It would be more accurate to call Waypoint 507 a nest. The same could be said of most space stations in the galaxy. Typically, these vast structures begin their life cycles as a refueling depot with one or two hab-modules. But since breathable space is a premium in vacuum, these small compartments which are not bigger than a cargo bay on the Aphelion, accumulate any and all junk that can hold an atmosphere. Used storage containers, decommissioned escape pods, and most often, the salvaged wrecks of spaceships. They were all bolted, welded, and otherwise strapped on until the space station was a great ball of mismatched hulls and parts. Then come the gaudy holo-advertisements, the permanent layer of graffiti, and the clouds of frozen sewage. The biggest of these stations can reach up to thousands of kilometers in diameter, becoming miniature worlds unto themselves. And inevitably, they all meet the same end.

  As the centuries pass by, the core of these stations finally give out to metal fatigue. Sometimes this is ignored, as maintenance has become logistically impossible. Sometimes the core is inaccessible, buried through kilometers of trash, toxic compartments, and flooded access shafts. Sometimes the oldest sections of the station have been completely forgotten, the maps being lost or destroyed. In any case, as the core disintegrates at the seams, the inhabitants are slowly pushed outward, sealing compartments behind them which only slow the encroach of decay. By the end, the population is living at the outer edges of the station, staving off the ball of rot growing under their feet. This continues until the station is either destroyed with antimatter charges, or more likely, pushed on a vector to leave the system.

  In my opinion, Waypoint 507 deserved to be destroyed by antimatter charges, even before it could find itself in such a sorry state. As I watched from a viewport on our approach, I saw a jumble of trash, beaming a thousand multi-colored lights into space. The landing lights flickered, guiding us into a three dimensional maze of landing platforms and rusted umbilicals. Even in the unpressurized hangar, Waypoint 507 was teeming with aliens. Sparks flew from welders repairing girder braces, hawkers beamed their prices and rates, and then there were also the eyes of the station’s master, watching with concealed scanners and noting every ship which came through.

  In this sense, the Aphelion was not unusual, as the only ships which came to these parts were unusual. I watched the aliens, who stared at my ship with envy and greed. I glared back at them, with much the same feeling. A thousand times I envied those who wished to devour me and my ship. A thousand times I wished I was in their boots. Because if I was in their place, at least I would not have to run anymore.

  I felt a shudder on the floor as an umbilicum connected with the Aphelion. Amon Russ had come to Waypoint to collect another life. I turned to get ready for the next hunt.

  …

  “Where’s the rest of your men?” The Station Master squinted at Amon. “You’ll need at least a hundred to drive out Skavvan-Kors.

  Amon jammed his thumb to the old bird and the young boy with red eyes watching from a corner.

  Skavvan-Mek looked incredulously at us. First at Amon, then to Rykar, then to me. He hesitated at me and looked away before returning in disbelief to Amon. He tapped his long nails on his desk. “What species did you say you were again?”

  “I didn’t,” Amon cooly replied.

  Skavvan-Mek snapped his fingers. “No, no, no, I think I know your kind. You’re Monkites, aren’t you? I’m told they do not have fur on their faces.”

  Amon rolled his eyes. “The boy and I are Terrans.”

  The Station Master looked like the wind had been knocked out of him. Just as I was expecting Skavvan-Mek to fall on his knees, as did most who recognized the name, a high-pitched laugh broke in the room. Tears in his eyes, Skavvan-Mek pounded his desk with his fist, hollering in fits of laughter.

  I crossed my arms, but I continued watching in silence as the Station Master worked it out of his system. With a pink finger, Skavvan-Mek wiped away his tears, and he leaned back in his chair. “That’s a good one, but I would expect the race that defeated the Abberants to be a little more fearsome.” Skavvan-Mek leaned back in his chair and shook his head. “It doesn’t matter. You want to kill yourselves? Fine. I’ll give you the coordinates. Maybe you can take down one or two of his men before a round is blasted through your head. I’ll keep an eye out for footage of you in the drinking holes.”

