The focal point of all A’li-uud ships was the command center, which was where the captain and the control crew were located for the majority of a mission. There were stations for each role: navigation, communications, defense, and so on. The captain was ordinarily seated in the center of the room to optimize access to each station, and his chair offered the best vantage point for visibility out of the viewing window. It was a clean and simple structure.

The room into which the Novai led us was so drastically different I first wondered if he had brought us to the wrong location. If there were stations, they were arranged so haphazardly it was impossible to distinguish one from another. The walls were richly brown and reminiscent of the walls in the rogue lair, cave-like and rock-textured. The floor was the same material as the walls, and strange mounds protruded up from the floor, some merely ankle-high while others easily reached my chest. From the ceiling, stalactite growths staggered downward toward my head. Had it not been for the massive viewing window arcing across an entire side of the room and displaying the starry speckled blackness of space, I could have been convinced we had been transported out of the ship to a cavern on an unknown planet.

Novai were scattered about the room just as they had been in the docking bay. While I saw no strange oblong scanners, there were a number of other foreign gadgets being used I could not have imagined into existence. One Novai carried a square of glass no thicker than a piece of fabric upon which unrecognizable symbols scrolled in glowing blue. Another was prodding a palm-sized silver octagon embedded in the wall amongst the rock. Several were hunched over the various mounds with blue light illuminating their white faces. Everywhere I looked was a contradiction between the primitive and the technological.

Our guide left us wordlessly and blended into the horde, but a new Novai took his place. I recognized him as Captain before he even spoke. He was as tall as the others and equally as eerie in appearance, but he was dressed differently and carried himself with staunch confidence. The crew in this room wore the brown tunics donned by the Novai colonists back on Albaterra, but this male was adorned in gilded carmine armor down to his matching boots. Additionally, his hair was pulled back high on his head with a shimmering golden band. He may have been hideous, but he was unequivocally regal.

“Welcome,” he said. I was conscious of his screech, but I was able to understand him despite it. Phoebe, however, flinched as if in pain, and I pulled her back against me to allow for slightly more distance between her ears and the Novai’s voice. “I am Captain Arguute Hett.”

Venan inclined his head. “Captain Venan Et’Haren Vastitribus. Thank you for allowing my crew to board your vessel.”

I bent down slightly and began whispering translations to Phoebe. She was completely still against me; I could not even feel her lungs expanding and contracting with breath.

“I understand from your transmission you require our assistance?” Captain Hett asked.

“Yes,” Venan confirmed. “It is my sincerest regret to inform you your colonists are not well. It seems they have contracted a disease neither our healers nor the humans have seen before. We have brought one of the humans who have been assigned to the case with us to speak with you today. She will be able to enlighten you to the details of your colonists’ status, and hopefully, you will have some information to impart to aid in finding a cure.”

He turned slightly to extend an arm toward Phoebe. She shrank into me, having not the slightest inkling what was said about her until I interpreted. The Novai turned his eyeless face toward her as well. A creepy feeling crawled up my spine seeing him look at her without actually being able to see his eyes. I preferred the nightmarish red orbs of the sick Novai over the blank ones of the healthy.

“Are you to be her translator?” he asked. I did not realize he was addressing me for a long moment, as his head did not move to indicate where he was looking.

“I am,” I said hastily.

“Very good,” he replied. “Please tell me about this disease.”

Phoebe began talking when I cued her, and I heard a distinct tremor in her voice. She sounded even more nervous than when she had gone before the Council at Venan’s trial. I could not blame her, of course; though they appeared to be occupied with their various technologies, the throng of Novai in the room had become rather quiet, and it was unnecessary to see their eyes to know they were listening.

“Our observations show the illness begins in the brain. The first symptoms to draw attention from those tending the colony were drastic behavioral changes, primarily relative to aggression and ability to reason.” Hearing her speak, then reiterating her words in Novain, was an awe-inspiring moment I had not expected to experience. Despite her nerves, she was polished and concise. She sounded just as medically educated as any doctor or healer who could have been sent in her place. It was difficult to restrain myself from beaming with pride and wrapping my arms around her, but I satisfied myself with knowing I would be able to rave about her in the privacy of our own ship soon enough. “Affected Novai responded to high-pressure situations with violence initially, and, as the disease progressed, that threshold became lower and lower until violence became the sole response to anything or anyone they encountered.”

Gauging Captain Hett's feelings regarding Phoebe's description was impossible. He did not sway slightly from side to side as he stood, nor did he knit his fingers or tap his foot. Without eyes, the only source of facial expression was his mouth, which remained closed and still. I would only learn if he was alarmed or angry or indifferent when he spoke.

“The second stage is physical in its development,” Phoebe went on. I was translating for her while she talked, but I was able to hear her clearly over my own screeches. “Growths resembling scabs formed on the eye pockets. They spread outward and left the skin they previously occupied disintegrated, causing an opening that revealed the eyeballs beneath. These growths extended to the rims of the eye pockets before halting in their progression, and they are still present in all the patients under my care, essentially bordering the eye sockets.”

Captain Hett was now beginning to respond in a manner I could identify. He had lifted his hand to his chin and pressed a finger to the space just below his bottom lip, and I imagined his red irises beneath hazy with consideration.

“We also observed during this stage a great deal of skin discoloration, notably darkening. The dermis appeared to remain intact rather than disintegrating as it did over the eyes, but it developed semi-transparency as if it was chronically atrophying,” Phoebe explained. Her voice was no longer quaking with nerves, and she sounded confident in herself. I did not know if her growing confidence was evident to the Novai, if he was perceptive to human vocal inflections, but it did not go unnoticed by me. I squeezed her arm with gentle praise.

“Have there been any casualties?” the captain asked.

I was startled by his sudden leap into the morbid. Based off Phoebe’s depiction thus far, I would not have assumed the worst so quickly. As odd as I found his response, however, it held within it a great deal of promise. I immediately wondered if he was familiar with the symptoms she was describing.

“No patients under the care of my team and myself have died,” she said. “It was disclosed to us prior to our patients’ arrival that several Novai perished on the journey to our hospital, though.”

He nodded, and the finger beneath his lip tapped several times. I did not need to see his eyes to know he was definitely thinking now.

“Do you know what it is?” I inquired without waiting for anyone else to ask.

“I cannot be certain, for I have not seen the symptoms myself,” he replied slowly, “but I believe my colonists are suffering from the sun-sickness.”