoblade drawled, “here we go again.”

“Wilbur,” Philza quickly inserted himself between the two. “We should head to the medbay. Your veins are looking a little pale.”

Wilbur pointedly ignored him. He stretched himself tall so Philza no longer obstructed his vision and glared at Technoblade. “The fuck does that mean?”

“Oh for Kuoltem’s sake,” Philza groaned. 

“It means what it’s always meant,” Technoblade said. “You’re too soft-hearted. I’m surprised the human didn’t rip you to shreds the moment it saw you.”

Wilbur growled. “Just because you don’t care about anything doesn’t make me soft-hearted.”

“Wilbur, that is not true.” Philza said.

Technoblade sneered. “Sure, okay. I don’t care. You can just slot that little factoid inside Wilbur’s imagination land where I’m the bad guy and the humans are yours and everyone’s perfect little pets.”

“Technoblade do not antagonize him!”

“To be fair, he started it first.”

“Would you quit patronizing me!” Wilbur said as he bristled. “I’m not the one who slaughters innocents because I feel like it.”

“Wilbur, the day someone faces a human and comes out alive is the day I eat my left tusk. This ain’t personal, we just can’t risk it. Whether I ‘feel like it’ doesn’t matter. If taking the life of a human means we save the lives of potentially thousands of others, then that is a sacrifice I’m willing to make.”

“But that doesn’t– AGH, Technoblade!” Wilbur shouted in frustration. “What if that human is innocent? What if they haven’t done anything? They don’t deserve this!”

“It’s not a matter of what they’ve done, Wilbur, it’s a matter of when they’ll do it. We have the history journals, the footage, the proof of the length a human is willing to go to hurt another creature. And that’s when they’re on their planet! Wilbur, what can we do against one, ten, or even hundreds of them?”

“It’s not that simple! They’re more than just their instincts and bloodlust, they’re beings, Techno! We haven’t studied them since the Federation quarantined their galaxy. They’ve changed since then!”

Philza chirped loudly. “Boys, that’s enough!”

“And when did you come to that conclusion?” Technoblade said, ignoring Philza completely. “Was it before or after you killed the human on the Starborne?”

“Oh Trix, give me strength…”

“I ne–” Wilbur choked on his words before snapping back. “That’s not the point!”

Technoblade leaned back and stared Wilbur down from over his snout. Wilbur flashed his teeth with a snarl. “Look, if you hadn’t killed that human, the Starborne would have finished it off anyway. There was no way that Captain was gonna let any of them escape her ship if she could help it.”

From the corner of his eye, Wilbur spotted Philza cocking his head in confusion. Still, he didn’t let up the glare as he asked, “so what, they blew themselves up on purpose?”

“Yeah,” Technoblade huffed, “that’s exactly what I’m sayin’.” 

“I… suppose,” Philza muttered quietly, looking pensive. But Wilbur snorted.

“To sacrifice her whole crew like that? That’s ridiculous, Techno.”

“Is it really? Okay, let’s make this easier for you to understand.” Technoblade stepped closer, and Wilbur stretched himself taller. He only reached the hoglin’s shoulder-height. “Let’s play pretend. Here, you can be the enderian–”

“Fuck you–”

“And you’re the captain of your own ship. Wow, that’s a pretty big deal for you, right?” Technoblade drawled in mock praise. Wilbur snarled. “Picture: you are knowingly exporting illegal and deadly creatures from a restricted galaxy for whatever little science experiment you and the Federation are trying to keep hush hush about. Following so far?”

Wilbur bristled silently.

“Good. So there you are, doing your job when, uh oh, what’s this?” Suddenly, Technoblade slammed his hand against the metal wall, and the resounding bang made Wilbur jump. “You’re under attack. Your ship is breached and the humans get loose. You’ve got two options here, Wilbur.” The wall shuddered as Technoblade slammed his hand again. “One, you decide that you really are that piece of shit everyone makes you out to be and you space yourself before the Federation can do it themselves to cover their tracks. You leave the crew and the rest of the known universe to the mercy of vengeful humans.”

“Techno…” Philza’s warning went unacknowledged by Technoblade as he continued.

“Or two, you scrape up that last little shred of honour you still have and you take the ship down with you, because if those humans get out and find a planet, it’s done for.”

Wilbur flashed his teeth. “You don’t know that.”

“I do, actually,” Technoblade said, “and I’ll play the human, who has been taken from my home, my people, my planet, and everything I know to be hurt by monsters I could have never fathomed to exist in my life.” Technoblade sneered again, and this time Wilbur saw the unspoken threat in the gleam of his tusks, and the anger that prowled behind his eyes. “I don’t know about you, Wilbur, but as a death worlder myself,” Technoblade leaned over him, the heat of his breath ghosting Wilbur’s face. “I wouldn’t blame a human for wanting to watch the galaxy burn.”

