"Here we are Dash, my new lab," Streak smiled as he walked Dash into the small dark room.
Dash was well familiar with this place, he had to clean it up after it's last resident had gotten sick in it, but was too polite to say anything. This was the first time someone had talked to him in a non-demanding fashion and he didn't want to do anything to mess it up.
He looked around the room, not much had changed. The vomit and other waste products had been cleaned up and the room smelled descent. The same old sheets laid on the same old bed and on the other side of the room was a small creaky desk and a chair. In the corner of the room there was a new cardboard box that he guessed must have belonged to Streak.
"Now I know it ain't much, but its a start, and I have big plans for this place." Streak said.
Not much, Dash couldn't help but think to himself, an entire room to yourself was a luxury. Most of the hard labor crew, including himself had to sleep outside on deck. The navigator got decent sleeping space so his eyes would be sharp enough for the job. But again he didn't say anything, he just stayed quiet.
"You're a quiet fellow, aren't you?" Streak snapped him out of his thoughts.
Dash just shrugged.
Streak smiled softly at him then went over to the box, "This is the only thing they let me keep from my last ship," he said.
Dash perked up when he saw Streak pulling out something hard and rectangular, "Do you know how to read Dash?" he asked.
Dash looked at him puzzled, "Read?" he asked, truly confused, he never before even heard the word.
Streak frowned and walked over to him, he opened up the rectangular object and pointed to symbols on the paper inside, "Do you understand any of this?" he asked.
Dash looked down at the book then shook his head, it was the first time he ever saw a book before.
"Well that's a shame, books and imagination are two key ingredients to going places, escaping." Streak said then sighed, "There's nothing I want to do more." he said softly.
Dash looked at him, "What?" he asked daringly.
"Escape, escape this slaughter house,the thieves and murders on here." he said, then looked down at Dash "Bet you do to huh? Escape."
Dash looked away, "I don't have anywhere else to go," he whispered.
"Course you do! You are traveling in Triangulum! One of the most logical and aware galaxies in the Universe!" Streak said, "There's so much out here to discover, I should know I've been doing it for years."
Dash looked curiously back up at him.
"You know what I was doing right before I wound up here," he said "I was studying the stars, how they work. I was one of the head scientist on my research ship, the other two being my big brothers. We was studying some of the closest stars we could reach by ship, we were going to research their age, what they were made of, why they were here..." Streak stopped and stared out into space.
"Now of course wish we stayed with our telescopes, studying from a long distance." he murmured.
"Say Dash, do you know what ship you're on?" he asked after a few moments on silence.
The question startled Dash but he anwsered quickly, "The Astral Light." he said simply.
"No that's the ship they stole," Streak clenched his fists, "You're now on the Ship of Murder, that's people call it now, even the people that make it call it that, it was suppost to be our biggest success, turned into our worst nightmare." he said stopping again and keeping quiet.
Dash tore his eyes away for the man and looked towards the bucket. It wasn't that he wanted to go but if the Captain found him not working...
"You got somewhere to be Dash?" Streak asked.
Dash quickly looked back at him and searched his mind for an answer. He didn't want to leave, in fact he wanted to stay more then anything, and tried to think of a decent excuse before Streak interrupted his thoughts again.
"It's okay, I've got work to do too" he said and started to leave.
Dash looked after him and suddenly found that he could not stand not being near Streak, he gave him a feeling he had never felt before, he didn't know what it was but he wanted more of it, needed more of it.
"Wait!" he called after the man.
Streak stopped and turned around.
"D-do you need me to clean up there?" he asked pointing to the post.
Streak smiled, immediately getting what he was trying to do "Well as a matter of fact it was a little dusty up there."
Dash felt himself smile too, out of eagerness, he felt weird on his face, but it was a good weird. He quickly grabbed his pail and mop and climbed up the navigation pole with Streak.
The next couple of hours was filled with conversation, most coming from Streak. He went on and on about everything he knew about stars and the space between them. And with every fact about stars came another story of him and his brothers, Solis and Sidus.
"We were a lot like you, Dash." he said "Adventurous, young, eager. Our dad was obsessed with astronomy, he told us tales about it before we went to sleep at night. He talked to us about it so much that we too became obsessed and fascinated with the world above. It was something we could all share and be good at equally." he smiled, "We made the perfect team, the three of us, I would make the observations, Solis would keep track of what we already knew, and Sidus would analyze it, or put everything together." he chuckled to himself "You know once when..."
Streak's eyes suddenly cast to the other side of the ship. Dash followed them and found a small speck where the old man was staring, he squinted and immediately recognized the figure of the ship.
He looked back at Streak who was locked on the ship, waiting for him to yell to the captain, instead he stood quiet and did nothing.
