The Betwixt Book One (2 page)

‘
What's a Kroplin?’ I had caught a hold of the end of my long
ponytail and was stroking it compulsively. I just wanted this
little scene to end.

He pointed at the red alien.

My cheeks flushed with embarrassment. Of course, he wasn't
going to be checking my general knowledge here, was he? 'I, well,
no. I've never seen anything like him before. I mean, that is, what
I mean to say is, I've seen aliens before,’ I chuckled erratically,
‘of course I have, I work in a space diner . . . but
I—’

‘
You haven't seen him before,’ he cut in, saving me from
drowning in my own babble. Then he turned to his men, ‘call
security.’

I watched him as he massaged his forehead with the palm of his
hand, that hint of weariness was crinkling back up around his eyes.
‘And this was meant to be shore leave,’ he mumbled under his
breath.

The crowd was starting to disperse around us, thankfully. Even
Claudia moved off, apparently realizing my officer was far too
tired and busy to pay her any attention. Soon it was just us in the
center of the room: the Kroplin, my officer, the other GAMs, and
me.

My officer was busy barking more orders at his men,
compulsively checking they had a firm grip on the alien. I started
to wonder if I could just leave, I mean, they didn't need me now,
did they? I would just get in the way if I stood here like a chunk
of space debris.

So I moved off slowly, hands patting at my skirt to ensure it
sat straight and neat. I could go and feed Hipop, my pet, or
perhaps have a quick lie down . . . 

‘
What are you doing?’

I turned to face my officer, a nervous smile stretching my
lips to a thin line.

‘
You are going to the Med Bay,’ he supplied quickly, answering
his own question.

‘
Oh, I don't really need too, I fe—’

‘
You're going to the Med Bay. Name?’

My eyebrows squeezed together in confusion.

‘
What's your name?’ He repeated, voice slower, lips collecting
around each word.

‘
Mini.’

‘
Mini?

‘
Yes.’

‘
Last name?’

I was starting to realize this guy wasn't big on conversing in
whole sentences. He was to the point like a sniper rifle at twenty
paces. ‘I don't have a last name. I mean, I might
have . . . but I don't know it—’ I began to babble
again, but cut myself short by sucking in a little gulp of
air.

He looked at me and it was clear he found me to be the oddest
thing this side of the Milky Way. ‘Sorry, what? Do you have a last
name or not?’

‘
No, I don't have a last name . . . ah,
sir.’

‘
Commander Jason Cole. You're going to the Med Bay now, someone
from Station Security will meet you there.’

‘
Oh, I,’ I began to protest once more, it was ever so
half-hearted, but I really didn't need to go. The alien had been a
surprise, sure, but I wasn't hurt. And, in fact, the more I looked
at the little guy as he was sandwiched between a trio of GAMs, the
more it felt like he had never intended to hurt me at all. He
seemed . . . it was hard to put a finger on it. ‘I
really don't need to go—’

‘
N-o-w,’ his voice wasn't angry, but it wasn't pleasant
either.

‘
O, o-okay Mr Cole. I – I mean, Commander Cole.’ I turned on my
heel before this scene could continue to bleed more
embarrassment.

I resisted the urge to pick up the overturned table and
straighten it up before I went, as I was sure that Commander Cole
wouldn't approve. Instead, I walked quickly for the door, not
turning back once.

I would just head up to my quarters, I certainly didn't need a
doctor.

I headed for the lifts that connected the shopping district,
where Marty's was, to the living quarters, with a quick trot to my
step. The sooner I was out of the public eye, the better. I reached
down to key in the Accommodation Deck, but another hand got there
first.

‘
The Med Bay isn't on the Accommodation Deck, Mini.’

I jumped, just a little, and I gave another pathetic yelp. I
could never help it, when I was startled or scared I would always
cry out like three-year-old in sea of clown masks.