  I looked around, thoroughly unimpressed. The Ratten were a species of clutter, fit for this station. Skavvan-Mek’s office could more appropriately be called a heap. I had never seen a place where so many lock boxes and servo-safes were scattered about. There were piles and piles of data-slates, filled with encrypted information and probably encrypted currencies. The walls were choking on tattered bits of paper filled with scribbles.

  At first, I thought they might’ve been personal notes, but upon closer inspection, I realized they were hasty IOUs. The paintings were crusted, crooked, and of bizarre taste. Again, they weren’t for any aesthetic purpose, instead taken as collateral from various transactions and then promptly forgotten about. If there was anything about this office that the Ratten seemed to have chosen for himself, a real preference instead of letting his nature take its course, it was the bones of some great animal suspended by wire above us. The fossil was massive, encompassing the entire room with a huge skull and an empty eye socket looking down at us. The creature must have been majestic once, perhaps some ocean dragon or great bird of the air. It opened a certain longing in me, wishing for wings I never had. But I was not the type to be easily distracted.

  Turning back to the conversation, Skavvan-Mek was not a pleasant sight and neither was he in speech. Whoever had uplifted the Ratten species had done a quick job. The Station Master’s snout looked like it had been pushed back into his face, and similarly his teeth were a jumble of gnawing bone that needed to be filed regularly. His beady eyes seemed entirely too small for his head, like they could be swallowed up by his own skull. His fur was overgrown, practically spilling out of the Station-Master’s spacesuit. I was only convinced he wore it because he lived in perpetual fear of a hull rupture on his entirely too cheap station.

  Amon looked unamused at the Station Master. “I’ll hand you Skavvan-Kors’ head personally. But before I take another step in this cesspool you call a home, I want fifty up front.”

  Skavvan-Mek clicked his long teeth. “That joke is a lot less funny. Payment upon completion of job. That’s how it works around here.”

  Amon clenched his fists. “Do you know how many times a Ratten has scammed me out of my pay after I finished the job?”

  “That’s—”

  “Once,” Amon interrupted sternly, placing his pistol on the table. “That’s because I always take your head after the part where you double-cross me. But what amazes me is that every time I’ve done a job for your kind, you keep trying. So here’s what is going to happen. You pay me my fifty right now, or I splatter your brains for wasting my time.”

  “You won’t get out of this room alive.”

  “I came here to kill Skavvan-Kors. You think your security is a threat to me?”

  Skavvan-Mek glared at Amon. “Who do you think you aliens are? I—” He cut himself short as he glanced at Rykar again with a sudden flicker of recognition.

  The old bird suddenly looked embarrassed as Skavvan-Mek squinted with a look of absolute disbelief on his face. “You’re… You look like— But you can’t be…”

  Rykar turned his back on the Station-Master. “You’re confusing me for someone else,” he said, and that was all you were going to get out of the old bird.

  Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  Amon tapped the Station-Master’s shoulder with the gun. “I’m the only one you should be paying attention to here.”

  Skavvan-Mek looked at Amon fearfully and nodded. The Station Master tapped the comm and ordered that the heat-units be transferred to the Aphelion.

  “Good,” Amon said. “Now if I get one word from my Nekomata that my payment has been counterfeited or bugged or tampered with in any way whatsoever, I will kill you. And it will be far slower than the bullet.”

  The Station Master tapped the comm again and quickly advised his men.

  With that, Amon put his pistol in his holster, and negotiations were concluded. He walked out of the office with Rykar shortly behind. I was the last, and as I glanced behind me, I saw the Station Master was staring a million miles away, pale, as if he had seen someone brought back from the dead.

  …

  I was still angry at Uncle Rykar for saying he was taking the Aphelion, and so the two of us walked in silence down the back corridors of Waypoint 503. As we passed the bulkheads, Rykar had to hunch down so the barrel of the guass cannon wouldn’t snag on the banded ceiling.

  I walked just fine, holding my rifle and keeping an eye out down the dark passages.

  Just as I was to step forward, Rykar slammed his arm against my chest. I was about to snap at him, but then I saw the tripwire mine bolted to the side of the passage.

