I wasn’t a complete psychopath. Just a partial one. Like seventy-five percent. “I will not kill you for no reason. I’m not a total savage. I love your general and it offends me that someone would go against him. You don’t have to agree with him, just don’t actively work against him and you will never see my teeth in anger,” I said to the timidly growing crowd. None of them would ever want to be my bosom buddy, but that was fine with me.
Ohem flared his Izi in approval at my words and helped me to my feet, he turned to the big green lizard guy and pointed at the bloody remains on the table. “Would you have this room sealed and sanitized, Aga-Ush?”
The green male winked at me. “You may call me Aga, Nin At’ens.” He nodded at Ohem. “I will see this done for you, General,” he said and bowed. Aga started barking orders into his link. He then sternly told the crowd to scram and to see counselors. They would need it. I’d made quite the impact statement with my early dinner.
Ohem held my hand in his all the way back to the portal with Rema staying behind to help with the cleanup and crowd control.
The portal closed us inside, and he looked down at me. “I understand you thought you had to take action against my enemies, my ursang, but perhaps the next time you do you can take it to a secure room without giving me crew nightmares for the rest of their lives.” There was amusement in his voice that made the tension melt from my shoulders.
I shrugged. “I needed them to witness what I was capable of and tell the rest of the crew on the Solus what they’d seen. I won’t have to do such a public execution again.”
“Ah, I see. Yes. I imagine you won’t. Our remaining enemies will try to stay hidden now. They will also understand just how lethal you are. I will have Rema track Serail’s comings and goings. We will find who else he conspired against. I will also move the departure date for those leaving to tomorrow morning.”
They should have already been tracking him, and maybe Rema already had. He appeared untrusting of anyone but Ohem, and he’d pointed out to his General that even a seemingly loyal crew could be snakes in the grass.
The portal opened in our hallway and Ohem gently nudged me out. “Go get cleaned up, I have to see to the departures. We will have to postpone our celebratory night for a later date. I am sorry, Jack, that my ship hasn’t been the haven I had wanted for you and our friends.”
He was so solemn and genuinely upset that I’d had to kill some people. Silly man.
I smiled up at him and reached up to pull his face down to mine so I could kiss his jaw. I left behind blood smudges on his face. “I live for this shit, Ohem. My life back home was boring as hell. This is awesome. Patty and the girls are fine. I’ll kill anyone who threatens them, and I think Callie enjoys the challenge. Sam wants to help, and Patty is a wildcard that lives for chaos. Don’t apologize. I’m here to help you. This is me helping. I’ll worry about the spies. You get your people situated and get us to where we need to go. I love you,” I said and started walking towards the metal door of our rooms.
“And I love you. Be careful,” he said, and the portal door closed around him.
I called Patty and the others to check in after I’d washed all the blood off me. Patty was with Sam in the labs where Rema had dropped her off when he’d gotten the call about my incident in the cafeteria, and Callie was grilling the pilots in one hangar. They were all safe and being watchful. I told Callie to be extra careful being alone, but apparently she’d found the big boss of the pilots and was sticking close to him. Her voice had an added huskiness to it when I called. It might have to do with more than just the fancy alien spacecrafts she was interested in. Sexy alien men would do that to a girl.
Once I was dressed, I figured it was time to do a little exploring myself. I french braided my hair to keep it out of my face and tied it off with some weird rubbery hair ties that Ohem had left for me.
I entered the portal and touched my wrist link to bring up the map. There were a million cargo bays, docking bays and ship hangars. So many crew quarters it was overwhelming to look at the numbers running on the side of the map. Kitchens, dining halls, common rooms, gyms. Entertainment rooms? Might have to check those out. Gardens, pools, theaters, training grounds. This ship was gigantic, and I’d never see all of it! I’d start with the entertainment room farthest from me and work my way back. We were towards the front of the ship, closest to the bridge. The entertainment room I selected was almost completely at the ass end of the Solus, towards the bottom. There were so many levels on this thing.
