The kitchen was small, grimy, and it stunk of some greasy non-distinct meat. Three crew members that Sarah didn’t recognize were seated around the long, metal table that took up most of the room. Reema was sitting at the far end, shoveling food into her mouth and smacking her lips in a way that validated all the rumors Sarah had heard about Haraldie table manners. The Haraldie looked up as Sarah and Nickle walked towards the caffie-drink machine and called to them with her mouth full, littering the table with bits of chewed breakfast.

“Well, well, there she is.” Reema clasped a hand on the shoulder of the alien sitting in the chair next to her. “That’s the captain’s new pet.”

The short, dirty alien grunted. “She doesn’t seem so special.”

“Looks pretty ordinary, ugly even, if you ask me,” The hairy one across the table chimed in.

“The captain isn’t interested in her looks.” Reema stood up and walked towards Sarah. “Word is he’s keeping this one for her brain.” The Haraldie reached her hand out and tapped Sarah on the forehead. “Apparently, she’s one smart cookie.”

Nickle stepped in between the Reema and her prey. “Back off. You heard what that captain said. No one touches her.”

Forgetting all about Sarah, Reema hungrily shifted her attention to Nickle, moving within inches of his face and pulling a small knife from her belt. “I know what the captain said. He said not to touch this slave, but he didn’t say not to touch our other slaves.” She pushed the knife lightly into the space between Nickle’s bottom two ribs. “So, please, tell me one more time what it is I’m not allowed to do.”

Nickle cleared his throat, about to repeat himself, when Sarah interrupted. “Don’t hurt him. I need him. To do my work, uh, on the ship.”

Reema looked past Nickle and fixed Sarah with a sharp stare. “You need a doctor to help you with technical ship maintenance?”

Having entrapped herself in her own lie, Sarah thought about Margaret, the best liar she knew. “Once you’re in deep, why not dive even deeper?” her friend had once told her, in reference to an elaborate lie Sarah had cultivated to get out of a date. Although there wasn’t much logic to back up Margaret’s claim, her words were the only advice Sarah had at the moment, and she rolled with them.

“The ship’s manual. It’s, uh, it’s in Latin.”

“Lat-in?” Reema over enunciated the second syllable. “What the hell is Latin-”

“It’s an ancient human language. No longer spoken, except by the first aliens who visited Earth. You see,” calling on what she learned in her middle-school Earth history class, Sarah’s lie took on a life of its own, “there was a group of aliens, you know them as Gearns, who landed on Earth around 100 BC. That’s ‘before Christ’, you know about Christ yes?” Sarah was rambling, in hopes that her inclusion of pointless tidbits would help distract Reema from the inconsistencies in her story. “Anywho, the aliens came down, and some humans taught them Latin. Their own language was incredibly basic and their method of written communication was virtually non-existent, so they adopted Latin as their secondary language.”

“I don’t understand, what does this have to do with the ship’s manual?” Reema’s face remained stern, but Sarah caught a slight glimmer of confusion in the Haraldie’s eyes. “Slipsteams were designed by Chappicks, which, if I remember correctly, are not descendants of Gearns—”

“No, you’re right,” Nickle spoke in a slightly shaky voice, “but since the Gearns are famous for their ship technology, a lot of companies use Latin in there manuals and designs as a sort of…homage.”

“Yes, that’s right. It’s very trendy using Latin,” Sarah concluded. “And lucky for me, Nickle here knows Latin.”

Nickle coughed and gave Sarah a look, then said, “Indeed. I-I studied Latin in med school.”

“It helps doctors learn all the medical terms, you get it.” Sarah could tell Reema was still not fully convinced, so she decided to cement her lie by using the glue of truth. “Look, I need Nickle to help me do my job. The job that the captain assigned me. The job that he commanded no one get in the way of, so are you going to stop harassing us, or do I have to go tell Grom I can’t fix his ship because one of his easily replaceable crew members got a little too stab-happy?”

With a sigh that screamed of rage, Reema brought her knife away from Nickle’s stomach and stepped back. “Fine.” She pushed Nickle aside and once again advanced on Sarah. “He lives another day. But I’d be careful abusing this small amount of leverage you’ve been handed. All it takes is one carefully planned accident, and you’ll be floating, breathless, amongst the stars, and I’ll be here, explaining to Grom how his stupid human girlfriend mixed up airlock controls and shot her scrawny ass right out of the ship.”

Reema pushed past Sarah, and, calling for the other crew members to get back to work, she stormed out of the room.

“Psst.” The whisper caressed Sarah’s ear as she finagled with the ship’s intercom system, attempting to fix the thing’s nasty habit of cutting in and out randomly. Turning around, she saw a single, bright blue eye surveying her through the cracked door of one of the chambers.

“C’mere.”