“Techno, that’s enough.” Philza was suddenly between them, and he pushed his wings against Technoblade’s chest. A moment passed, and for a heartbeat Wilbur thought Technoblade wouldn't listen, but then he backed off. Technoblade gave one last glance at Philza, and then he stormed out the bridge.

Philza heaved a sigh as the door shut between them, the tense silence following the wake of Technoblade’s leave weighing heavily in the air. Wilbur slouched back into himself, and he glared into the rough floor as his fins flicked about irritatedly. “So that’s it, then?”

There was a quiet shuffle of feathers as Philza turned. He let out a soft sound of inquiry. 

Wilbur continued, “I mean that’s it. There’s nothing else that could’ve been done? Techno was right and those innocent humans deserve to burn because of something they never did?” Talons clacked against the ground, and Wilbur glanced up as Philza approached, confliction in his eyes. “What if I…” Wilbur briefly shut his eyes, squeezing them tight until stars burst in his vision and he opened them again. 

“What if I didn’t kill them?” 

The words were rushed and quiet, spoken in a breathless confession.

Philza was silent. Wilbur braced himself as the soft tapping of talons against metal approached and then stopped in front of him.

Philza knelt, matching Wilbur’s height with an unspoken, yet mutual pain buried in his expression. Wilbur refused to meet his eyes. “I’m sorry, Wilbur,” he said with a sympathetic coo. “I really am. But Technoblade is right. It was for the best.”

“How do you know that?” Wilbur spat at the floor, and for a moment, Philza had no response. There was a quiet shuffling of feathers as he shifted, then finally, he spoke. 

“Because there was no other choice,” he said. “You and Techno… you were stronger than I ever could’ve been in that situation.” Wilbur glanced up at that, wrinkling his snout in confusion.

“What are you saying? You mean… you wouldn’t have…” Wilbur trailed off as Philza looked away, his gaze locked on the door.

“No,” Philza said, and Wilbur’s heart leapt. Philza’s eyes lowered, and then they darkened. “I couldn’t have killed them.”

“Why?” Wilbur whispered.

Philza was quiet for a moment. His beak clicked in indecision before he finally answered. “I’m… too selfish.”

“Selfish?” Wilbur blinked, and then he glared. He stood, stretching tall over Philza until the avrania had to look up to meet his eyes. “How is not killing an innocent life selfish? Philza opened his beak, but Wilbur beat him to it with curled lips. “You didn’t see them, Philza. They didn’t want to– they didn’t want to die!”

“I couldn’t kill them, Wilbur,” Philza said calmly, and it made Wilbur’s fins bristle. “But that would leave them with a fate far, far worse than death.”

That gave Wilbur pause, and he tilted his head. “What do you mean?” he asked slowly. 

“Killing them would be an act of mercy,” Philza sighed, “and that is true to an extent. Humans are not permitted to roam free in this galaxy. It is a tight law that the Federation has kept in place for millennia, and it is not about to change any time soon. Breaking it will result in serious repercussions.”

Wilbur felt his rage begin to deflate as his heart sank. “So, you mean…”

“If, if, we spared a human, I would have no choice but to report them to the Federation. From there, they are free to do with the human as they please. Whether it be execution, or experimentation.” Philza huffed, closing his eyes. “My wings are clipped, Wilbur. It’s them, or us. I cannot take that chance.”

Wilbur growled at the floor. It wasn’t right. That human hadn’t even wanted to be there in the first place. What right did the Federation have to strip them from their home, and treat them as rabid animals, only to forbid them from ever returning to their planet.

“Wilbur,” Philza's voice broke the silence that had fallen over them, broken only by the quiet whirrs and beeps of the ship’s navigation systems. “Perhaps it’s time you changed and got some rest. It’s been a long day.”

Wilbur glanced down at himself. Blood still stained his suit, the red colour having long since soaked into the fabric of his suit. It would be a pain to get out now, if the human’s blood was anything like Technoblade’s. 

“Yeah,” he said. “Sure.” He stood, brushing past Philza as he made for the door.

“And, Wilbur?” Philza asked, and Wilbur paused at the doorway.

Philza whistled low. “It’s times like these where you cannot linger in the decisions of the past. You will always be forced to make a choice, and sometimes there is never a right choice to make.”

The ship hummed in the silence.

“They will haunt you. No matter what you do, sometimes there just isn’t a way out. But what’s been done is done. You can’t…” Philza trailed off. Feathers brushed against the ground. “...You can’t change the past. All you can do is move forward.”

Wilbur turned his head and glared over his shoulder. “What would you do, then?”

Philza stared right back. “Same as I’ve always done, I suppose.”

Wilbur snorted. “Right. Just keep running.”

The door shut behind him before Philza could answer. 

