Sweat beaded on Silver's wrinkled forehead and he leaned, panting slightly, on the tiller of his frigate ship, the Benbow. The deep, angry orange light of Ophiuchus Beta seared the ship and a baking stellar wind blasted it with otherworldly force. There was nothing much to do now except ride out the wind. The sails were furled, the bulkheads latched tight and everything that could be roped down had been. Despite the scorching presence of Oph-Beta, it was night and the crew, having been awake for close onto three days preparing for the pass, were exhausted and down in the barracks catching a well-earned forty winks. Silver had put himself in charge of the ship, confident she could weather the stellar storm, as the many ships he had captained in the past had done.
The gust calmed, and he dared himself to take a breath. His lungs filled with burning ash, the top few layers of Oph-Beta's closest planet, and set him coughing.
"Here," a voice bellowed over the wind. It was the deep baritone of his first mate, Leonard. He thumped up beside his captain and held a mug out to him. Puzzled but unable to reply, Silver took it and gulped several mouthfuls down around the coughs. Suddenly, the fierce, knife-like pain in his chest died and a rush of cool shot through him as if a bucket of cold water had been upended over his head.
"From Bonnie," Leonard yelled. "She said it may help with the heat."
Silver swallowed and glanced up at his hulking first mate, a head and a half taller than Silver himself, his face wide and flat, the gorilla-like nose set in a hairy, squinched face with glittering black eyes overshadowed by heavily-furred eyebrows. "Tell 'er thankee from me," Silver shouted back.
"Aye, sir," Leonard barked as he placed another mug carefully down beside the green glowing compass. "That one's for you, too, Cap'n. She said not to worry; it'll stay cool. She also said that there's plenty more below if you need it." Leonard turned and trudged back down below deck, the muscles under his hide rippling powerfully.
Silver peered into his nearly-empty cup. Its contents were an unassuming shade of yellow-brown, quite close to the color of the cheap beer Bonnie had bought. The liquid itself was not cold, but hit his tongue with a deep chill and coated his throat like silk. Its taste was hard for him to place, for it switched between sweet and bitter almost like a hologram. He wondered what the strange little girl had put into this mixture. Surely none of the simple, commonplace ingredients on the ship could have produced something this bizarre.
Amazing what you find when you explore a new planet every other day, he heard her say in his mind. He remembered her regaling him with stories of her adventures with her parents' team of surveyors, and her boasts that she had seen half the galaxy before she was five years old. Silver had asked if she remembered any of it, and she had laughed and shook her head.
He smiled and downed the second cup of cooling liquid in three huge gulps. The drink not only bathed his body with cool comfort but his mind as well, and he felt himself slip into a quiet, contented peace even as Oph-Beta was screaming out its last violent millennia or two of life off the starboard side of the Benbow. Gratefully he let his mind wander away from the stresses of maintaining a ship, a crew and evading galactic naval police. He remembered the months he had spent on the Legacy, lusting after Flint's Trove and the life of happiness it promised, and, grudgingly at first, making friends with Jim until they were inseparable as father and son. He felt again the cold, hard handfuls of treasure in his hands, and he loved the way his coat pulled on his shoulders as he loaded his pockets with heavy gold. His mind wound back further to when he first became a captain, being only a few years older than Jim had been, feeling ten feet tall and on top of the world. He even remembered his first wife and the brief but wonderful months they had spent being pirates together, two of the most notorious bandits ever to come out of the wild no-man's land of space. Further back in his mind lay the fond memory of his childhood. His mother the ship would rock him to sleep at night, and his father the wind would caress his cheek as he drifted off into his dreams.
"Life's much better with a little extract of Hisciphid in your system, isn't it?" Bonnie's voice reached his ears and jerked him back from his thoughts. He blinked and glanced around him; gone was the roiling, blazing sight of Oph-Beta and gone was the blistering stellar wind. The star still loomed large behind them, but the black drips of turpentine melting from the repaired mast had stopped and some of the crew were now attached to rope ladders, repainting the wood. The sweat had dried in streaks on everyone's body, including Bonnie's. She had shed her father's coat and was dressed in the white tank top and pants Silver had bought her, but she had cut them off just below the knee. Her boots, heavy and black, were untied and scuffed. Her hair, which she had cut before they embarked, was still wet and hung down just above her chin in wavy clumps. Her two-toned eyes were still ringed with sleep-circles and her strong, boxy face seemed haggard and pale, but she was smiling.
She was always smiling.
"I find it helps pass the time too," she said, swishing the liquid around in the small tin mug.
"Aye, it certainly does, lass," he mumbled, wondering how much of life he had missed.