“Entertainment room 473 deck level 234,” I said to the portal, and the door opened a few seconds later, I stepped out into the corridor and followed my map to the left. There were hundreds of aliens crowding the wide hall, moving back and forth that it was almost like walking around in the Mall of America. I kept my ears open for snippets of conversation as I walked, and I took notice of how they parted around me, avoiding my eyes. Word traveled fast on the ship. Good.
The glowing line on the map turned right down a side hallway. I followed it to a swirling neon lit door. It slid up at my approach and the map pinged to let me know this was the place. I touched the link to close the map and walked into the room. If you’ve ever been to Dave and Busters, then this was what this was, times a thousand. It was dark with neon lit games and virtual reality sections.
There was music here! Bass pumping from invisible speakers and aliens grinding along to the beat on a pulsing dance floor in the center of the room. The dance floor was a sunken section that had steps wrapped around it. It was probably the size of a football field. Everything on the Solus was larger than life. How awesome was this! I weaved my way through the crowd to a long bar on the far side of the room. It was like a dance club in here, dark and confusing, so no one would recognize me. Cue evil hand rubbing.
The bar was red neon with glowing mushroom like bar stools all along the front. I snagged one as an alien vacated and surveyed the wall behind the bar. It was red with floating white shelves that highlighted all the various sized bottles covering the wall. The bartenders were six-armed slender creatures that wore illuminated paint on their bodies like rave dancers. I met one of their many, many eyes and locked my muscles so I didn’t bug out like a coward. They had faces full of eyes! The bartender smiled at me and I shuddered.
It approached and placed a wavy glass in front of me. “Nin At’ens! What an honor to serve you! What can I get you?”
I couldn’t tell if it was male or female. Its voice was deep, and it was slightly larger than the others, so we’d go with male. He was staring at me, practically vibrating with anticipation, and I felt a little bad at being so put off by his appearance. I looked at the bottles again until I snagged on a glowing pink liquid that looked interesting,
I pointed at it. “Whatever that is. Can you make me something with that?”
He didn’t even turn his head, just some of his eyes glanced back and it was a herculean effort not to gag.
He twittered and waved his many hands enthusiastically. “Yes! I will make you the very best drink! I am so honored!” He said and turned to grab bottles off the shelves.
I turned and bobbed my head to the beat, and crowd watched. If I didn’t know I was in space on an alien ship this would look like something earth would think up. Combination night club/arcade with bar. The alien crew weren’t dressed in the typical crew red either. There were all kinds of attire out there. Short club dresses transcended Earth, it would seem. Some dancers had no clothes, just painted bodies that glowed under the lights. This was my favorite room, hands down. I was going to bring the girls here later, and we were going to get drunk and dance. I was going to drag Ohem’s big body onto that dance floor to grind all over him. I needed to have some club dresses made asap and paint my exposed skin to really drive him wild.
The trill of the bartender had me turning to see him place a wavy glass in front of me filled with swirling pink liquid. The rim was crusted with gold flakes and there were glowing balls floating in the drink that were dissolving into foam that threatened to overflow the glass. He stood there and watched me take a cautious sip, my eyes widening at the fresh, sweet flavor and the kick of alcohol. It was delicious, and I took a longer taste.
I flicked my eyes to his many, many eyeballs, and finally settled on two large ones in the center, and smiled over my glass. “This is amazing. Thank you! I’ll be sure to only come to your bar for my new favorite drink,” I said.
He wiggled and his thousand eyes blinked rapidly at different intervals that threatened to bring my drink back up. I swallowed it down and held my smile in place. It wouldn’t do to throw up his drink right after I promised to make him my personal bartender.
“I call it the Nin Rijitera! In honor of you!” He said, his voice overly emotional at my compliment.
I dipped my head at him and drained my glass. “How do I pay you?”