Nickle had gone to ask Wex if he had any extra tools, leaving Sarah alone in an area of the ship she was unfamiliar with. She wasn’t sure exactly whose room it was that the voice was coming from, but based on the eye, and the little bit of skin she could see around it, she was quite certain the voice came from a human.

Cautiously stepping towards the door, Sarah whispered, “who are you?”

“You have to help us.”

“Us?” Sarah craned her neck to try to see past the man’s head. “Who is us?”

“We’re the prisoners! Who do you think we are?” The man rolled his eye. “I sat across from you on the shuttle.”

Sarah looked up and down the hallway, double checking there were no prying eyes or eavesdropping ears. “Are all the prisoners in there?”

“I think so. Nobody has been taken yet, but one of those monsters could grab us any minute now and make us do god knows what. You have to get us out of here.”

“And take you where? There’s nowhere to hide on this ship. Not forever, at least.”

“We only have to hide until we land. One of the other prisoners overheard the Selachi saying something about arriving at the markets tomorrow.”

“Even if I could hide you, they’d notice you were all missing long before we land. And then they’d wait to land until they’ve searched the ship. No, hiding is no good.”

“So you’re just going to leave us here!” The man’s voice rose quickly, surprising Sarah.

Putting one hand on the wall next to the door, she leaned in close, sporting her most critical of expressions. “I’m not going to leave you,” she explained in a serious, yet soft tone, “but I’m also not interested in going with the first half-baked plan we come up with. If we’re going to come out of this situation alive, it’s going to take a lot more than a game of spaceship hide and seek, got it?”

The man nodded, a gesture Sarah was barely able to detect through the very small opening in the door. “I said, do you got it?”

“Yes, yes.” The man was thankfully whispering again.

“So, if we’re not hiding, what do you suggest we do?”

Sarah sighed. “I wish I knew this ship better. If I knew which chambers they kept their supplies in…”

“What about that guy who’s with you. He’s part of the crew, right?”

Sarah gave the man a look.

“I’ve been, uh,” he was unable to keep eye contact with her, “I’ve been spying on you most of the afternoon. Sorry I didn’t speak up sooner. I wanted to wait until you were alone.”

“I understand.”

“So…what about him? Do you trust him? Can he help us?”

Sarah pulled herself back into an upright position and folded her arms. “I’m not sure. I mean, I think he’s trustworthy, but whether or not he would help us get our hands on weapons—”

“Wait, hold up, weapons?”

“Yes. Weapons. I think it’s our best shot. If I could load you guys up, and you keep the blasters hidden until they bring you to the market tomorrow, you might be able to strike and run to freedom during the chaos.”

“That’s…that’s your plan?” The man allowed the door to open a few inches wider, revealing his whole face to Sarah. There was a large, freshly sown scar stretching from his other eye down to his chin. “I doubt anyone in here has ever shot a blaster before. We’re far more likely to shoot ourselves than do any real damage to the enemy.”

“You have a better idea?”

The man frowned. A second voice called from behind him, a woman. “Franklyn, the watch is due back any minute. Shut the door before we get caught and executed on the spot.”

“She’s right,” Sarah said. “Nickle will be heading back by now, too. Look, leave the plan up to me. I’ll come back tonight. I’ll knock lightly, three times, like this.” Sarah knocked on the wall twice, paused, then knocked a third time.

“And what if you can’t get the weapons?”

“Then get ready for hide and seek. Which will likely turn into a game of tag.”

“A lethal game of tag.”

A whistled tune faintly emanated through the halls, just before Nickle rounded the corner carrying a chipped, green toolbox. “Watcha lookin’ at?” Nickle asked chipperly, pointing at the door which had closed just in time.

“Oh, the, uh, keypad to open the door. It wasn’t lighting up.”

“They’re all broken,” Nickle admitted, then quickly threw his hand over his mouth.

“They’re all broken?” Sarah couldn’t help but hide her excited curiosity.

“No, sorry.” The doctor started shaking his head nervously and kept his eyes glued to his shoes. “I meant to say they used to be broken. But Wex fixed them, at least he said he did. Maybe he missed that one.” Nickle wiped some sweat from his hands and approached the keypad himself.

He tapped the screen and it lit up without hesitation. Turning back to Sarah, the two humans stood in a knowing silence. It was clear they had both just lied to one another, but what wasn’t clear was whether or not either lies were going to be addressed. Finally, the young woman broke the tense quiet with the blunt force of a direct admission of guilt.

“I lied. I wasn’t looking at the keypad.”

“Then what exactly were you looking at?”

“Why exactly did you say they were all broken?” Sarah countered.

After a brief pause, the doctor cleared his throat. “Well then, I guess we should be getting back to work on the intercom system. Wex said he wants his toolbox back within the hour.”

With that and an approving nod from Sarah, the two humans agreed to forget the last minute or so and carry on with their duties.