"Please don't tell the Captain," the words that came out of Dash's mouth surprised him and Streak at once.
There was something that made out Dash after all. In a mass of stars he stood out but fought to keep his individuality in. All these years he's tried to suppress the one thing that separated him from the rest and hoped that it would go away, but it never did. It was one of the weakest things a pirate could feel, sympathy.
Although he'd never even think of saying anything, he hated the murder that went on the ship. He hated it whenever they took over a ship and people lost their lives. Hated it. He hated it when prisoners that he took care of died on the ship, he hated the smell of death and it sickened and scared him. Maybe he was taught morals at an early age, or maybe he learned it from cleaning up the dead bodies, but he was not a murder like the rest of them, and he pitied those who died.
Neither said anything for awhile after Dash's plea. Dash fully expected a harsh punishment and replacement, if he was lucky, instead Streak simply said "I wasn't going to."
Dash practically jumped at this. Never in his life did he think he would meet someone with mercy, who would spare an unlucky ship passing by, least of all a navigator.
"You weren't?" he asked daringly.
"Of course not I don't want what happened to me and my brothers happen to anyone else." he said sadly and clenched his fists.
"What did he do to your brothers?" Dash asked, even though he knew the answer.
"Same thing he does to anything else that defies the fear his trying so desperately to bring," he said "Destroy it,"
Dash could see the old man's lip quiver and his fists were tightly squeezed.
He brought his hand to the old man's bone thin shoulder, a gesture he saw others do when they tried to comfort those who lost their loved ones.
Streak gently grabbed his hand, "You're different from the others." he said.
"I know," Dash replied then pleaded "Please don't tell."
Streak shook his head "Nothing good would happen if I do Dash, for now all we can do is save as many ships as we can from the shadows." he said.
Dash had fully acknowledged the use of the word 'We', he also heard 'for now'. The two watched the speck of a ship fly by beyond their view, unnoticed by the savages.
When the dinner bell had rang the Dash reluctantly left Streak's side and didn't see him again for the rest of the night. The next day he had to clean the other side of the ship, so he didn't see him most of that day either.
But Streak was all he could think about, which was a strange change considering the thing he mostly thought about before was his fear of being replaced or killed.
After about ten hours of straight cleaning, Dash picked up his mop and pail and headed over to the navigator's pole, only to be bitterly disappointed that Streak wasn't there. He tried to just forget about him and move on but his heart was to heavy. The thought of not seeing Streak suddenly became as sad as attacking another ship. He had experienced that sadness many times since he was on Red Sun's ship, but it never stung this deeply and he suddenly relaized he couldn't take it.
So instead of heading back he headed to Streak's room. It was empty, this time the pain was deeper. He put down his mop and pail and slowly entered the room. He never trespassed before, but maybe he could get a feel of Streak by walking in his room. He was suddenly drawn to the box in the corner. He went over and dared to peak inside.
But was utterly confused of what he saw. He pulled out a much smaller wooden box from the cardboard one and studied it in the light. Like most of the things about Streak, this was completely new to him.
"It's a puzzle box." Streak's voice came from the door.
Dash gasped and dropped the box on the floor. His heart was racing as he approached "I-I'm sorry I just wanted..." he tried to explain but was to terrified to come up with anything that made sense.
"Hey it's okay Dash," Streak said soothingly, "I was looking for you anyway, to show this to you in fact."
Dash took another look at the box in his hands, he knew enough to recognize the fine wood. Some of the things they stole from richer boats were made from the same kind of wood. There were different patterns on each side of the box. They were drawn in fine ink and beautifully detailed.
"Its kind of like a game." Streak explained "The object of the game is to get all the patterns right on each side."
He carefully removed the box from Dash and started to move around the sides, suddenly the patterns were all over the place and unorganized. Dash's eyes widened in wonder.
"Now watch this," Streak said, and with a few clicks and turns everything was as it was.
He handed the box back to Dash.
"It's harder then it looks, believe me. I just loved puzzle boxes when I was younger, it was my other obsession, next to astronomy." he explained. "I got my first one from my father on my Birthday, on the card it said 'With every answer comes more questions.' It was my dad's favorite quote, and mine too. It's probably one of the truest things ever said. I keep these boxes as a testament to that, and my father." he said, then looked at Dash "Would you like to see some more?" he asked.
Dash nodded eagerly. For the rest of that night Streak showed him every puzzle box he owned. Then the nights following he taught him how to solve them. And when they had studied that for weeks, he taught Dash how to read and pretty soon he found that he was teaching all he knew plus something he wasn't even aware he was teaching Dash. But because of him Dash finally learned of what it felt like to be loved.