"Ah, don't worry," she said, detecting the uncertainty in his voice. "It didn't put you to sleep or anything. You haven't missed anything. Everyone just now woke up. It's pretty obvious, I think..." she pointed to her face and the bags under her eyes. "I gave the crew some so they could sleep through Oph-Beta. You never came down for dinner, so I never got a chance to get you any. I see Leonard brought yours to you."
"Oi wanted t' stay up here fer me watch," he said, anger suddenly rising in him. "Oi wanted t'be on alert for anyt'in' that could go wrong. Oi was th' on'y one up here, lassie! What woulda happ'ned if somet'in' were to go wrong wid' th' ship an' oi was sittin' here daydreamin' wid' yer foolish Hissa-drink in me system? What if th' 'ole bloody ship were t' get sucked int' Oph-Beta an' th' 'ole bloody crew were asleepin' an' oi were sittin' up 'ere wid me moind in th' clouds? We'd all be nuttin' but space dust, lass! Y' can' jus' send us all t'sleep loike that an' pretend nuttin'll happ'n! Y' coulda gotten us all kilt, y' know that!" Silver shouted down at her, his cyborg eye glowing angry red. How could she be so stupid as to drug the entire crew, including Silver himself, in the midst of one of the most dangerous and delicate maneuvers in space travel?
She seemed to shrink before him and drew her arms tight around herself, backing up several steps. Her eyes grew large and alarmed. She put her hands up, trembling. "I'm— I'm sorry! It wasn't a drug! It didn't do it on purpose, I just thought it would help, I just... I won't do it again!"
"See that ya don't! Now go, get out o' me sight. Oi don' want you t'be cookin' breffast or dinner t'night. Tell one o' th' cabinboys t'do it, an' show 'im where every'tin' is an' such. After ye do that, oi want you up here swabbin' all th' turpentine off th' deck, an' then oi wan' t' see you repaintin' th entoire deck an' th' masts an' th' hull wid more heat resin."
Her shoulders and face fell, but she saluted. "Uh... aye, Cap'n," she spluttered, then turned and skittered away, her shoulders hunched.
-----------------
Silver's hackles were still up by the time the galactic clock struck seven and the crew were piling into the galley for a much-needed meal.
He had trusted the girl, trusted her, and what had she gone and done? Slipped some sort of drug into their drinks and made them all stupid. While they were passing a volatile red giant, no less! What was she trying to do? Kill them all? Was she really some agent of the Galactic Naval Police, investigating them undercover with a plan to turn him in as soon as they landed at Geminae Stellae? He growled as he watched three inept cabinboys dish something gloppy out of a pot too small to hold all of it into dozens of bowls, several of which they spilled on the way to the benches. Silver's bowl arrived first, with the gritty stuff running thickly down the sides. He wrinkled his bulbous nose and settled for drinking the little beer that was left in his mug. Despite himself, he missed Bonnie's cooking, which had always been simple but delicious, prepared quickly by skillful hands. The cabinboys finally finished serving the crew, and plopped down in their seats to wolf down their food before they began cleaning up.
Silver surveyed his crew, and found only two empty seats: the watchman's and Bonnie's. Good. As it should be.
No one had asked him where Bonnie had got to; of course most of them had heard Silver's bellows, and those who hadn't certainly had been told in whispers while Silver's back was turned. He tipped his head back and swallowed the last of his beer. Rising from his seat without a word, he stumped out of the galley, pointing a robotic finger at a fat Flatulan thoroughly enjoying a third helping of his dinner. "Ye've got watch next, Rogers."
"Pbthbppbththpthbbbpt!" the creature complained. Silver whipped around, both eyes blazing.
"Ye got a problem widdat, laddie!" He roared, and flicked his wrist. Out flashed a deadly scimitar where his cyborg hand used to be, and he bore down dangerously on Rogers' flabby throat.
"Pbbthpththbp pbbtht pbpbthppbthbbthpt!" Rogers blubbered, his tiny eyes wide and frightened. Silver grunted and resumed his thumping walk out of the galley, leaving the crew silent and Rogers trembling so violently his blubbery body sent shockwaves vibrating throughout the ship.
On deck, the sky was deep indigo, but the ship shone brightly with starlight reflected off a shiny new coat of heat resin, a clear liquid that protected the wood of the ship from the deep cold of space and the blazing heat of nearby stars. Silver strode up to the tiller, careful that his cyborg leg did not slip on the still-drying resin. Bonnie was nowhere in sight.
