I own Kaly, Denizen, Fahd, Bilge, the "rookie" echidna, the olive-furred female (Nocturnus) echidna, and any anonymous characters.
Archie comics owns the world it takes place in.

"All hands!" Fahd called. "Storm brewing! All hands on deck. You, too, rookie," he said to the echidna who'd surrendered. "Go help with the rigging."

"Yes, sir," the echidna replied, and ran to do as ordered.

Denizen climbed out of the hold. "How are the skies?"

"Blacker than the bottom of the devil's heart, Captain," Fahd replied. "I've only seen the skies like this in the desert storms."

Denizen nodded.

Fahd gripped the railing and peered out, trying to see with his cat's eyes see what the rest of the crew could not. "The storm is between us and port! Might be we could sail around it in four days—"

"We may not have four days," Denizen snapped. "Bilge! Get that rookie! Ask him if he knows anything about birthing!"

"Yes, captain," the rat replied, and scurried up the ropes to find the echidna.

"Foul time for foul weather," Denizen muttered. "If that mage would wake, might be we wouldn't have this problem."

"You would trust our lives to a half-dead mage?" Fahd replied. "An unknown mage?

"Maybe not." Denizen shook his head. The wind picked up, and he raised his voice to hear himself. "I'll need you down below!"

"My eyes are needed out here!"

"Even if that rookie does know anything useful, he won't have eyes to see in this muck. I need you to be sure nothing goes wrong!"

A wave crashed over them, threatening to roll the ship. The clouds dropped closer to the sea, and the wind practically threw the ship into the darkness.

Fahd blinked at the iguana. "It's the crew or the child, captain."

Bilge climbed out of the ropes long enough to shake his head at Denizen before returning to the rigging.

"Stay to your post, then," Denizen replied. "Demons take it!"

Fahd smiled. "That may be what they want," he said, peering into the clouds. "Why else try to keep us from port?"

"I suppose you think it's demon-spawn?" Denizen growled.

"If it were demon-spawn," Fahd replied slowly, "I think they'd want it to live."

Denizen blinked, then nodded and returned to the hold.

Fahd did not bellow orders. For one thing, the wind had picked up again, too loud for his voice to carry. For another, the crew knew its job. Even that rookie merchant was doing well enough at the ropes.

Fahd simply took his place at the helm, watched into the storm, and prayed to whatever gods were listening that they would make it out.

—

It was impossible to tell how long or how far they sailed in that darkness. There were no stars to judge their position, and the wind blew at odd intervals that even the most skilled could not count.

Their hearts filled with the icy chill of the depths, and the crew began to count instead by the waves left before the ship might break apart.

Only the lone echidna refused to give in to despair. And so it was he who saw the pinprick of light, even before Fahd's feline eyes.

"Fahd, sir!" He climbed down out of the ropes to get the cat's attention. "Fahd! Look there!"

Fahd looked where the boy was pointing, and the pinprick became a sunburst amid the storm. "The Desert Flower—" he whispered. "Rookie, get the men back to their posts. Beat them if you have to. But tell them we're making for the Flower."

"Yes, sir," the echidna replied, though he doubted the pirates would accept orders from him.

But neither doubt nor threat was warranted. Once the sunburst had appeared, that chill had vanished. They were wary of the sudden light, but eager enough for anything that could lead them from the storm.

Fahd beckoned one of the larger pirates over to the helm to replace him, then ran down to the hold to speak to Denizen. "Captain!" he called. "The Desert Flower, she comes! She has brought us the sun!"

Denizen stood over the female echidna, holding a small object in his arms. He turned to face Fahd.

Denizen looked completely puzzled.

"Captain?" Fahd tried again. He frowned. "What is that?" He peered at the object in Denizen's arms. It looked like no baby he'd ever seen. It rather looked like...

"It's...an egg," Denizen said.

—

It was a little after midnight when Fahd saw the first lights of the port town. The storm still rocked the ship, and he feared the damage if they docked close by, so he anchored a distance away and sent a few men to shore in rowboats.

Denizen reached the shore first, leaped onto the beach before his boat had even touched the ground, and raced in search of a healer. He took the egg with him, and Fahd stayed behind to make arrangements for the two dying echidnas.

Whatever fortune had carried them out to port stayed with the iguana, for he met Kaly herself. "Kalyptos," Denizen said, holding the egg out for the platypus to see, "what is this?"

Kaly lifted one eyebrow. "It's an egg." She shook her head and walked back towards her hut.

"I can see that," he snarled. "But it can't be an egg—" But Kalyptos was getting farther away, and Denizen had to jog to catch up.

"You poor dear," she said, and laughed. "One of your ladies finally got fed up with you, didn't she? And left you to take care of her baby?"

Denizen shook his head. "It isn't mine. You know I don't dally around like that."

Kaly took one glance at his confused expression and stopped laughing. "You're serious? You really don't know what this is?"

"I thought we'd agreed it was an egg," he muttered. He sighed. "It came from a mammal."

"Ah, I see. And you're thinking mammals don't lay eggs?"

Denizen nodded.

They went inside the hut before Kaly turned to face the iguana. "Let me see that egg."

Denizen placed the egg in her arms and let her examine it.

"Echidna?" Kaly said after a few minutes.

Denizen blinked several times, then finally nodded. "How did you figure?"

"Because two kinds of mammals do lay eggs," she replied. "And this didn't come from a platypus." She set the egg down and stared at Denizen until he quavered. "Why don't you tell me how you got it?"

Denizen nodded. "In time."

"You'll not be leaving in this weather. We have time enough."

—

Denizen did not leave Kaly waiting long. He only stepped out to summon Fahd, then swiftly returned, the two dying echidnas towed on planks between them.

The sight had gained the interest of the town. Most waited outside in the weather; the wisest returned to the tavern to wait for the tale, but for a foolish few, their curiosity overcame their fear of the foreign healer, and under the pretense of helping, they followed the pirates inside her hut.

And, by unspoken agreement, Fahd and Denizen began to tell the healer a carefully edited tale about the event.

"And when the soldiers saw that they were losing, they turned on their own crew," Fahd finished the story. He did not mention the one merchant who had managed to surrender.

"My goodness!" one of the strangers, a female, olive-colored echidna exclaimed. "Did anyone survive?"

Denizen shook his head. "None but these two."

"And now the egg," Fahd added. He nodded towards the echidna male. "You have a similar look to you," he said to the olive female. "Is he your kinsman?"

She shook her head. "I am of Nocturnus blood, yes, but I've been traveling for some time. I don't know him." She continued to stare hard at the echidna male.

"Can you restore them?" Denizen asked the healer.

"Hard to say," she replied. "Their hearts beat, but their spirits have fled."

"But you can call them back," Denizen insisted. "You can tell us why he was so desperate to murder them."

"I am a healer," Kaly snapped, "not a necromancer. I cannot call the ghosts of the dead."

"Is it necromancy," Fahd asked, "if their hearts still beat?"

Kaly glanced at him and smiled.

Kaly's name (Kalyptos) is based on the word Eucalpytus—specifically, a species called Eucalyptus platypus. It probably would have worked better if she was a koala, but then she wouldn't have had nearly as much fun teasing Denizen about the egg.
Her name is not related to "Calpyso" from Pirates of the Caribbean (not intentionally related, at least, as it seems the words have a shared origin)...a similarity which I only recognized after naming her.

The echidna "rookie" is not a kid, nor a rookie. Fahd only called him that because he's the youngest person there.
That might become important...later.