‘
It didn't take a genius to realize you don't follow orders,’
he said as he keyed in the button that would take us to the
Services Deck.

Now hold on, I thought to myself as I sucked in a calming
lungful of air. I wasn't some GAM under his command, I had nothing
to do with this man. I was just an ordinary galactic citizen who
had just happened to be assaulted, rather innocently, by a two-foot
alien monk. Why should I be expected to follow his
orders?

I didn't say any of this, of course, I just looked at my shoes
and moved over in the lift to let him in.

I was aware he was looking at me from the side as the lift set
off with its characteristic shudder. This station was old, but so
large that risking one's life with the lifts was the only way to
travel. But no matter how hard I tried to pay attention to the
rattle and shake of the metal grating under my feet, I couldn't
block out that stare.

He eventually sighed and rubbed his forehead again.

I slid my gaze to the side, just glancing his way. He was
pinching the bridge of his nose, eyes squeezed shut. He looked
fatigued, frustrated, and irritated all at once. He really needed a
cup of steaming hot Tika tea and a good lie down, perhaps even a
plate biscuits. But instead, he was taking me to the Med
Bay.

A flicker of guilt burnt away my desire to run back to my
burrow like a startled rabbit that had shown her knickers to a GAM
Commander. The poor guy was obviously under a lot of stress, what
protecting the galaxy and all, and here I was adding to his
burdens. He had saved me, after all.

‘
Look,’ I turned to him, not fully - just enough so it was
polite, but not enough so that I faced him front on in this tiny
lift. ‘I will go to the Med Bay, I promise. Thank you very much for
saving me back there, and I'm sure if you go back to the diner they
will give you a nice Tika tea on the house.’ That was a lie, Marty
didn't believe in the concept of ‘it's on the house’. To Marty, we
were in space, and there were neither houses nor free meals in
space. It would just come out of my pay.

He blinked his eyes open and crossed him arms. He shook his
head.

I turned quickly, suddenly aware of how much of a clumsy fool
I'd been.

The seconds ticked by as we waited for the lift to make its
shuddering way to the Services Deck, and you could almost hear them
clunk around us like a great grandfather clock timing the
awkwardness and embarrassment. I found myself chewing industriously
on my lips.

But I should have enjoyed the silence while it lasted because
just as the doors opened to the massive Service Deck the questions
began.

‘
Why don't you have a last name?’ The Commander powered on
ahead of me, pushing through the crowds like he was a searing hot
iron through snow.

‘
I . . . it's a little complicated,’ I mumbled
as I managed to just keep up. The Med Bay was all the way on the
other side of the Service Deck. I was hardly an emergency, and I'm
sure the Commander could see that – he was just playing things by
the book. But it would take us minutes to reach it in this thick
crowd. Several ships must have come in at once – because there were
people, GAMs, mercenaries, space bums, and all sorts just milling
around before us.

‘
Short answer.’

There was that charming brevity again. He didn't sound curt or
rude exactly, just excessively short of time. If he had somewhere
more important to be, he should have taken me up on my offer to
escort myself to the Med Bay. I decided it was better to play along
though. The problem was, there wasn't a short answer. For a girl
who worked at a space diner, I had an unnecessarily complex life.
‘I'm a Floater.’ I paused, waiting for him to add something, gasp,
or acknowledge the statement at all. Most people would at least
raise an eyebrow when they found out about my unconventional early
life.

But not this guy, he just kept marching, obviously waiting for
me to illuminate, while keeping it 'short' of course.

A Floater was a rather unattractive term used to describe
orphans found in space with no traceable records. Perhaps a GAM
ship would come across a wreck pirates had scavenged, only to find
they'd missed a bouncing bub when they'd slaughtered or kidnapped
the crew. Or maybe a colony ship would go nuclear, and the infant
was the only person they'd managed to get to the life pod. So until
these children were found, they would literally just be floating
around in space – Floaters.

