Rated: T for Teen. Suitable for all ages of hoomans above the minimum age to watch sci-fi.

Time: Just after Episode 1 - "Premiere / Through the Eye of the Needle"

FARSCAPE is owned by the Jim Henson Company. This story is for purely personal entertainment purposes. No encroachment on any property rights are intended or implied.

I followed a beeping and bleeping DRD down the tier and into a large chamber, passing through a typical valve-like door. I had to admit that if I was designing a living ship, the idea of pivoting doors seemed like a good design. I watched as the door slowly swung closed behind me while the DRD circled back and nudged my boot. "Okay little guy. I get it."

The chamber was huge, the largest I'd seen on board, and at the center sat the pilot, no wrong, Pilot; that was his name. The DRD chivvied me along like an electronic sheepdog across a catwalk that had no handrails until I was facing the creature. I snuck a look over the side and the chamber was far deeper than I imagined. It must go all the way down to Moya's keel. There was a strange odor in the room, but all the smells of Moya seemed strange to me.

I stopped about three meters away from Pilot, and it was all the closer I wanted to get. It, no he, was easily four meters tall covered by large exoskeletal plates, with a large head holding giant eyes above a beaky mouth. His four arms were as long as I was, but they seemed to have wrist, elbow, and shoulder joints which looked like spherical ball joints. The hands had three-digits and his skin or whatever looked like a well aged bronze statue. If he had legs they were hidden from sight.

How can I describe him? Take E.T., yes Spielberg's E.T., stretch him so he's about ten feet tall, make his head look like a helmet, take off his nose, add another pair of arms and cover him with scales. His arms were moving back and forth ceaselessly over some sort of control panel which looked like a jagged coral reef, not metallic like some of Moya's interior.

His huge eyes stared at me impassively as I stood in front of him. "Ah there you are," he said. "You look smaller in person." His voice sounded warmer in person and he spoke softly, almost companionably.

"Ahm, okay. And you are bigger, much. Much taller, bulkier. The viewer doesn't give any sense of scale."

The massive crested head nodded. "I am the usual size for one of my kind at this stage of my life."

"Zhaan says you are part of Moya."

"Uhm, yes. She and I are… we have been bonded… for several cycles."

"Bonded?"

"Grafted you might say. I am connected to her central plexus through my nervous terminus. Think of Moya and I me as having two bodies and two minds, intertwined as one."

"Everything she feels you feel and vice-versa?"

"No, she is…" he stopped mouth agape, "it is hard to explain."

"Ah," I replied. "So what's it like?"

"Like?"

"You feel what she feels? Know what she's thinking?"

"In a way." He sighed. "More like watching a stream flow past, being in the stream, but not part of it."

I pointed to his moving arms. "But why a control panel? Why? If you are joined into her thoughts why are there controls?"

Pilot cocked his head. "That is true, I do hear her thoughts, but… many of these…" a lower arm rose and arced over the panel before him, "are for the systems which make it possible for life to be maintained aboard her. But enough about me and Moya. Moya wanted to meet our newest crew member in person. You are Commander John Crichton, Astronaut, or so you say."

Dare I tell him that my rank of 'Commander' was made-up; that I had been tap dancing that day; feeling the need to elevate my status? "A Scientist too."

"Yessss." He stared at me. "Turn around."

"What?"

His claw-like upper left hand waved in a circle. "Please. For me, uhm, us."

I slowly turned so he could see all of me. "And you?"

"Sorry, Commander. I am, unable to do that, unfortunately."

"Oh the nervous terminus," I chuckled.

The giant creature snapped his beak-mouth closed. "You are making fun of me." His tone was angry.

"No Pilot just trying to understand. Never met anyone like you."

Several deep tones sounded in the chamber. "Yes, ahem, Commander, you look similar to Peacekeepers. Moya was enslaved by Peacekeeper for numerous cycles."

"But I'm not - not a Peacekeeper."

"Yesss," he hissed. "Zhaan says her bio scan agrees with you. So you are a hooman bean."

"Hu-man be-ing," I told him slowly. "From Earth."

"Urp?" He stopped. "No? Earrtthhh," he drew out the word. "Officer Sun calls your planet Urp."

I sighed. "I think she says it that way to piss me off."

"Piss out?"

"Off. Translator microbes not working. It means that she'd doing it to get under my skin."

"I see." Pilot cocked his head. "Officer Sun appears to be having a tough time - adjusting. Life on a leviathan is… well," he blinked his eyes, "different from her former life."

"I sense that."

"Astronaut you say?" the large pilot asked.

"Means star traveler."