Wilbur huffed as he threw his bloodied suit aside. He’d been right. The blood was an absolute pain to scrub off, and now he had to order a new one because it still stank despite the vigorous washing he’d given it earlier. It hit his floor in a wet thump, and he kicked it towards the entrance of his pool before sliding the cover over it to keep the water from escaping. 

What a pain. Everything was a pain, and Wilbur could think of two particular causes that he’d love nothing more than to space and never think about again.

Wilbur sighed as he slipped into his regular tunic. Finally, at least his scales and fins had a chance to breathe now. Moving towards the pile of things he’d taken from his suit pockets, Wilbur picked up the syringe. There wasn’t a drop of antidote left inside, and he quickly stuffed it into his new pouch. The human was due for a second dose anyway.

He stopped, and ran a claw alongside his door. His head settled against it with a thump. “Stars, what have I done?”

Stepping outside his room, Wilbur quickly locked it behind him and made his way down the hall and towards the medbay. Hopefully, Philza wasn’t there, and judging by the sounds coming from the training room, Wilbur had a good idea of what Technoblade was doing.

Quickly, he scooted across the floor and entered the medbay. The relief that swept through him at the sight of the empty room nearly made up for the stress from the meeting, and Wilbur quickly grabbed another vial of the antidote and hurried back to the pod.

Returning to the engine room was just as ominous as the last time. Wilbur hesitated on the stairs, the beckoning darkness below was nearly enough to make him turn back around. What if the human was awake? What if they were waiting for him now, waiting for the perfect time to strike?

Wilbur shook himself. No. He’d made his choice. He would save this human. He would prove them all wrong. He’d prove the whole galaxy, if he had to. He couldn’t fear the human. He wouldn’t fear the human. He wasn’t like Philza and Technoblade.

His claws hit the stairs with resounding clangs. He tightened his grip on the antidote as he descended into the engine room.

He would save them. No matter what it took, just like he’d been saved before.

…He just hoped the human would understand.

Chapter Text

“Three whole months left ‘till graduation. Isn’t that exciting?”

A breath of gentle air passed overhead. Winter’s chill rode alongside it, lingering in the breeze around them and sinking itself deep within Tommy’s sweater. He shivered as the empty branches swayed above him.

“I guess,” Tommy said. His breath puffed a small cloud above him. “Though, what’s it to you? You’ll still be here next year.”

“And the year after that, and the year after that, and the year after that…” Dead grass crunched under the weight of the person settling next to Tommy. “Still, the paychecks don’t hurt.”

Tommy snorted. “At least you get paid.”

“And you will too. As soon as you’re out of here…” He chuckled, wistful eyes cast towards grey clouds. “Tommy, the stars are gonna be yours.”

“Is that what you say to all your graduating students or…”

“Hey now, I’m not that cold.” Brown eyes smiled down on him. “You’re gonna do great up there, I know you will.”

“You think so?”

“I know so. C’mon, Tommy, a kid like you in a school like this with the grades you’ve got?” He snorted. “You’re gonna blow the socks off the Captain and the MMC.”

Tommy’s eyes trailed downward. Metal pins shone starkly against a navy uniform. “More than you?” he asked.

“Yeah,” warmth blossomed in his chest, “more than me.”

Tommy smiled and closed his eyes. He leaned back into the grass, letting the long stalks tickle his face. “Thanks, Teach.”

“Hey now, that’s Sergeant Sam to you,” A friendly nudge to his shoulder followed the lighthearted warning, and Tommy laughed.

He began to drift, his mind taken along the gentle wind and brought up, up, up, towards the sky. “Yeah,” he whispered as the stars began to wink out, “you got it.”

Darkness yawned around him, and swallowed the response.

Tommy opened his eyes.

The first thing he noticed as he slowly came back to reality was the dryness in his throat. He licked his lips and tried to swallow, but he may as well have been digging up a dry well. Sighing, Tommy tried to focus elsewhere. 

Turns out, there wasn’t much to scan. He was still in the strange, dark room. Engines hummed somewhere beyond the metal walls, and a steady blink from a terminal of some kind flashed in gentle pulses that occasionally lit up the darkness.

Not only that, but he felt a hell of a lot lighter than he did before. He relaxed his arm, and frowned when it drifted a hair from the seat. Who the fuck messed with the gravity?

He shifted in his seat. An uncomfortable pinch in his leg had him wincing, and when he reached down, his hand brushed against soaked cloth. “Bitch…” Tommy hissed. At least it hadn’t fallen off between the time he’d tied it and the time he’d passed out.

He was alone now, the lack of nervous chittering and scraping claws confirmed it as Tommy gave a wary glance around the room. Though, now that he finally had a moment to breathe and gather his thoughts…

“...The fuck am I?”

Two rows of seats lining each side of the room, a terminal blinking at the front, fortified windows that allowed just enough space for the light of suns and stars to drift through… Tommy’s head hit the back of his seat with a dull thud as the picture clicked together and realization finally struck him. He was back in the pod.