But once found they were usually adopted. After all, the
children of conflict and general misfortune were one thing, but
babies found floating, unattended in the vastness of space, were
another. Something about it always pulled at the heart's strings.
They were lucky to be alive, so fortune saw to it they were adopted
quickly.

I was a different case. Far more odd.

I wasn't on an attacked cruiser, or found alive in some
half-wrecked hull. I was almost literally dropped on the doorstep
of the GAM Head Quarters: Station One. I was found in a single
person cruiser, in stasis, with the navigation set to drift their
way. It was the single laziest case of abandonment ever. My
parents, or guardians, hadn't even bothered to nip into the closest
planet and deposit me at a hospital or with some appropriate
childcare facility. No, they had set a cruiser to drift and sent me
on my way.

Perhaps my parents had hoped some kindly old admiral, who had
an emotional connection to any soul unfortunate enough to be lost
be space, would adopt me and set me up in a life of fortune. It
didn't happen that way. I was sent straight to a planet-side
orphanage on Earth. And unlike the other Floaters, was never
adopted. Few parents, especially humans, were happy taking in an
unidentified halfy. Humans, or pure breed aliens, people could
manage - but halfy babies were always a gamble. Who knew how the
DNA would combine, what results it would have? Human DNA could
combine with surprisingly few alien races, and most of the results
were never pretty. So halfies were treated with general disdain,
they were too strange, too in-between.

So I'd grown up in an orphanage instead. And the old Matriarch
there, Mother Mirabella, had become my surrogate mother.

And the short of it was, I didn't have a last name, only the
nickname the GAMs who found had given me: Mini. Now how was I going
to give the Commander the quick version of that?

I chewed my lip for a bit, hoping the Commander would just
move on. It wasn't a fair line of questioning anyway. Why should I
tell him about my irrelevant past when he wasn't going tell me
about his? How would he react if I asked why he seemed so tired, or
how he'd gotten that little scar along his jaw line, or even why,
for a GAM commander, he appeared to have a tattoo on his upper
right arm?

‘
You weren't adopted?’ he obviously wasn't about to give up.
‘Didn't the government assign you a last name?’

The government assigned people identity codes, they didn't
usually scroll through the pages of the galactic phone book to pick
out a surname for the little orphan. ‘Ah, no.’

‘
Why are you on this space station?’

I pressed my lips against my teeth and smiled wanly.
‘I . . . just am, I guess.’ It was a poor answer,
but it was the only one I could give. I didn't choose to come to
this huge chunk of rusting debris out in the middle of nowhere
colony-space. I had just drifted here. At least out in the further
reaches of the galaxy people didn't tend to care too much if you
were a halfie Floater - just as long as you served them their
mind-destroying alcohol. That, and I'd always been drawn to the Rim
- to the outer reaches of known space. I didn't have the guts to go
adventuring – I was a self-confessed, easily scared, clumsy, and
often-pathetic scaredy-pants. Working on one of the outer space
stations as a waitress was all I could manage. Still, the pull was
always there . . . .

This time he slowed and turned his head towards me. ‘You get
attacked by one of the calmest, most spiritual races known; you
don't have a last name or a traceable lineage; and you move out to
the reaches of colony space for no reason. Is there something you
aren't telling me?’

I began to laugh, feeling nervous and foolish about how silly
that must sound. Then I realized he wasn't smiling. He didn't
actually believe I was on the run or something: a spy, a hunted
mercenary, an escaped convict? 'I - no, no, no. I know that sounds
bad, I just, I came to this station because there didn't seem any
other place to go. I mean, I'm a Floater and a halfy- a half breed,
and well, it was hard to find work in the Galactic Center, so I
just came out here because I thought maybe people would be more
accepting,’ I took a sharp breath, but wasn't about to stop. ‘Not
to say I ever really faced that much prejudice over being a mixed
breed, I mean, I'm not saying most humans are racist or anything,
not at all, it was just easier, and I thought—’