The mess was as quiet as it ever got, absent of Lehua’s lovely loquaciousness and little diddies dear. With neither her warmth nor the warmth of the ovens running full time, it was close to cool, and dark, and graven, one of the largest rooms on the ship and sepulchral in its solitude.
More oft than not this was how she preferred it. Slipping into a tomb, dining with her ghosts, an aberration herself, prone to fading and twisting in between blinks.
Did she even really exist?
Oh, brilliantly.
Connie crept quiet and quickfoot to the kitchen, stealing into shelves that were never locked but to give her a sense of challenge, and their jailor a sense of control; a silent game negotiated not between her and sweet Lemon Drop, but the Captain.
She picked it in a tick of the tock on Lehua’s tchotshky tooka clock.
Stealing out her prize, her siphoned a finger of tihaar into her own flask and then returned the bottle. This process repeated, so they all looked, relative to one another, untouched at a glance. The liquid menagerie would need to last her a few days, if she rationed. And she would feel like death, as usual.
Which was what the cookies helped.
Inhaling when she got down the platter, a little note on them sweetly labeled Connie in Lehua’s bubbly handwriting, she breathed in the notes of spices and sugar. She didn’t know what these were, never did, whatever new batch the Nautolan made her, but she hadn’t not adored one yet. She’d never had a cookie before she joined the crew, and now she had them every day.
She took three. Then six. Then nine. Then put back the tray, kissing the note, and scampered back out to eat.
Only now the mess wasn’t empty, and she wasn’t alone.
The new one. Chai. And she hadn’t spotted her yet, soft of footfall and shadow as the shifter was. Connie lingered in the doorway, a mirage behind Lehua’s beaded glass curtains, and watched. Debated. Touched her dagger.
Well, why not.
“Out for a late night rummage, then?” she called, sing-song, using her tail to flick the curtains in dramatic fall about her stride.
Chai was new to the Crows but she wasn’t new to piracy and thievery. The woman had traveled across the stars, drifting from crew to crew, unable to find a group she truly connected with. After all her searching she had all but given up on trying to find a place to fit in and began treating the variety of crews she joined as if they were just another job. The Devaronian almost felt like a mercenary with the mindset but it’s what protected her.
That’s how she found herself in the mess, hopefully alone with her thoughts and some stress food in the middle of the crews decided evening hours. A sing-song voice broke through the silence of the mess and the crashing of her thoughts, forcing a small screech from the woman’s lips. She looked around for the source, letting out a sigh of relief when she noticed it was another member of the crew, Connie.
“Yes.” She said, her voice mildly stern to make up for the fear. “You know, it’s impolite to scare people, especially when you’re doing the same thing.”
“Such an accusatory tone. I did nothing to scare you, we only both thought we were alone. Hmm? I didn’t shout and go, ‘boo!’ Unless you wanted me to?” The hybrid gave a smile, sashaying her way in a wide circle around Chai to loop back to the opposite side of the table closest to the Devoarian and gesture at the benches. “Now, now, come and sit, we sup together. Fetch us some drinks to share, why don’t you? And I will share my prize.”
She showed the cookies like fanning cards, and a faint sparkle of light surrounded them at her will, perfectly displaying Lehua’s handiwork.
“Maybe you can tell me what kind they are. I’ve yet to ask, and they’re delightful as sin.”