He glanced down at the compass, already set to the gravitational signature of Geminae Stellae. They were on course, approaching the pair of stars from a wide curve, since the violent Crab Nebula was between them and Geminae. He nudged the small afterburner switch down a bit, since they were running low on fuel. They'd have to dock soon. A quick scan of the galactic map, programmed into the ship's navigational system, told Silver the closest system was only four light-days ahead, but out of their way. The next solar system on the way with a feasible port was two light-weeks away. That was too long. He'd just have to go out of his way. With another grunt, he tapped the compass screen and set the new coordinates. The planet was Tereth Three, but the port was located on its moon, Uet. He had been there before. The moon's parent planet was a small but harmonious one, its dominant life form being intelligent horse-like creatures that kept their delicate planet isolated from Uet, which was crawling with pirates, marauders and the normal potpourri of criminals one would find at a galactic port town.
The lookout, a stocky Yarbouchian with legs like a lizard and a beak like a flamingo, slid down the mast, her sticky, padded hands gripping the wood expertly.
"Cheerio, Gov'nah," she tipped a wink to the captain. "End o' me watch, ya know. Gunna get me summa Bonnie's luvverly vi'uws, I am."
"Bonnie ain't cookin' t'night," Silver said flatly, ignoring the creature's wide-mouthed look of shock.
"Good gravy, Gov'nah, it ain' so!"
"'Tis so, an' if you've a moind t' keep yore mouth, you'd do well t'shut it an' get outta me earshot," Silver snarled.
"Aye, Gov'nah!" The Yarbouchian jogged away nervously.
No sooner had the pattering footsteps of the lookout left Silver's ears than a pair of hands gripped the starboard edge of the deck. Silver heard frantic scrabbling sounds as Bonnie heaved herself up onto the deck, a matted paintbrush clenched between her teeth and a bucket swinging on her wrist. She lay and caught her breath with her feet trailing off into space for a few moments, then drug herself up and began hauling in the platform she had been sitting on while she painted the sides of the ship. Silver watched her silently from the forecastle, a frown on his face, careful to catch any suspicious move she made.
She heaved the workbench on board and drug it to its place, unaware that she was being watched. Rogers, the next watchman, squelched up from below and blew a noise in Bonnie's direction, to which she responded with a curt nod. Was that a nod between two fellow mutineers? He'd question Rogers later.
Ignoring Silver, Rogers boarded a platform, which he hoisted on a pulley to take him up to the crow's nest. Silver watched him carefully, but he did not look Bonnie's way again. Bonnie stowed the bucket, the paintbrush and a mop she had been using for the deck in a small closet and heaved a deep, tired sigh. Instead of plodding down to the barracks, she leaned on the port railing of the ship and gazed out at the stars. It took Silver a minute to realize she was humming again. This one was new. She hummed all the time, but the songs were all different, and he could not recognize any of them. He knit his brows. Were the songs some sort of code or message to the mutineers? Going by the crew's squawky renditions of old sea shanties, they couldn't carry a tune if they had had a bucket. Maybe Bonnie's hums were just to calm her nervousness at keeping a mutiny or an investigation undercover for so long.
The door below deck opened, and a cabinboy trotted out, his arms full of a tray with a bowl and a cup on it. Bonnie stopped humming and turned. Silver opened his cyborg eye wide and centered the crosshairs on Bonnie and the cabinboy, zooming in close. "This is for you, Miss Bonnie," the gangly boy said and held out the tray to her, which she took with a grateful smile.
"Thankee kindly, Jonas," she said softly. "But please, stop calling me 'Miss'."
"Aww shucks, Miss Bonnie," Jonas blushed and scuffed his foot on the deck, "I can't let my good ol' ma's parentin' lessons go all to waste, can I?"
Bonnie chuckled and ruffled the young boy's hair. "Well, I suppose not. You can all me 'Miss' if you must."
"I must, Miss, I must," Jonas grinned. "Oh, I hope you like the stew. I'm 'fraid me an' Grey an' Matthew are not near as good at cookin' as you."
Bonnie took a sip of the thick mess in her bowl and smiled. "Well, you did your best, Jonas, and that's all anyone can ask. Besides, there's always room to get better." She gently set the bowl on the tray and picked up her mug.
"Aye, Miss."
"Get on to bed now. Busy day tomorrow."
"When is there ever a day that's not busy?" Jonas joked.
"Never, when you're on this ship," Bonnie chuckled.
"No, not with that slavedriver of a cap'n. He runs all of us ragged."
Silver smiled and sneered at the same time.
"That's just his way. He's a salty old pirate, doesn't care about anything but piratin' and getting what he wants."
Righteous anger flared in Silver, though he knew she was right.