The large eyes blinked at me while the DRD at my feet backed up and went away. "Just like me then. Your spacecraft…"

"My module. Farscape 1."

"Yesss. It is like the Peacekeeper craft - being made by artisans."

"Yep. We have engineers who build, well design them. My friend DK; he designed her; modified from a NASA prototype with money from IASA. Lockheed-Martin built her hull but the avionics are by Northrop Grumman."

"I do not recognize these people. Did they do a good job?"

"Yes - she's a good ship."

"Her?"

"On Earth all ships are called 'she.' "

"Like Moya."

"Moya is female."

"There are also male leviathans. The Peacekeepers…" he stopped and coughed. "Moya wants to be assured that your craft is unarmed."

I knew the DRDs had been crawling over Farscape, so he knew all there was to know. "Yes. No cannons or anything like that."

Pilot nodded. "You told Zhaan that you are a scientist and you are on a science mission."

"One way to put it. Bit lost at the moment."

"Yes." Pilot paused and blinked several times. "Moya asks if your quarters are acceptable."

"Quarters? Oh, my prison cell."

"Commander you are not being held captive."

"So I can leave any time. Just get in my module and go."

His large eyes blinked. "If that is your desire."

"Fat lot of good it would do me with that Crais character after me."

"Captain Crais is pursuing all of us, Commander Crichton. Now," he sighed, "your quarters?"

"The bed's a little hard, but the blanket is silky and soft, comfortable even."

More tones sounded. "If you wish to have a pallet for your sleeping platform Moya can easily grow one for you."

"You said grow."

"Yes. The material would be derived from a natural insulating substance that Moya grows. It is used to mediate thermal transfer of the gravity bladders."

I shook my head.

"Something wrong?"

"No." I was shaking my head. "A living ship."

"You have no, what would you say? You do not use other creatures on your world?"

"Animals which we use for domestic purposes, yes, we do." I didn't want to say beast of burden for this beast had a mind of her own, and she was sheltering my tender pink body from the vacuum of space.

"So Commander you find it strange that Moya can grow a part of herself that would aid your comfort."

"No… it's just…"

"What?" he asked.

"Hard to accept," I gulped and waved my arms. "A living ship. You. All of it."

Pilot almost shrugged. "On my home world - Dolen - there are no creatures such as yourself, or Zhaan, or even D'Argo. You have your skeleton on the inside. My people have theirs on the outside. Is that so hard to accept?"

"Like a lobster."

"What's that?"

"On earth we have crustaceans, crabs, lobsters, crayfish, even roaches, and they have exoskeletons. They live on land and in oceans and in fresh water." I laughed. "Need an awful lot of drawn butter."

"Butter?"

"Never mind. Will it hurt? Growing this pad thing. Hurt Moya."

"No."

"Then yes, I'd like a sleeping pallet for my bed. Aeryn might like one too."

Pilot looked at me long and hard. "One more thing."

"Yes?"

"Moya… Moya…" More deep tones sounded echoing deep into room. "She requests, no demands, that you do nothing to harm her and if you wish to leave, you may. Simply say so. But if you are or become a threat you should understand that the DRDs will be used to remove you - forcibly if considered necessary."

I smiled. "And go where?"

Pilot coughed. "Zhaan tells me that your home world is very far away."

"Yeah. Somewhere. Out there."

"So you plan on staying with us."

"Yeah, sure. Why not? I'll stick around for a while and I won't bite the hand that feeds me."

"I see." Pilot cocked his head. "I believe that I understand what you are saying Commander."

"Fine. Fine. Can I go?"

"Yes, that is acceptable. Well then, if you don't mind I have some things to attend to. Thank you for the…"

"Chat? Yeah, me too."

Pilot's arms continued to waver over his control panel never having stopped once.

"Pilot?"

"Yes?"

"What's your name?"

He sighed. "You couldn't pronounce it."

I stared at Pilot and I had to ask. "So how did you get this gig? Being bonded to a leviathan?"

Pilot's eyes closed then snapped open. "I was chosen. Now, Commander Crichton, if you would," he waved an arm in a very readable gesture.

I left his lair thinking that for a bug-eyed, uhm, creature, he wasn't half bad, not a nightmare by H.P. Lovecraft.

"Commander?" he called to my back.

I turned to face him. "Yes?"

"Moya welcomes you."

"Oh, okay. Tell her…" I stopped. "Pilot and Moya, thank you - both of you."

Pilot almost bowed. "She says we will have further conversations."

"I'll look forward to it," I told him. "See you later." I turned towards the door which opened before me, and only after I got out in the tier, did I realize how much I had been sweating bullets.