“Fucking…” He sighed. Okay. No need to panic. He just needed to find a way out. Surely, Salamander wouldn’t leave him stranded in the middle of space.

…Oh what the hell did he know. Tommy couldn’t count the number of aliens he’d met that hadn’t wanted to hurt him on one hand because they didn’t fucking exist. Of course he’d been left stranded.

Fuck. And One… One was still on that ship with those monsters. He had to do something, but what?

Well, if he was gonna get himself out of this mess, getting off his ass would be a good first start. A belt of some kind was holding him to his seat, he’d start with that. Tommy sat up to find the latch, but a sudden angry flare in his leg stopped him in his tracks. “OW, Fucking bitch–” Tommy spat a string of curses until the pain faded and he could move again, albeit this time with a sense of caution. Right. Leg. A strand of foggy memories came back to him as he checked his wound again. His memories, shrouded behind pain and dips in consciousness danced between his grasping fingers like mist. Nothing made any sort of sense, but yet, one thing still stood out to Tommy clear as day. He’d been saved.

“But… why?” He muttered. Why did they want to save him? …Did they even want to? Did Salamander need him somehow? Probably just for more experiments, then. 

Tommy tested his leg by pressing his heel into the floor. Shit. The second wave that ran up his leg and into his stomach was nearly as fierce as the first one. If he was gonna move, it wouldn’t be with his feet. Slowly, this time, Tommy felt blindly for the latch until his fingers found it. The belt broke apart with a soft pop, and Tommy fell back against the seat. Okay. Step one done, he was free. Now what?

The pod was still too dark for him to make out anything concrete. Lights were flashing at the console near the front, and Tommy tried to peer around the pilot seat to see what it was, but he couldn’t lean without straining his leg. He’d have to move. Testing his good leg against the ground, Tommy felt confident enough when he didn’t feel any pain and prepared to push himself up.

“Okay, one, two–!” Tommy heaved himself up on one foot with a strangled groan. His hands dug into the backs of the seats as he steadied himself. The pod didn’t feel like it was moving, but the floor still felt unsteady beneath him as he wobbled in place. His legs trembled, whatever strength he had left in him had been sapped a while ago. He reached forward with one hand, grabbing the next chair and hopping a step. His injured leg flared. “Fucks sake…” Tommy grumbled. He grit his teeth and shuffled again. “It’s like ten feet.”

He’d moved about two more steps before an odd scraping sound reached his ears. He paused, taking the time to catch his breath as he strained his ears. Again, it was coming closer from the outside, like the sound of clicking heels against tiles.

…Or the scrape of claws against a metal floor.

“Mother–” Tommy staggered and stumbled against a seat as he tried to turn around. The door whooshed open, and then Salamander was there. Large, green eyes locked onto Tommy, and they both froze. The door slid shut behind them.

Somewhere, faintly, an engine clanged. If Salamander heard it, they paid no attention to it, their body still as a statue.

…At least, Tommy thought it was Salamander. They looked a helluva lot more different without the weird spacesuit on. A yellow, toga-like robe was draped over their scaly body, and Tommy was half surprised that their scales were coloured a dark blue, almost to the point of black. At least that was what he thought, as it was hard to tell what colour they were with the green lights that decorated their body in an odd, branching pattern that reminded him of the roots of a tree. The lights pulsed in an increasingly accelerated pace, branching outward from their chest to the rest of their body. Like a fluttering heartbeat.

As mesmerizing as the lights were, Tommy forced himself to tear his eyes away. Salamander didn’t have any spines despite their draconian appearance, instead Tommy noticed there were fins that hung around the sides of their head, and what looked like a pair of bigger ones that trailed along their spine. The fins waved with every invisible breath Salamander took, the only part of them that wasn’t as still as a statue.

Tommy was the first to break the stasis between them when the growing cramp in his leg couldn’t be ignored any longer. He felt for the nearest seat with a breathy curse, keeping his eyes on Salamander until he could sit down. He sighed in relief as the strain that had built up in his good leg began to recede. 

Salamander made a chittering noise, and Tommy turned to glare at them. “What do you want?”

The chittering stopped as Salamander seemed to freeze again. Tommy’s eyes fell to their claws, and he squinted at the gadget that it clutched between scaled fingers. He shifted uneasily in his seat. He didn’t recognize what it was, but a gadget of any kind in an alien’s hands was never a good thing, in Tommy’s professional experience.

Salamander followed his gaze. They glanced up at Tommy, then back down at the thing. Their green eyes seemed to bounce in the dark until finally they settled on Tommy and chirped once. They held out their claws.

Despite the dim light Salamander was providing, Tommy still couldn’t make out what they were holding, but he was distrustful of whatever it was nonetheless. He leaned away from the alien as much as he could and glared. “No thank you.”

