Chapter 30
Samples of anything and everything we could imagine hung in the hallway like a strange mobile. I hoped it would be enough to entice the hatchling leviton. All we had to do now was wait, which was easier said than done.
My pen light had been eaten, and our tablets didn’t really provide much light. None of us wanted to do this in the pitch darkness.
There was a small noise in the ceiling, like something moving, that made my head snap up.
"Oh, there you are," Lily's voice spoke through it.
"Well, there you are," I said, relief flooding through me. I didn’t realize how much I needed to hear her voice. "I've been wondering where you went, Lily.”
“And is this your way of summoning me?" I could tell her attention was on the floating morsels of food. Perhaps I just understood her well enough to know.
"No, this is for our unexpected guest." I was about to explain.
"Oh, that thing," Lily said, no small amount of venom in her voice. Well, I guess I didn’t need to. She apparently was well aware.
"You know?" I was surprised.
"Of course I know. I've been chasing it. The little thing is fast, and the one time I got my hand on it, it ate my fingers. So don't touch it, and don't try to feed it."
I pointed at the hanging bits. "I'm not using my hand, see?" Having a black hole in its mouth was plenty of discouragement for me trying to hand-feed the thing, even if it was adorable.
"It is a menace," Lily said.
"No, it's just a hungry little baby," I argued, only to get a weird look from Brick.
"You were very upset with it only a short while ago," Brick pointed out.
"That's before I realized it was a baby leviton just looking for food." I grinned. "And it's going to become my pet… or friend."
"They're intelligent enough to have a civilization," Melgara offered. “Levitons are plenty intelligent; it’s just they don’t need spaceships or housing.”
"Okay, scratch that. Friend, definitely friend." I nodded. Though the image of a capital-class leviton stuffing itself into a ship did flit through my mind.
"Yes, well, it should be heading in your direction. I made this node to try and get ahead of it," Lily informed us.
"And it's eating your sensory organs?" I asked her.
Lily grumbled. "It takes a single bite and leaves the rest."
“Well, it's a cute one, so don't hurt it. I'm hoping we can do something here to feed it. Oh, and I saved you pieces of its eggshell and the amniotic fluid. It should be full of its genetics," I told her, mostly hoping to prevent Lily from trying to eat the little guy.
"Really?" Lily perked up significantly. "Hold on, my body is heading that way."
I chuckled; she just couldn’t wait, could she?
"On second thought. Gimme." Lily stretched a tendril of her mycelium that ripped down from the ceiling, and I pulled out the glove but held it off at the last second.
"You will not eat the baby leviton," I told her.
"Come now, Captain. Do you really think I would stoop so low as to eat a freshly hatched creature?" Lily asked.
"That wasn't an answer, Lily." I narrowed my eyes, and she let out a put-upon sigh.
"I will not eat your baby leviton."
"It's not my baby leviton," I said quickly. "They are a sentient race."
"Sure." Her body wasn't here, however, but if she was, I knew she would be smirking.
"Fine, I'll accept that," I said.
Lily cleared her throat, and I frowned.
"Oh, right." I held up the glove, peeling it back for the tendril to dip inside where the egg had been. "It seems to be hunting for something," I told Lily. "Any chance you could tell me what it might be hungry for?"
She withdrew the tendril, and I could tell she had only taken an incredibly small sample of the fluid.
"Why not eat the egg?" I asked.
"Most creatures get value from eating their own eggs," Lily said simply. Perhaps because I’d made this important to me, she was being helpful in her own way.
It made a fair amount of sense, and I held the glove up. "Well then, thank you for not eating everything here."
"Of course not. However, if this leviton is as interested in you as you seem to be in it, then I'm certain it'll stick around, and I'll have more chances later."
"It might be very dangerous to have it around," Melgara said. "As I said before, the race is quite cautious of everyone else. If the levitons find that you have an egg of theirs, not to mention that you've hatched it, there could be very dangerous repercussions."
"It's not like I stole the egg; I just hatched it. What we're very certain of is that this was a ship of smugglers," I added quickly.
"Yes, and any angry leviton mother would simply assume that you're related to said smugglers, especially flying around in said smuggler's ship," Melgara said pointedly. “Trust me, you don’t want an angry leviton mother coming after you.”
The idea of a capital-class space whale chasing me with a black hole in its mouth, ripping apart ships and worlds to get to me, flashed through my mind.
