Lyssa was taller than the harbor master by a big hand’s span, and Umar was my height. Despite the red carpet treatment the station was giving her, Lyssa was pissed. Her hands were planted firmly on her hips as she rained trouble down upon Umar’s head. She wasn’t shouting, but fury made her voice project. I couldn’t quite make out the words, yet. We weren’t close enough.
“Is that Lyssa?” Dalton breathed, next to me.
Fiori’s mouth opened, and she pulled her gaze back to Lyssa on the ramp. She had clearly dismissed the woman as some sort of bottom-rung spacer. Now she reassessed, her eyes narrowed.
“That’s Lyssa,” I confirmed.
Dalton let out a heavy gust of breath. “Damn…”
Vara and Darb were close to the bottom of the ramp. I reached out to Vara quickly and told her to halt there. She stopped obediently with her paws nearly touching the end of the ramp. Darb stopped with her.
“…water was so shot with impurities last time I had to jettison it. My passengers got sick, Umar! I should have had you clean up the mess they left,” Lyssa was saying, as we drew closer.
“I assure you, the water we provide is warranteed consumption safe, captain—” Umar began.
The storm was merely Lyssa being picky. It was her insides the water impurities coated. I couldn’t blame her for fussing over it. But it was an interruptible crisis. “Permission to board, captain?” I called out.
Lyssa had been on the point of responding to Umar. She closed her mouth and turned to us where we stood at the end of the ramp, smiling hugely, her green eyes dancing. She threw her arms out wide. “Vara! Darb! Oh, look at you guys! You’re so big now!”
I told Vara she could climb the ramp, and she hopped up onto the end. Darb followed her.
Lyssa crouched down to greet them, while Umar stepped back. He looked relieved to be off the hook, even if it was temporary.
I hid my sigh as Vara looked as though she might veer around Lyssa and keep going. Vara knew there was a heated sandpit waiting for her inside, and the pit was where deer carcasses were delivered for her to gorge upon. Lyssa was merely another non-living object to step around.
The parawolves could deal with images on screens and 3D displays and equate them with real people, but they could not seem to grasp that Lyssa was another type of display of a person.
I quickly ordered Vara to halt and sit. She sat on the very top of the ramp so quickly it looked as though someone had pushed on her hindquarters.
Lyssa threw her arms around Vara’s neck and buried her face in the thick grey-white fur of her ruff.
Vara just panted, waiting for my next order, while Darb sat next to his sister, looking around the empty freight bay with curiosity, his gaze not once lingering upon Lyssa.
“They can’t see her…” Dalton murmured.
“She’s non-living nanobots,” I reminded him, just as softly.
“She’s what?” Fiori added.
“When we’re inside,” Dalton told her.
A small furrow formed between Fiori’s pale brows, but she nodded.
We stopped behind Vara and Darb. Lyssa rose to her feet, smiling. “I had the sandpit rebuilt for them,” she told me.
“Thank you.” I looked at Vara and told her she could go find her pit now. She raced away, her toes clicking upon the iron fiber floor. Darb leapt after her. They shot through the interior bay door and disappeared. Then I glanced at Umar. “Master Umar.”
He nodded at me. “Colonel Andela. I didn’t realize you were the Lythion’s passenger today. The manifest says nothing.”
“This is a last minute trip.” I turned to Lyssa. “Hello, daughter.”
She gave a little happy sound and threw her arms around me and squeezed. I realized that I was squeezing just as hard and we were both laughing.
Fiori cleared her throat. Either she was recovering from my calling Lyssa “daughter” or she was uncomfortable with the physical display. Either way, I didn’t give a damn.
Lyssa let go of me. I wouldn’t have been able to break her grip if she had not, for she made herself out of construction nanobots, these days. Screw the expense. She charged enough per passenger she could afford the heavy pull of energy it took to use them.
She glanced at Dalton and Fiori. “Hello, Gabriel. It has been a while.”
“It has. You’ve grown up, Lyssa.” He was saying that for Umar’s sake, for the harbor master hadn’t moved out of earshot. But he also meant it. I could hear the admiration in his voice.
She grinned. “If you ask Lyth, he’ll tell you it’s all appearance and I’m still a brat.” She shifted her gaze to Fiori. “You have to be Fiori, then.” She held out her hand.
I held my breath, watching Fiori closely for any signs of hesitation or distaste. She did pause just for a heartbeat. Then she reached out and grasped Fiori’s hand, her expression polite. “Captain Andela, I’ve heard only a little about you. Everyone insisted I meet you, and I’m starting to understand why.” Her gaze shifted down to her hand, enclosed in Lyssa’s.
Lyssa grinned and released Fiori’s hand. Fiori didn’t shake her hand or flex the fingers, so Lyssa hadn’t squeezed too hard. Lyssa was behaving herself, then.
Lyssa glanced at Umber. “I’ll get my guests settled, then come back and sign off. Yes?”
“That suits me,” Umar said with badly hidden relief. He nodded at me.
Lyssa took off the headset—it was a real one, not a construction made out of her nanobots. She hung it over a hook by the ramp doorway, and waved us in. “Come aboard,” she added.
Dalton and Fiori followed her through the empty, echoing freight bay, which smelled faintly of old, dusty oil and the musky, astringent aroma the standard freight containers gave off when exposed to extremes of heat.
I’d lived aboard the Supreme Lythion for years, but every time I stepped aboard, I wondered what would greet me,