They stepped forward, and Tommy, with his heart already beginning to pound against his chest, snapped his teeth together. “I said piss off!”

Salamander jerked back, and all their fins flared. The sudden snap from their fins as they opened wide made Tommy jump. Without the restraint of Salamanders space-suit, the fins made Salamander look almost twice as big as they already were. The scare was temporary, however, and Salamander was quickly back to their normal, lean size as their fins tucked back against their body. 

Salamander's head drooped, and a mournful croon sounded from their throat. Tommy watched with fascination as their lights dimmed and their pulse began to slow. Could they control their lights? Or was it based on their emotions? He shook his head. Whatever, it didn’t matter. What did matter was the intention Salamander had with that object in their claws.

Salamander’s eyes were lost to the floor, seemingly deep in thought. For a second, Tommy thought he had somehow hurt their feelings when suddenly their head perked up. They carefully placed the object on the ground and then proceeded to gently nudge it in his direction. Tommy stared at the thing as it skittered to a halt somewhere between them. It looked almost like a toy gun from earth, with a shiny, plastic casing and a large trigger that he could easily slide 4 fingers into. Tommy’s expression twisted as his confusion continued to grow the longer he stared at it. “You… want me to have this?” he asked Salamander. 

Salamander warbled quietly when Tommy glanced up at them. Their fins flicked once, and then they sat back on their haunches, watching Tommy with wide, puppy dog eyes. 

Not a dog, Tommy chastised himself. A giant freaking alien that may or may not want to kill me.

Stiffly, and as slowly as he could, Tommy pushed himself up and out of the seat. His leg throbbed in protest, but he forced himself to ignore it. Salamander had perked up at the movement, but otherwise they remained still as Tommy slowly approached the strange gun. It was hard with one leg essentially out of commission, but still Tommy managed to hobble towards that halfway mark, eyeing Salamander all the way, just to make sure they wouldn’t try anything.

His legs were killing him by the time he made it. Sweat dripped along his neck to his back, and every exhale felt as though he were breathing against a crushing force that pressed into his chest. He glanced up. Salamander didn’t even make a sound.

The gun-like object was shiner now that Tommy was closer to it. He could make out some inner mechanism through the clear chamber, and when he gently nudged it with his injured foot, it didn’t explode. One point in favour of Salamander. Tommy swallowed dryly.

“Still doesn’t mean you’re not a bitch,” Tommy told Salamander, who simply blinked and warbled at him.

He kicked the gun-thing again, and he frowned when he heard something slosh around on the inside. Weapons weren’t supposed to make that noise, were they?

With a distant alarm bell that rang in his head, Tommy stepped away and glared at Salamander. Just what exactly was their goal here? 

Salamander had chirped when he stepped away, and after a moment of frantically fumbling with their arms, they made an odd gesture with their claws, pointing from themself to Tommy, and then the gun. Tommy’s head whirled as he tried to follow the motions. Salamander made the awkward gestures again, a little more slowly. They pointed at the gun, and then at Tommy. They chirped.

What? Tommy shook his head and took another step away. If Salamander was insinuating what Tommy thought they were, there was no way in hell he was gonna touch that thing.

“No,” Tommy said, enunciating the word slowly and loudly for Salamander to understand. Then, quieter, “fuck off.”

Tommy shuffled back as far as he could before he felt his legs begin to give up on him. Tommy grabbed at one of the seats behind him and slowly sank to the ground, keeping an eye on Salamander all the while.

Salamander let out a harsh exhale, and slowly, carefully, they stepped forward. Tommy stiffened, but they simply grabbed the strange gun and tucked it beneath the folds of their cloak. They dug around a little more before they pulled out a device that Tommy actually recognized. The tablet.

An awkward moment of silence filled the air between the two as Salamander fiddled with the device. Tommy took the time to try and figure out an escape, but the pod was dark, and the only escape he could make out was the one that sat behind Salamander. He sighed, resigning to his fate and closing his eyes. He swallowed thickly, God, he could really go for a good cup of water about now.

A sudden, excited chirp forced Tommy to open his eyes, and he blinked at the tablet, now sliding its way towards him and stopping just at his side. Salamander’s fins flicked and their head nodded as Tommy slowly picked up the tablet. Tommy gave their excitement a glare of suspicion before he turned the device over and read the screen.

The first thing that stood out to Tommy were the odd glyphs that decorated the screen. Without the help of his translator, it all looked like gibberish. The alien words were sharp and without curves, like scratches dug into stone. All of it was meaningless to Tommy. As his eyes trailed towards the bottom of the screen, his eyes were caught by the one word that stood out like a beacon amongst endless scratches. Despite himself, Tommy’s breath caught in his throat at the sight of the English word “Hello” staring back up at him in all its orange glory.