I frowned and glanced around me. "Well then, maybe help me try and make this situation a little better." I chuckled nervously, shifting and continuing to stare up at the food, waiting for our newest passenger to arrive.
***
It didn't take long for the baby space whale to show.
In the dark, it stuck out like a sore thumb.
A thin line along its side glowed in the dark, alternating through the colors like an RGB light, cycling through the rainbow.
It moved quickly, flitting from one side of the hall to the other as it cautiously made its way down, until it was close enough that I could make out its expression.
Its round head seemed to be sniffing as it wandered down the hall, this time far more warily than the first time we interacted with it.
I held my breath, trying to remain as quiet as possible, and in the silence, I could hear a small noise from it; a quiet little note that rang through the area like it was calling for someone.
It got close enough and hesitated by the first hanging morsel, a slice of ham that Brick had found in his room. It called out, hovering around the floating piece of meat, before, with a happy chirp, it swallowed it with its little black hole for a mouth, sucking up the meat in an instant.
The lights from our tablets were dim, but that ripple of shifting light made it impossible for any of us to pull our eyes away from its eating.
Some people might think that someone's stomach was a black hole, but this thing actually was a black hole.
It made another call, looking around and trying to find something.
This little call pulled at my heartstrings, and I stepped out of where I was hiding, holding out the glove with its eggshell still remaining inside of it.
It flitted back and then curiously eyed me around the corner that it was hiding behind.
"It's okay," I said.
The little leviton watched me, and I did my best to seem non-threatening. It came a little closer, eyeing me curiously, and I held the glove up.
As it inched closer, I remained still. I could hear Melgara behind me, practically panting, and I knew that it was killing her not to have a tablet out, recording and documenting this for science.
"After you've befriended it, we're just going to have to pretend and remake this moment," Melgara whispered.
"Deal."
I was more than happy to make a deal like that.
The little guy came up closer and darted in, his mouth opening to a small black hole as it sucked in the glove, spaghettifying it as I watched in horror as the spaghettification stretched closer to my fingers.
Thankfully, it stopped an inch short. It made a few quick happy chirps and then started swirling around me.
"Good boy… girl?" I asked, hesitating, unsure which I was dealing with or if these even had a gender at all. Regardless, he seemed fairly happy, and I plucked one of the other hanging pieces and offered it to him, holding a nice long stretch of string.
He chirped, snapped it up in that black hole again, before patiently waiting for more.
"If you want more food, you can wait here and not run around so much?" I asked.
However, he flitted back and forth, now between the hanging pieces, sucking them up faster than I could offer.
"Ahem," Lily said, her glowing pink eyes all I could make out of her in the dark.
"Hmm?" I said, as he continued to eat, seemingly comfortable in my presence.
"What is it doing?" Lily asked, and the leviton, spotting her, quickly moved behind my shoulder, apparently using me for protection.
"Sorry, little guy. She's with me."
He cocked his head.
"Yeah, I know she can be scary, but you have it on my word that she's not that scary," I promised.
The leviton didn't seem entirely reassured by my words, squinting at Lily like she might take a bite out of him if he came out of hiding. I held another morsel of food up to lure him back out.
"Are you sure it's a him?" Lily asked.
"No," I answered bluntly. "Are any of you experts on leviton gendering?" They all shook their heads. "Great. And ‘it’ seems rude somehow, so it's going to be 'he' until we have more information."
Lily paused and then relented with a bob of her head. "You know, if you misbehave, there will be consequences," Lily said to the little guy, and I glared at her.
"Now you're just trying to scare Pip, aren't you?" I tucked a protective arm around him.
"Pip?" Lily asked, like she was tasting the name.
"Yeah, for Pip-squeak." Obviously.
"You realize he's going to be quite large," Melgara offered, inching closer.
"Yeah, but for now, he's tiny compared to where he'll be eventually," I justified. Of course, that only made them stare at me more strangely.
"You are aware that you can't raise him, correct?" Tiri asked.
"Why not?” I wasn’t giving Pip up! No, I wanted to raise the space whale. Not just because he was cute, but for science!
“I mean, he's a leviton.” Tiri said it like it was obvious.
“I don't think that's much of an excuse. Heck, if anything, that's a reason to raise him. I mean, just look how cute he is." I smiled.
