Marik did not look tough. But he was used to the hot and humid air that was favoured by the Fallerians, and his smaller size worked to his advantage when walking the narrower corridors. She anting and sweating like crazy when they finally got on the lift to the shipyard. She had to leap aside or hold her paws up at the st moment to avoid trampling a smaller residele way too often, all while being downwind of Marik. Fanny had done a little better.

  "Fanny, I need one," she sighed, no way she could pilot without.

  The suppressa like a cold shower. Unfortunately, only a figurative one, she was still sweating. And it should not have acted so quickly, but the mental relief was there, full pcebo up front. Relieved, she ehe code at the shipyard dog port of the White Ocelot aered the cockpit first. It reeked of the still ied toilet belts and the stale sweat after the jump. But the human seemed unfazed.

  Fanny looked equally embarrassed.

  "Sorry Fanny, you will have the harness in the cargo hold should we o jump."

  "Ok, but until then I'll be standing by Marik."

  She shrugged, fih her. She went back to the trols and checked the ste bank. Almost full, they should be able to do without the core if there was no jump.

  "Ok, I'm bringing the propulsion online. Please give me a course." She quickly ran through the checklist. His strong mase st was still distrag, but hey, she rofessional and the suppressant should soon make things easier.

  "Ok, the systems are online and responding. Your should work too. We could leave after 0014."

  He iated something in Fallerian, only half of which she could follow, and theered a course into the navigation sole.

  "Ok," he said and they were clear.

  She looked at the indicated flight path on the sole. Great, no jumps, o power up the core. But the corridor was narrow, even close to some structures aween some docked ships. Their destination was close, just a little more towards the equator, still close to the station's nadir.

  She was moving very slowly to serve power and stay as close as possible to the challenging trajectory. It meant also drifting most of the time.

  During the weightless drifting, the human - no she should think of him by his name - Marik enquired a lot about the ship. This time, with an unclouded mind, she happily expined. He really listened, was even ied in b things like the seque up the fusion core. His questions were detailed, showing that he took her answers seriously. She became a little unfortable in the role of teacher. He had an E-css lice at an age when anyone would be happy to just have a C-css. And he had been around a lot, much more than she had. Well, meeting the Koni was certainly something special; unfortunately, she could not talk about it.

  She offered him the sticks, but he deed. This was a challenging flight path, true. But even if he was only used to flying with AI, he should be able to trol the White Ocelot.

  Fanny looked more and more desperate as the talk drifted to repairs of various systems, like the galley. That had been her first job at the shipyard, all the non-life-critical systems, so she had ample experience of those. She had moved on, but there was also the galley on her first flight. She grinned, not using ferrules, so stupid. Marik joined her in shaking his head, while Fanny was a bei out; but then, a leading member usually did not repair their kit.

  It was a short distand not much ter their destination was in sight. It turned out to be a real hangar, well, open to space but closed on all other sides and thus easily accessible and easy to work. It would have been even more impressive if there hadn't been piles of assorted parts from dismantled ships and a smelter o it. Overall, it gave the impression of a pce where ships went to die. But to be fair, the shipyard at the station had not been much better, apart from a small area that had been always ed up for important tasks and visitors.

  The single cmp held them with some groaning. "Thank you," she said, "I would never have found this pce." And even if she had, she would have turail. But he was the native.

  "Well, we still o find the right spares. And a space suit for you."

  "I have a thinsuit." She unbuckled and took out the sweaty thing. She almost gagged at the stening from the leg. It needed ing badly.

  "I've got nothing," Fanny pined. "How do I get off?"

  "We are docked via a UDA. The suit would be for w on the ship."

  Marik nodded.

  "You go ahead with Marik, I'll just shut everything down. Should not take long as the core is off."

  * * *

  She rolled up her thinsuit, her only belongings due to the hasty departure, and finally turned off the master switch.