Across the pod, Salamander chirped again, and then they made that warbling sound again, a garbled and mixed up “Hello” of their own. Tommy’s head shot up at the sound, and Salamander, seemingly happy that they’d caught his attention, said “Hello” again. Tommy felt his lips begin to twitch, and he responded in kind.

“Hello,” he said, and Salamander bobbed their head again, but this time with more fervor. Well, Tommy thought, they seemed to like it when he did that. Without much left to do with the tablet, and now with a budding sense of curiosity, Tommy slid the tablet back to Salamander, who caught it all too happily.

Another brief pause took the room as Salamander fiddled with the device before it slid back Tommy’s way.

The English word simply said “Heal”. Tommy felt his brows knit together, and he glanced up at Salamander, who was nodding and awkwardly pointing at his leg. “Heal?” Tommy asked. “You mean, my leg?”

Salamander cocked their head as Tommy’s words practically flew over their head. Tommy sighed. “Right. Okay, let’s see…” Tommy began to mess with the tablet. There seemed to be a thousand different menus and even more alien words, but eventually he began to somewhat grasp it, and by what was probably sheer luck, he eventually found himself in a small dictionary of human words, all of them ranging randomly from English, to French, to Korean, and on. Tommy blinked in surprise. Well, he could work with this. Luckily, there seemed to be more English words than not, so he scrolled through until he found a word that, in his opinion, summed up his feelings on the recent events that were happening in his life quite well.

Tommy selected the word “Unhappy”, and after seeing it automatically translate to alien gibberish below, he slid the tablet back to Salamander, who quickly scooped it up without delay.

Salamander flicked their fins as they read the translation. They chittered something quietly, and then the tablet was slid back to Tommy with a sharp bob from their head. This time, two words were shining up at him when he picked up the tablet, “Help” and “Trust”.

Tommy snorted, and it didn't take him long to find and select the word “No”, before he practically tossed the device at Salamander, who caught it with a sharp chirp. Tommy crossed his arms and waited.

Now, despite having been around aliens for as long as he’d been, Tommy hadn’t necessarily become an expert at reading body language, but he was almost certain that he’d either pissed off Salamander, or greatly exasperated them when their tail flicked about in the air like that of an angry cat. When they glanced up at Tommy, he glared at them until they looked away.

Salamander’s claws clacked gently against the device as they appeared to be deep in thought, but, to Tommy’s slight surprise, they hadn’t dropped it in favour of strangling him. 

Why? Tommy wanted to ask. He still couldn’t think of a reason as to why Salamander hasn’t tried to kill him yet, let alone save his life. The Rabbits hadn’t tried to trick him when he had been back on their ship, but that didn’t mean that Salamander had some ulterior motive in trying to keep him alive. These guys were two entirely different kinds of aliens, and Salamander was one that Tommy had never encountered before. His hands fisted into his shirt as Salamander began to fiddle with the device again.

He’d rather die than go back to being experimented on again. But… Salamander had put away the gun when Tommy said no.

Was Salamander… different?

“...What do you want from me?” Tommy asked, voice scratchy. Salamander glanced up at the question, but besides a curious tilt of their head, they didn't respond.

Tommy sighed. He was exhausted, sore, and so, so thirsty. He let his head fall back against the seat’s cushion with a thump, and shut his eyes, only leaving them open a crack so he could spy on Salamander, who was still watching him curiously, and not once moving from their spot. Occasionally, they would turn back to the tablet, but stolen glances would still be sent Tommy’s way. Were they just as nervous as him?

A terrible idea wormed its way into Tommy’s head when his gaze fell to the tablet Salamander was still tapping their claws against, and Tommy wanted to wave it away, he wanted so bad to ignore it and just go to sleep, but his throat was beginning to itch, and no amount of dry swallowing was helping to soothe it.

Besides, he was never really that great at following his common sense.

Without putting much more thought into it than that, he waved at Salamander to toss over the device. It took more than a few “gimme” waves before Salamander caught on and they slid the tablet over.

He found the word “Water” almost instantly. He clicked it, but still, he hesitated. Gripping the tablet with both hands, he raises his eyes to meet Salamander’s gaze. They shifted awkwardly in place, still sitting back on their haunches with their front claws tucked close to their chest. They looked innocent, and Tommy had no idea whether it was all an act or not. Their pupils were large and round as they stared at Tommy, not constricted like he’d seen them before. If he squinted, Tommy could almost make out his reflection within them.

Tommy released the tablet, and he slid it over.

It stopped at Salamander’s feet, and Tommy sucked in a sharp breath when they picked it up. He prayed to whatever gods that might exist somewhere out there that there wasn’t a way to misinterpret the word “Water” to something like, “Please kill me now”.

