A/N: Here's something new: Something that isn't a crossover.

Let Me Skitter Among the Stars

"Cadet?"

I snapped out of my meditation. "Hm?"

"Cadet, Captain wants you on bridge."

I resisted the urge to drop my jaw. "We're there already?"

"The Quartermaster told you that her and Captain's Gildings are ideal for warp, correct?" The pishon was obviously attempting to not roll his eyes. "I expected that-"

"No, no, she did, it's just that...that fast?"

"Correct. Wonderful for smuggling." The infamously humorless administrach inferior of the Honored Adventure caravan took flight, resembling nothing so much as a stingray with a bird's beak while winging back to his own ship's bridge.

I blinked a little before emerging from my communion with the Broodmind. This was going to be exciting or terrifying. Probably both.

"Right then, a brief briefing for all of you too drunk to remember the last one." Quartermaster Wilbourn marched up to the projector and kicked it, revealing a static-riddled hologram of our theater of operations. "Our objective is a basic shoot-and-run against the Protectorate treasure ship Galatea to get at the high-value colonist fare and black data they have on board, which for the benefit of our newbie is that crappy-but-expensive food they ship out to we Outzoners, and various juicy tidbits we can use to blackmail the not-so-upstanding rich citizens of the universe."

I nodded. "But that's for us. The pishoni hired us for something else."

"Exactly. We get to take whatever's not nailed down except for the administrator lens plus a bunch of coupons, they get a distraction to get the lens in the first place." She motioned to the perching aliens, who unraveled their tentacles out of their hand shape and crossed them in front of their torsos. Their sign of promising to keep their end of the bargain. Once in a year event right there - pishoni viewed looking for better deals as a generally laudable quality, and made no secret of that.

The quatermaster gave that odd, vulpine grin of hers at that I still wasn't used to. "To that end, we've decided on that golden oldie, the hollow javelin maneuver. The Pluto rams the biggest escort they have, then we release fighters, whatever warp beast Rachel is keeping below decks, and-"

"Question," said a translated-as-feminine voice.

Oh dear sweet merciful El Elyon, not this shit again.

The pishon clicked her tail against a foot pincer before speaking. "I was wondering about that. Captain, permission to inquire?"

Captain Laborn cradled his head in his hands. "Permission to ask stupid question granted."

The pishon clicked again, much louder this time. "Pardon my asking, but we do seem to have a Swarm emissary being relied on to-"

"First," I said, rising to my feet. "They have a proper name, and it is sinaan. Second-"

"See? She even refers to them as if they were a sapient-"

"Enough, Eudokia," cried the voice of the aministrach superior. "I won't brook your prejudice against a client race, however removed from their direct intelligence."

"Yes ma'am," the ray mumbled as she shrank back.

"Second, if I was a sinaan emissary, I'd be one myself, instead of a parahuman. I just have the gift - sorry, Gilding - to communicate coherently with a Brood of them without a medium and serve as a ganglia creature in a pinch. Third, I seem to remember that they only implant crewed ships who attacked them-"

"Whoa. Hold it dorks, you can compare genitals later, ix-nay on the lame-fay war until we have our booty."

I grumbled and returned to my seat. The third officer was right, this wasn't the time or place. Back to the briefing.

"As I was saying, Taylor's sinaan will join the raid. We've also seen a Ward training barge in the area, so we fully expect some parahumans to show up in response to the distress call, but they're going to be wet behind the ears and probably setting themselves up for a good ass-kicking."

I flipped my visor back on, ostensibly to check the HUD but really to hide the guilty expression on my face. Why did I feel bad about selling out a bunch of ambling pirates again? It was probably safer for them in custody, not jumping from dubious client to dubious client with nothing but a bunch of bio-robots for crew. Hell, they weren't even adults! How did we...they get a ship again?

Thankfully, the quartermaster didn't seem to notice. Or she was really good at hiding her expressions. "Anyway, once that happens, the caravan will use the chaos to draw attention away from their cloaking signature..."

"This is Skitter-5, ready for launch."

I felt my mind and passenger merge with the Zion device and amplify my power. The Broodmind, normally a chittering mass of similar emotions, became coherent, "speaking" in the almost-one voice that I nearly could parse as language.

Prepared. Selves attention. Launch=xenoform's.

"Tattletale-2, ready for launch."

A glowing set of "eyes" was all I saw in the lightless depths of shallow warp.

"Regent-3, just got out of bed and wondering why I'm not in my bed."

A simultaneous sigh came over the speakers.

"Bitch-4."

Something that looked almost like a dog with fur made of tentacles swam past to Rachel's Nebula fighter, despite the utter dark. There was a sort of anti-light that allowed it to be seen despite there being no other light at all.

"Grue-1 is on standby."

I felt the Pluto lurch as its nosecone shifted into a missile.

"Three...two...one..."

The dark lifted, revealing the docking bay and the whirl of stars.

Then another lurch as the entire corsair shook. The soundless nature of it combined with the shaking nearly caused me to lose my lunch right then and there as my internal balance completely vanished.

"LAUNCH!"

Go, I whispered to the sinaan.

The stars came closer as my Nebula shot out into space.

Crunch time.

Also known as: Worm, IN SPAAAAACE!

Featuring Space Pirate/Mercenary!Undersiders