  The seal on the ship's side of the UDA hissed, leaking audibly. Frost was on a quarter circle. The access tunnel was also half dark, cables hanging out, panels missing, well, a seamless tinuation from her Sagan. She sighed. On the bright side, it was cold by Fallerian standards but just right for her. As expected from the leaking air, the outer lock was immediately sucked shut. She was not very impressed, even with the standard set so low by the sorry state of the shipyard at the station. But at 47 a day she could not pin, back at the station they would charge at least five times as much.

  Fanny and Marik were in a versation. But they stopped as soon as she emerged from the outer lock. "I found a small pension close by. They do not speak Standard, but it is only 7 per person. And you will likely be the only non-Fallerians there."

  Staying among Fallerians, away from any human males, was a good idea. "Yes, sounds good."

  Fanny smiled. "It's even half-board. Shall we have a look now?"

  But first, they went to see the owners of the hangar, a pair of bleached and stained from whatever chemicals, roules, probably Palest. (She really o update her knowledge of the Fallerian races.) She let Marik do the talking, only occasionally interjeg in Fallerian to prevent them from developing the idea that they might overcharge her because she was a cat. But then, this was deep in the Fallerian III station. Nobody seemed to care much about cats, or humans, only about their tracts.

  This was repeated in their aodation, which was a tiny room for two with private facilities. The probably old ndl, at least the colours were not so brilliant anymore, was ok as long as she spoke Fallerian to him. (It turned out he was a she, as she had st been active in the female phase). She leased that they did not ask for any special food a it at that. Marik stuck a small over the drain of the shower he had brought from the shipyard. "Fallerian showers clog up even with my hair," he winked. He also showed them the toilet, which was a tren the shower, all tareel, but free of mould. It could have been worse, being made for Fallerians.

  Fanny wao go shopping with Marik. But she needed a shower, badly. And to the thinsuit. As she started to undress, Fanny dragged Marik outside. She hadn't even thought about it. The suppressant worked so well that she had just thought of Marik as another cat. Well, she hadn't used one for a long time.

  Back to the task at hand. She sighed. First, she emptied the smelly tank from the thinsuit into the toilet trend then washed her top and trousers uhe shower, not sure how long the water would st. She soo much better. There was still warm water, so she rinsed out the suit too.

  Unfortunately, there was no dryer and the towel was tiny. But her fur would dry quickly in the heat of this station, and hopefully so would her gym uniform. Only the thin suit had to be carefully wiped dry.

  Her thoughts went back to the . How did they fare oation now? And somehow her thoughts went further to Trina. She should send her a message, the Samul on Fallerian V had been so unfriendly.

  "Hey, Rerra!"

  She blinked. Fanny was standing at the entrao the bathroom, strategically blog Marik's view. She had fallen asleep, the thinsuit still over her legs, the damp towel lyio her left hand. She rose, embarrassed. "Sorry, I was a bit tired." Fanny closed the door and she hastily put on the now thankfully almost dry gym uniform.

  When she came out of the bathroom, Fanny was sitting otress e pile of clothes. Marik was standing in the doorway, carrying a human-sized thinsuit. "Sorry, we also start the work tomorrow. Just that Jedro was ok to work with us today for another 2000 before he closes his shop."

  She stifled a yawn. "Yes, let's go." She picked up her still slightly damp thinsuit. "Males first."

  "Have fun," Fanny said and nodded.

  She quickly followed him. As soon as they were walking the corridor and out of earshot, he asked. "Tell me, is Fanny a real pilot? She doesn't know much about ships."

  "Fanny just passed her B lice today. Before yesterday she was very high up in our society. Her mother was the seost powerful cat on Hopkins until she was murdered." She swallowed. "I told you we fled. Many have been killed on Hopkins station. Including my aunt, ex-aunt. Er, it's plicated. Never mind." She stopped, sniffing, tears filling her eyes.

  He pulled her aside, out of the stream of scurryiles, into a small cul-de-sac. "I'm so sorry."

