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Oops! - Chapter 2
CY 10086 - AD July 5163Location: The Eureka Maru
"EEEEEEE!!"
Beka was hunched over the computer console in her stateroom going over the Maru's accounts payable ledger when she heard Trance's scream. Jumping up from her chair she ran into the common room just in time to see Trance running into the room from the corridor leading to the engine room, with Harper following close behind her.
"What the hell? What's going on, Trance?" she asked.
"He tried to eat me!" exclaimed Trance pointing an accusatory finger at Harper.
"Boss, it was just a harmless..." began Harper looking nearly as agitated as Trance.
"Quiet, Harper," interrupted Beka. "You'll get your say. Now, Trance, tell me exactly what happened. Harper's got many faults but cannibalism isn't one of them."
"Oh," said Trance a bit calmer but still keeping a wary eye on Harper, "I'd gone into the engine room to see if Harper had any preferences for lunch since I have cooking duties today, and I decided to give him that friendly greeting I see members of your species sometimes giving each other."
"What greeting is that, Trance?" asked Beka. She noticed that Harper had gone from looking agitated to looking embarrassed.
"You know, the one where you touch your mouths together and then rub noses. It's just like the how cabbits on Kolk 7 greet after the female comes back to the den from hunting. I thought I'd greet him the same way, but when I tried to rub noses with him he stuck his tongue in my mouth like he was tasting me. That was icky enough but then he grabbed me and pressed his mouth even closer to mine like he was trying to swallow me. So I yelled and ran away."
By this time Harper had gone from looking embarrassed to looking as if he wanted to crawl under the Maru's deck plates. "I see," said Beka trying very hard to keep a straight face. How could she explain this? "I guess kissing isn't a custom where you come from, Trance. The greeting you are referring to is called a kiss, and it can be just a friendly greeting, but when a man kisses a woman in the way you described it indicates that he desires to mate with the woman he is kissing. He wasn't trying to eat you, Trance. He wanted to mate with you."
A look of distaste crossed Trance's face. "Your mating rituals include exchange of saliva? That's disgusting" She turned to look at Harper. "I don't think I'll ever want to mate with you."
Location the Andromeda Ascendant
Ow,” said Andromeda. “A direct hit to the ego. That must have hurt. Especially when you're a self proclaimed love god. What else happened when she was new aboard the Maru?”
“Well,” said Beka looking thoughtful, “there was the time Trance tied to make cheesecake and the time I murdered Walter.”
“You murdered someone?” there was shock in Andromeda's question.
“Not someone,” corrected Beka, “something. Walter was a tree.”
“How do you murder a tree?”
“It was right after Harper tried to eat her. We were on Huron. I had spent the entire day haggling with a pair of shipping agents about cargoes and after we had finally made a deal they insisted we celebrate by having dinner at a fancy restaurant. It was well past midnight when I got back to the Maru and I was dead on my feet...”
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