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The Pink Dresser
The white cottage that was home to Taro and Sonno’s family didn’t look like any of the house-type structures that Cissy was used to from her limited time on civilized planets or in holo-vids. It didn’t have any of the right angles, square corners, or perfectly straight lines that most spaceports and planetary cities used in such structures. It was more like it had been molded out of clay by a huge child of some sort. And she noticed the window structures looked exactly like whale eyes in the greater hull of the space whale. They probably functioned like whale eyes too, meaning the whale watched everything.
Cissy was sitting at the table with Taro and Suki watching Diznee and Sonno try to calm the crazy-sad tantrum of Friday the Lupin dog girl. Sonno sang an indecipherable lullaby of great beauty while little Diznee wrapped her naked little girl body around Friday on the pad that served as a bench or bed, cuddling the inconsolable dog girl until the exhausted child fell into a fitful doze.
“So, why does the prince want to execute us, anyway?” Cissy asked nobody in particular.
Suki said something complicated to Taro. Then, to Cissy, she said, “Our people and your people have a history of hostility between them. Since the first Earther explorer entered the Great Nebula we have been treated with little besides suspicion, aggression, and exploitation.”
“But I am twelve. I never had anything to do with Nebulons my entire life. Why does Prince Porodor blame me?”
Suki said a whole string of Nebulonin words to Taro. He answered back with a long string of, “Ek-ek-akakaw tac and something more that Cissy couldn’t follow,” that Suki had to translate.
“Taro says that it all goes back to Porodor’s father who was the Vorranac Warlord. An Imperial task force started a war with the clan by attacking while the space whales were grazing at an Imperial-owned gas giant. They targeted the space whale that the warlord was commanding from and killed it with the warlord on board. Porodor was too young to be crowned warlord, and that is how he lost the office to my great uncle.”
Wylo had been listening to the conversation from the corner of the room where he had been eating the blue food that Sonno had prepared for him. He got up and came to the table.
“Porodor has more than just that as a reason to hate Earthers. It was an Earther colony on the edge of the Imperium that he attacked and rescued my family and me.” Wylo’s eyes were as serious as Cissy had ever seen a pair of dark blue eyes.
“You were enslaved by Earthers?” Cissy asked.
“My grandmothers were taken as slaves. Both of my parents were born from Earther fathers. That’s why I turned out pink instead of blue.”
“Oh? Can Nebulons and Earthers make babies?”
“It is believed that Humaniti and Nebulons had common ancestors millions of years ago,” Suki said seriously.
“How can that be so?”
“All intelligent races in the galaxy were probably created by the Ancients,” Wylo said. “In a way, all life is the same.”
“It still doesn’t seem right that we have to die just for being who and what we are,” said Cissy, beginning to feel angry.
All were in agreement.
And suddenly there was a delighted squeal from Friday.
“I gots un dresser on! Un pink wun!”
Everyone looked at Friday, standing there in a frilly pink dress like the ones Cissy had made for Friday on board the Happy Luck.
“How…?”
“It’s the Danjer suit,” Suki said. “It read Friday’s mind while she was dreaming. It’s a living creature that wants to please its master.”
“Ent I purdee now?” Friday cooed.
Cissy laughed. It was not over yet. In fact, the battle to survive was just beginning.
Catch a Falling Star 