  Uncle Rykar groaned. “There’s going to be a million more of these. I expect the whole corridor is lined with them from here on out.”

  “Will we get to the location in time?” I asked.

  The old bird tapped the wall, looking for something and not answering me.

  “Rykar!” I yelled a bit loudly, my voice carrying down the passage. We both paused and looked down the dark, dripping corridor, listening for movement. There was none.

  “Here’s the thing about back entrances kid, especially for a thieves den.” Rykar had to awkwardly lift the guass cannon on his shoulder. “They’re usually packed with enough firepower to blow a hole straight through the station. But escape hatches aren’t worth a damn if you’re tripping over your own mines.” He pressed the trigger, and instead of a shot, a funnel of blue flame spilled out from an attachment Rykar added to the cannon.

  The sheet metal collapsed into white-hot liquid. I took a step back to keep it from pooling at my boots. Behind was a narrow passage adjoining the main one.

  Rykar’s beak twisted. It was his version of a grin. “Amateurs.”

  He ducked inside, and I followed him. It was cramped, but it was still barely passable with Rykar’s huge weapon.

  “I get the sense that you’re mad at me,” Rykar said as we shuffled down.

  I glanced away. “I am.”

  “About taking the ship?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you want to know why?”

  I didn’t reply, but Rykar began anyway.

  “I was raised in this world, kid.” Rykar tapped the moldy bulkhead with his talons. “There’s nothing except the climb, the choice between a higher deck and the rot that consumes you. You spend your whole life running from the bottom, from being just another part of the cesspool. The great story of the Pirate Lord of Artorius? I just didn’t want to be eaten. More than the rest. That’s how all thieving legends are born.” Rykar snapped out a zakon dart. “That’s the excuse I go with at least. Our sorts of stories don’t get to be that simple.”

  “But why do you want the Aphelion? Why do you want my home?” I asked. “Why can’t you just stay in Sanctuary?”

  “Ingrish may not look it, but she has a lot in her still. Another ten years at least. The Aphelion ain’t flying after being grounded for ten years. There’s no hard feelings, of course. Ten years is a blink of your eye. Would happily partner up again.”

  “But why do you want my home?” I asked again, hurt.

  Rykar paused with the guass cannon slung over his shoulder. He turned and looked at me with his yellow eyes. “Hatchlings of my species… we have a tendency. Call it genetics or whatever. Maybe you humans programmed it in me. Maybe its from when my kind used to be able to fly. I dunno. But now we’re forced to choose our wings. We’re not born with them anymore, and we die when we’re grounded. I don’t expect a human to understand. The earth, the sea, the stars, they all belong to you. They’re your birthright. I just have that horizon.”

  “Why my home?” I repeated, frustrated that he was taking so long.

  Rykar sighed. “My kind—most go for the fastest ships. The ones that burn out after a few minutes of fuel. That, or they make their nests surrounded by weapons. Course they don’t know someone always wants those weapons. The smarter ones, they choose a ship which that lasts them a long life. Freighters and the such. Freedom to fly and freedom to live. Can’t blame them for that.”

  “But why—” I stomped my foot, but Rykar interrupted me.

  “I remember when Amon Russ matched my fleet with the Aphelion. The damn thing must’ve faced a thousand scrap cannons. It took a beating. And still, it killed half my fleet before I destroyed it, or so I thought. Then imagine my surprise when I faced it ten solar cycles later. And again, and again. You see, I had a bounty on my head, and Amon had a death wish. What kind of ship is like that? I’ve seen cargo haulers eight times her size go down to a single torpedo. I tell you. She jumped straight out of a Xurak Hangar. How does that even happen?”

  “You did that, not the ship.”

  “Ship is the crew.” Rykar puffed on the zakon dart. “Ship chooses the crew. You’ll get that when you’re older. My point is, the Aphelion was old when she stared straight down a Pirate Lord’s fleet. She was old the next six times. She was older when faced the likes of the Xurak. I wouldn’t be surprised if she outlives you.”