"Aye, Miss. I was afeared for you earlier today when the Cap'n shouted at you. I myself personally enjoyed those drinks you made us. They helped us a lot with sleepin' through that supernova an' all."
"Well thankee kindly. I'm glad at least two of us enjoyed it."
They laughed and Jonas dipped a bow to Bonnie before loping back down below. Bonnie took a long pull from her mug, smacked her lips and sighed, turning back to the empty expanse of space.
Silver pulled his eye back from its magnified level and blinked, latching the tiny flaps down again. Nothing suspicious about that, he grudgingly agreed with himself. His instinct kept telling him that Bonnie was as innocent as the day they had met, but the doubt clouding his mind made him blame it on his softness. He had been soft with Jim, and had barely avoided being caught. Now it was happening again. Though he had never regretted for an instant caring for the boy, it did not help his image any to be seen coddling a little orphan girl, just because she made good cornbread. Maybe it was because he was getting old too. He had refused to admit it, but he was no spring chicken anymore. When people got old, they got soft. But not him. Not Cap'n Long John Silver, the most fearsome scourge of the seas since Cap'n Nathaniel Flint.
As much as he tried to convince himself that for once, his gut reaction was wrong, it simply wouldn't stick. He had trusted her from the moment they had met, which he had rarely, if ever done before. And his gut had never told him to do otherwise.
Bonnie suddenly caught sight of him out of the corner of her eye and jumped, stumbling back over a pile of rope.
"Silver! I— I didn't know you were out here!" She cast around frantically for help, but there was no one else on deck, save for Rogers, snoring loudly up in the crow's nest. "I— I finished with the heat resin. I did the whole deck, all three masts, the bowsprit, and the entire hull. There were a lot of barnacles, so I had to take care of them too... I got all the barnacles off and then I did the resin on the keel..." Her voice trailed off, and she gulped.
Silver didn't know if her reaction was from fear of exposing her mutiny or just the fear of another verbal bashing. He stepped off the forecastle and approached her warily, his face expressionless. Bonnie looked down at herself as Silver shot a red beam from his eye onto her.
"Hey!" She squeaked and crossed her hands over her chest. "There's nothing there for you to see!"
"Oi hear th' crew thurr'ly enjoyed yore little potion. Said it put 'em roight t'sleep," he snapped, settling his fists on his hips.
She threw her hands up. "Silver, I swear it wasn't a sleeping potion or anything! It was just some Hisciphid root! It's a plant that grows on some planets that calms you down. I just ground it up and put a pinch in everyone's beer! I told them what it was, and that they'd feel better. I thought I was doing everyone a favor! Silver, we'd all been awake for almost three days straight. Do you honestly believe we'd have been any more alert? Half the crew were falling asleep on their feet anyway! You said yourself they needed sleep, and I just thought it'd help them drift off. I didn't put as much in your cup when I made some for you, because I knew you'd want to be more awake! I'm sorry I didn't tell Leonard to tell you what was in it. I truly am sorry. I won't do it again." She gazed up at him imploringly.
The gears in his mind stuck, spitting and grinding noisily. Which part of him should he believe? His rational mind, which told him Bonnie was much too skittish and nervous to be telling the truth, or his deep intuition, on which he had relied all his life, which told her she was honest, just intimidated by him?
"Silver, please believe me. I really wasn't trying to do anything or kill anybody. I was just trying to help."
His supersensitive cyborg eye did not detect any sweat on her or swelling of her pupils, nor did his mechanical ear hear any increase in the already quick thump-thump of her heartbeat. His laser roved over her face and he watched her reaction carefully. She just stared up into his normal eye, both of hers wide and pleading. She flinched when he shone it in her eye, but did nothing when he cast it down her front and her legs, looking for a concealed knife or pistol.
"There's nothing, Silver. I promise. You can go ask the crew. Ask Leonard. I wasn't planning anything, if that's what you think." Her voice and her eyes hardened with the force of conviction. Silver switched off his laser and sighed.
"Seein' as how oi c'n spot nuttin' amiss, yore free t'go back to th' galley t'morrow an' resume yore duties as cook. But oi'll be searchin' th' kitchen for anyt'in' out o' th' ordinary." Silver narrowed his eyes.
Bonnie shrugged. "Do as you like."
"An' yore comin' wid me." he beckoned her with a metal finger.
"Fine," she said. "But if you please, Cap'n, I'd like to get a bit of sleep, because, as you know, I've been up here all day long repainting the entire ship." Her captivating eyes blazed for an instant.
"We'll jus' see how long this takes." He grabbed her arm roughly and drug her down to the galley.