Tiri glanced at Lily. "He's your man."
Lily, however, shrugged. "If he believes he can do it, why should I tell him otherwise?"
"Because… I mean, even if it's a baby leviton, it's most likely going to get bigger than this frigate in a few years, I think." Tiri's jaw dropped open.
"Melgara said no one's documented the life cycle of one of them. It could take decades," I grumbled. "And what am I supposed to do, abandon him to the far reaches of space?"
"Yes," Melgara said. "That's actually his habitat."
I frowned at her very reasonable use of logic when it went against what I wanted, and then I turned to Lily to see what she would say.
"Whatever you want, I'm here to support you," she told me.
"Me, too." Violet stuck her chin out. "I mean, it's not like it's going to grow too large overnight.
As it gets too big to move through the hallway, we'll have to move it into the cargo bay, and perhaps then we'll have the time to find someone who knows something about levitons and can give us clearer direction. "
"Great. So we agree we will keep Pip for now." I smiled, hearing what I wanted to hear. "Wonderful. Welcome to this ship, Pip," I said.
Only for the little guy to go "Pip, pip!" in response.
I was stunned. "How smart are levitons?" I asked, a small hint of nervousness in my voice.
"Most likely as smart or similar to dragons, which is to say, highly intelligent. As for milestones that might give us a clue, if it's just repeating you or actually knows that's its name now, I do not have a clue," Melgara answered flatly.
"Either way, I'm sure Pip is just incredible for his people. Isn't that right, Pip?" I grabbed him with both hands and attempted to lift him up, only to find that Pip was very heavy.
"Pip?" I asked, staring at the little whale.
Who just responded, "Pip, pip."
"Has anyone ever told you, you're very heavy?" I asked.
The leviton tilted its head, not understanding a lick of what I said, only to return to me with an incredibly cute expression.
"You know what? It doesn't matter." I waved a hand. "What matters is that you are incredibly adorable."
"Pip, pip."
"Yes, exactly," I said. This time, when I tried to lift Pip, he at least helped me, floating in the direction of my nudging.
"Pip, pip," it said and then began swimming around my head rapidly.
Lily stood behind me with crossed arms. "Now, Pip, just because you're cute, don't let it go to your head and become a troublemaker."
"Pip would never be trouble," Violet challenged Lily. "Pippy, come here. Come to mama." The whale swam into Violet's arms, nuzzling her, as Lily stood beside her, fuming.
"Mama?" Lily, who had just been assuming Pip would be nothing other than trouble, seemed offended that someone else would take the position of mother.
"Well, I assume we're all going to be taking care of Pip.
Lily, you can be his mother, too, if you want.
I'm not sure how good your maternal instincts might be," Violet said.
"I mean, after all, you said your people just send their children out into the far reaches of space rather than any proper parenting.
And the captain isn't going to be able to do this entirely himself. "
I stared at Violet in shock and horror. "Perhaps don't antagonize Lily like that," I offered. However, Violet seemed more than prepared to ignore my words.
"And why not? Are you going to raise Pip all on your own? Lily's not even going to help," Violet challenged.
"He won't need help," Lily insisted. However, that made me waffle my head slightly.
"Help would be nice," I conceded.
"Well, of course, then I will help. I just didn't want to make any assumptions that you would need it. You are an incredibly capable person, but, of course, help is completely understandable, too," Lily answered.
"It sounds like you don't know what he needs." Violet huffed and turned her nose up at Lily. The two of them had a minor stare-off, and I held Pip.
"Let's go somewhere else," I offered the little leviton, who just continued to say ‘Pip, pip’ as he followed me.
"Hold on, that's not necessary," Lily said, chasing after me. "Besides, I think we could all use a little sleep." Those words caused hesitation among a few of the group.
"Well, if you'd like me to take Pip… as a doctor, to look after." Melgara held her hands out, practically frothing at the mouth at the opportunity.
"That's fine." I clutched Pip, feeling defensive. "He'll sleep with me."
"And me," Lily said quickly.
"If you need a break, you're welcome to come drop him off at my room. You can even sleep there, too," Violet offered, only to get a scowl from Lily.
"You will cease your offerings to have the captain spend more time with you." Lily put her fists on her hips.
"And jealousy isn't so becoming," Violet replied sharply.
I put my attention on the cute baby space whale and left them to figure out the rest.