Salamander chittered something, and they bobbed their head at Tommy twice before they stood and moved to the other side of the pod. Tommy leaned as far as his wound let him to the side in an attempt to peer over Salamander, who was crouched underneath one of the chairs and messing around with something he couldn’t see. Their tail flicked and waved as they dug around, and Tommy was left to stare at their gently flashing lights until they finally dragged themself out with something clutched in their claws in tow.

Not without a lot of caution, Salamander slowly shuffled over to Tommy and held out what looked like a narrow bottle, and then they chirped something. It rose and fell like a short melody, ending in a succession of rumbling clicks that resounded from deep within their throat like a purr. Tommy blinked at them, and they blinked back.

Then, slowly, they held out the tablet, the word “Water” still shining a bright orange against the darkness. They made the sound again, and then they jerked their head at the tablet.

“Water,” Tommy repeated in English, and he held up the bottle. “Water?”

Salamander quickly bobbed their head. Right, Tommy exhaled slowly. He just learned a new word. Cool.

Without another thought to hesitation, Tommy practically tore the odd top off the bottle. No longer caring if it was poisoned or not, he guzzled the entire thing dry. It hadn’t smelled, and it had certainly tasted like water, but Tommy didn’t really care for much other than how it soothed his burning throat and washed away the clouding fog that had taken residence over his thoughts since he’d woken up.

He dropped the bottle to the side once he was finished, and he hardly had a chance to examine the odd grooves that decorated the outside of the bottle, for grip, likely, before something nudged his leg again. A second bottle.

Salamander held a third bottle in their claws, likely waiting for Tommy to finish the second one. Tommy huffed. “Thanks,” he murmured as he picked up the second bottle and brought it to his lips.

 He got halfway through the second bottle before he finally felt quenched enough to take a break, and when he breathed in,he felt like an entirely new person.

“Thanks,” he said to Salamander a second time, his voice a little stronger now, and they tilted their head. They chirped once, quick and succinct like Tommy’s thanks, and Tommy huffed a short laugh.

Tommy dipped his fingers into the bottle and splashed some water against his leg. It stung a little, but it was worth it. Tommy felt more alive than he had for these last few days.

Salamander, who had shied away from Tommy’s laugh at first, was back to bobbing their head and wagging their tail as Tommy gently washed around his wound. They looked happy for Tommy, with their eyes shut in gentle crescents as they bobbed and weaved like a parrot.

Yeah, Tommy thought as their little dance came to a stop, he could start getting used to this guy.

Their eyes trailed down to Tommy’s leg, and for a second, Tommy hesitated on his last thought as the pod fell eerily silent.

Tommy tensed up despite the protests from his leg, but Salamander never grabbed for the gun-thing. Instead, they went back to sitting and typing on the tablet like the moment had never happened. Tommy exhaled, forcing himself to relax. Salamander didn’t want to hurt him.

They held out the tablet suddenly, and the words “Happy Water” glowed against Tommy’s face.

“Um, yeah, I guess?” Tommy reached out, and Salamander gave him the tablet. Tommy selected the word “Yes”, and returned it to Salamander.

They light up. Literally, and metaphorically, Tommy thought with slight amusement as a happy trill sounded from Salamander followed by a series of happy bobs. They typed something else.

“Together happy water?” Tommy read, and then he snorted. “You a big fan of water or something, big guy?” His eyes took in Salamanders dark blue scales and fins. Of course they’d enjoy water, they looked almost as if they’d popped right out of an old-school fairy-tale, dragon scales and all. “That’s something we’ve got in common, I guess,” Tommy said, and Salamander chirped.

Tommy selected “Yes” again and handed the tablet back to an increasingly excited looking Salamander.

A glowing “Interesting” was sent back Tommy’s way, and this time he couldn’t help the small smile that stretched across his face. Salamander didn’t seem phased by it when Tommy glanced up, so he kept his lips sealed as he took the tablet and scrolled through more words.

“Water help heal”, Tommy settled with, and he held it over. “It’s good for waking up too,” Tommy said once Salamander finished reading and glanced at him. He dipped his hand into the bottle and splashed a little onto his face. He smiled without his teeth. “See?” Then, taking a leap of faith, he flicked the remaining droplets at Salamander, who goes cross-eyed at the small droplets that land on their snout. Tommy snickered.

Salamander shook their head, and then bobbed for the tablet, to which Tommy gleefully handed over.

“Human interesting”, Salamander typed. Tommy snorted.

“I guess,” Tommy said. He reached for the tablet, but Salamander quickly pulled it back. Their eyes narrowed as they focused on typing something. It took a few seconds longer than usual for them to type something out, but then the tablet was finally handed back to Tommy, and he read.

“Phan… Phantlus additional interesting?” Tommy read the new word slowly. The english translation of the word looked clumsy, as though the program had to scramble something together in order to make it make sense. Tommy glanced up at Salamander, who was watching him with those same, wide eyes of wonder. “Phantlus,” Tommy said again. “Is that what you are? A Phantlus?”