  “I could live a thousand years,” I said, with full knowledge that it was a curse and not a blessing.

  “Take this old bird’s wager. There’s a point where luck becomes a pattern, and a pattern becomes fact. I didn’t choose the Aphelion because she was the fastest or the strongest. Hell, the Aphelion was on its knees by the time Amon cornered me. Except I was even worse off. I chose the Aphelion because she was the ship that wouldn’t die, no matter what stood against her. That was what I fell in love with. Those were my wings.”

  Rykar’s shoulders stiffened, and I realized then the great pain of his species. Reflecting back, I suppose we all have them. The Dalfaen desire the frolic of the shallows yet their ugliness condemns them to the depths. The Rhodeshi desire the dignity of poets and yet their rage condemns them to the coliseums. Mankind desires the ache of all things and yet we’re eternally left disappointed.

  “If you think Aphelion can’t die, why do you think she couldn’t stand ten years grounded?” I asked.

  Rykar laughed at that. “You’re a clever kid. Smarter than anyone gives you credit for. I suppose you’re right,” he said as we came to a room and a hatch in the floor. “Truth is, I’m selfish. I want to fly with the Aphelion. I don’t want her to fly without me.” Rykar glanced down at me. “You keep asking me why I’m taking your home from you. It’s not that. I stay down in the soil, and I die. You’ll live. Your kind always does, no matter what the galaxy throws at you. That’s what I’ve always admired about Amon and humanity. They’ve clipped your wings at least a thousand times by now, and yet you still fly with the best of us. Even now, at the ends of the universe, you’re still fighting.”

  I aimed my rifle towards the hatch. I looked at Rykar with my crimson eyes. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. All anyone tells me is that I’ve lost everything.”

  Rykar leaned on the guass cannon. “That’s where you’re wrong. You haven’t hit rock bottom. I hope you never will. You haven’t been tempted, looking at that ball of festering rot under your feet and throwing yourself straight to the center.”

  “I have.”

  “No. Listen, kid. You may have got those red eyes of yours, but the Xurak were never able to touch your heart. I remember when I met you after you boarded, while we were still on Ghiza VI.”

  “I regret that,” I said, and then I quickly added. “I regretted who I was.”

  “Oh come on. Don’t beat yourself up about that. You were a hatchling, barely cracked out of your egg. Point is, after the life I lived, I thought that this place was where I belonged, with the scum and sewage. I thought that was all I was—what I ever could be—scum and sewage. The things you do wrong stain you. They drag you down, till you lose sight of everything else except the rot. I know you’ve been through the worst, and it wasn’t easy climbing back up. But that’s nothing compared to climbing back up from your sins.”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I lied.

  The lock mechanism on the hatch began to turn, causing us to forget our conversation, and the circular plate lifted. Out popped the head of a Ratten, bloody and breathing heavily. His eyes widened in surprise, seeing the two of us in his secret passage. He thought he had escaped his death.

  Rykar puffed on a zakon dart and threw it away. “Skavvan-Kors. Nice to put a face to the name. I’ve heard so much about you. Hear you’re a legend around these parts.”

  I aimed my rifle at the Ratten’s head and pulled the trigger.

  …

  Amon Russ inspected the broken body of the Skavvan-Kors in the umbilicum and then he kicked it aside as he walked briskly towards the Aphelion.

  “Get to the bridge,” he ordered Rykar. “We’re leaving.”

  “What about the second half of our payment!?” I ran to catch up.

  The old bird chuckled as I joined them in the airlock. Amon pushed a button and the doors cycled shut. “We’re never getting it,” he told me. “They’ll stall as long as they can while Skavvan-Mek sends hull cutters to board the ship. I’m not playing these games. We don’t have the time.”

  The umbilicum unlatched from the Aphelion as the ship groaned as the clamps released their grip.

  “If we weren’t going to get paid for the second half, why did we kill Skavvan-Kors? We already had the money!” I asked, bewildered.

  Amon glanced at me. “Because we’re not thieves.” And promptly, he disappeared in the Aphelion with Rykar.