Page 6 of Narzek
“Break fast?”
“First meal of the day.” She sat back down and took up the fork-spoon thing to get a bite of warm mush from her bowl. It tasted similar to oatmeal but slightly nuttier.
Eating was good, and it would keep their bodies from getting ahead of their intellects. Narzek gave her a wry grin and took his seat as well.
“When we finish eating, would you like me to show you around the ship?” he asked.
“Sure,” she said, thinking that was probably a safe move. “I’ve been on a couple ships since I was abducted, but all I saw of them was the dingy room they crammed us into.”
“Damn slavers. The Consortium has been at war with the Sargan’s for solar spans. Then we made a peace agreement with them. They agreed to stop abducting our people for slavery,” Narzek explained. “But it was a lie. While we were fighting for the Consortium, the Sargans bombed our world and stole our people.”
“That’s terrible. I met a lot of females from Farseek on the ship that brought us to Berrapo. I half expected I would end up as a sex slave in a brothel when I was kidnapped. Instead, they brought us to this farm labor camp.”
“After our world was attacked, the Consortium released us from our contract to help defend our worlds. Nearly every warrior lost members of their family to the Sargans. Some were killed, and others were stolen to become slave labor for the Empire.”
“Your family is missing, too,” Cayla said.
“Yes.” He nodded grimly. “All except my father. He’s an officer on Dread Eight. The Consortium had our family home rebuilt, but without our family, it’s not really home anymore.”
“I am so sorry.”
“It’s not your fault. Why should you be sorry?”
“In our culture, that’s what we say to someone who has such a loss. When I say I am sorry, it is understood that I am sorry that you suffered the loss of your family.”
“Ah, then the proper response would be ‘thank you’?”
Cayla nodded and smiled at him.
Chapter Five
“Do you think some of them might have been rescued from the other work sites?”
“The liaison from the passenger ship was still adding people to our database. The AI will notify us if any of our family members are located,” he said.
“Could you find out if Luanne Field was taken to the passenger ship?”
He nodded and took out a small communication tablet the reminded Cayla of a smartphone. “AI Dreadnaught Ten, this is Pardantu. Please add Luanne Field to my list of persons I am seeking.”
Then he stood. “Shall we go?”
“I just need to get these new boots on, but they won’t open, and they didn’t give me any socks.”
“Socks?”
“Foot covering to wear under your boots.”
“These are smart boots with a self-cleaning liner.”
Cayla walked over to the bed and picked them up from the floor. Narzek followed, and she handed him one of the boots. He turned it to heel and pointed to a circular depression in the center then pushed it. The boot opened into three flaps.
Narzek hunkered down, setting the boot on the floor. “Put your foot there.” He pointed to the insole. With her foot in place, he pushed the button again, and the flaps closed over her foot snugly, but not too tight. “Now, you try it.” He stood beside her watching.
Cayla held the boot in her hand and pressed the button. Setting it on the floor, she stepped into it and squatted down to press the button again. It wrapped around her foot, just like the other boot.
“They feel pretty good, and they look smart, too,” she said and winked at him at the pun. They were shiny black to match the black uniforms.
Narzek gave her a faint smile. “While I show you around, we can stop at the medical bay, and you can get a state-of-the-art language chip that will allow you to speak and read Consortium within a day or two.”