Salamander warbled a word back, high and breathy like the trail end of a song. Tommy cocked his head as Salamander said it again. Before he could stop himself, or rather, before he really realized what he was doing, Tommy tried to mimic the sound. He knew how to roll his r’s, but the breathy whistle at the end proved to be too difficult, and he ended up just blowing out air instead.

Despite the pitiful attempt, Salamander still jerked back in surprise, and Tommy couldn’t help laughing at their wide-eyed expression. “What, you didn’t expect that big guy?” Tommy sputtered out the sound again, and this time Salamander chirped , fervently bobbing their head in what Tommy assumed was silent encouragement, and then Salamander joined him. Their voice seemed to dance around his; mastery clashing with inexperience as Tommy failed once more to whistle properly. 

A brief silence took the room as Salamander quickly gestured for the tablet and typed something inside. When they showed it to Tommy, it was all he could do to stop himself from bursting out into uncontrollable laughter so he didn’t further injure his leg.

“I am not ‘terrible’,” Tommy managed to say. “You’re the terrible one. A god-awful teacher. You ought to be reported.” Tommy dipped his fingers into the water and flicked it at Salamander’s head again.

Salamander, who’d been previously tilting their head at the sound of Tommy’s laugh, snorted when the droplets landed on their face. Suddenly, they moved, and that silent voice of reason that Tommy had been pushing away began ringing at the forefront of his mind because he’d just fucked up and he’d taken it too far and Salamander was only getting closer so they could stab him dead with those wicked sharp claws and–

Tommy’s spiraling thoughts screeched to a halt when a sudden splash of water hit his face, and he froze. Salamander sat in front of him, their claws dripping with water from where they’d dipped them into the bottle. They were frozen too.

Time stopped as they stared at each other, Tommy still reeling from having been splashed with water and Salamander seemingly surprised by their own action. Then, the moment vanished when Salamander, having clearly copied Tommy’s action from before, dipped their claws back into the bottle and flicked more water in his direction.

“Wha–” Tommy sputtered as he wiped the water from his face. “You bitch!”

A sudden, echoing trill reverberated the air around them, and when Tommy lowered his arm to see none other than Salamander, doubled over themself with their eyes closed and their tail whipping in the air. They were laughing.

“...You bitch,” Tommy muttered this time, hiding his growing smile behind an arm. 

Salamander settled in front of him again as Tommy finished drying himself off, already tapping away at the tablet. Tommy waited until the screen was shown to him again.

“Phantlus water interesting,” Tommy read aloud. He glanced at Salamander, who eagerly held out their water for Tommy to take. Before he could grab the bottle however, Salamander suddenly tipped it to the side, splashing Tommy’s arm in a small torrent of water. “Hey!”

Salamander trilled again as Tommy pulled his arm back, feeling somewhat undignified from Salamander’s sudden betrayal. He was about to open his mouth and give Salamander exactly what for and exactly why they were a little shit when Salamander held out a scaly arm, and poured the water over themselves.

And instead of the string of expletives Tommy had ready to dish out, his mouth dropped open as the water ran over Salamander’s scales, and vanished before his eyes.

Dark blue faded to light, and then it faded altogether until the dark pod was reflecting itself back at Tommy, leaving nothing but Salamander’s glowing branch-like lights behind. 

Tommy leaned closer as Salamander’s scales transformed, reflecting a perfect, mirror-like sheen that almost seemed to flash with every pulse from their surrounding green lights. If he reached out, Tommy could almost make out the reflection of his own hand in the scales before they began to dry and return some light opacity.

Salamander crooned suddenly, and Tommy froze mid reach. His eyes snapped up to Salamander, who seemed to have frozen in place as well, their eyes locked onto Tommy’s hand. Slowly, their green eyes shifted up to meet his own, and something in those eyes gave Tommy pause, even as he quickly retracted himself from the alien. Salamander followed suit.

“...You’re right,” Tommy said once the silence became too much to bear. Salamander curled back into that familiar kicked puppy hunch they usually did around Tommy, with their tail wrapped tight against their body and their claws tucked close to their chest. “...That was kinda cool.” 

He offered Salamander a small, tight-lipped smile, and in turn, Salamander slowly bobbed their head. Tommy leaned back, content to watch Salamander chirp and chatter to themself from a safe distance. Yet, despite the apprehension Tommy still felt lying beneath his somehow still-beating heart, he wasn’t afraid. Salamander wasn’t entirely like the Rabbits, and they certainly weren’t like the giant arachnid monsters that he'd encountered not so long ago.

Salamander… wasn’t bad. He couldn’t decide if they were good, but they weren’t bad. Tommy knew that for certain now. A little skittish, maybe, and definitely a cheeky bastard, but, yeah. They were alright.

They weren't so different from himself, after all.