  "Hug me."

  He stood still as she pulled him close. He was small, his barely over her shoulder, her nostrils in his hair. Despite the suppressant, his st rose her fur all over. He hugged her baot sure where to put his arms. Despite his st, he otherwise gave her the vibes of a fused kitteantly, he stroked her back fur. "I'm sorry. For you and for Fanny."

  Even if she thought of him as a kitten, he had power over her. With each stroke, her worries seemed less important. Her tears slowly faded as beetles of all sizes passed by, oblivious to them. It was her mess, not his. She rexed. "I'm sorry for"

  "Shh. Just a little longer," he said. "You're so soft. It's been a long time since I've cuddled."

  Now she worried that it would get out of hand. "We cuddle ter if you like." Fortunately, he could not see her very toothy smile.

  Her invitation had the opposite effect, he quickly broke the embrace. "Yes, we should repair your ship."

  * * *

  Jedro asked a few questions and then they decided to look directly at the engine. Which meant vacuum. Jedro put on what could best be described as a half helmet with twe hoses, while Marik and herself put ohinsuits.

  Sure enough, the beetle went into the airlock with only his breathi. The pumps were in good shape and soon they were all standing in the vacuum in the open space at the back of the White Ocelot, in front of the three perfectly round exhaust tube of the main engines. She expihe problem, well, that she wao repair main engine number 1, now on the left. That one. Jedro had a look ihe engine and then at the w engine No 2. But from the outside, they were all identical. She had dohe same.

  So they went into the vented cockpit. She booted up the propulsion system, clumsy ihinsuit, and showed them the err. Out of focus, too high resistance, circuit xxx out of spec warning, magic field interlock, warm superduain power failure, well, nothing jumped out at them. Some of the messages were anyway due to the warm superductors.

  It turned out that Jedro could barely read basic Standard. And that beetle should fix her drive? But then, being able to read and uand the messages had not helped her to find the cause. And then, for 47 a day, why not give it a try?

  Marik transted for Jedro, again in both dires and without hesitation, again a pro and not a kitten. Marik was obviously much better with ships than with people, and in this not so different from other pilots.

  came the visual iion from the inside. But there was not much to see, just the thick shielding where the wiring, optical fibres, fuel and cooling lines disappeared. Sihe drive had been out of service forever, they removed the shielding, soft brick by soft brick. And then disected the drive, electrically, optically, and even cutting the supply lines, all recorded of course; she was again impressed by the rge nuts holding the main bolts in pce. But then, this drive was rated f acceleration of the whole ship.

  Jedro showed ion, but then she had an exoskeleton and might not be able to. And her small size and the six limbs gave the beetle quite an advantage, better than even her hands. The drive was disected ihan 1000. Throughout the work, Jedro talked a lot with Marik and from what she uood, it was not hopeless. Tomorrow m, they would take the eo the workshop. Jedro sounded optimistic. She was too tired to show much emotion at all.

  They returo her lodging just in time, dinner was ready. Marik said good night outside and made some strange haures while she entered, probably the equivalent of a Fallerian antennae wiggling greeting. Fanny smirked out of his view.

  Dinner was a thick soup with chy is and as much water as she wanted. Well, it was iing, another Fallerian food she had never heard of. But then their p was three times the diameter of Hopkins, and with about 100 billion Fallerians in this system among the 17 intelligent races, there should be lots of food culture to be yet discovered.

  The nddybug tried some small talk. But she was tired, even more now she had eaten, and had no idea what to talk about. Not to mention the unknown at, she uood at best half of it. She made a few noises of agreement as she ate, then yawned and excused herself.

  Ba the room, she let her fall backwards into the mattress. In the low gravity at this deck, it was a rather gentle affair. They both y orange, spongy bed without bs and it was still too warm. The warmth and Fanny's st close by brought back memories of the night on the beach, ihe Koni ship. With these memories, sleep came quickly.