Pylo took another break to snack on some more oxygen saturated grist slurry. She was, maybe done with Dushɪ of Tunie’s feathers. Working in a slow spiral from her fore to her aft.

The sweet delighted buzzing song of her friend and companion rang through Pylo’s body as the fibres and struts of each feather was first torn into wispy rivulets of atomised matter and then knit back together in pristine shining health in the wake of the ‘comb’.

The going was slow by necessity, Pylo could no more press the wondrous artefact any faster then she could launch Tunie out of the dock by her own muscles.

With the light flaring and twisting in the cradle of its hoop the thing was active and but for the direction with the careful pressures of the grip it was utterly and completely immovable.

“So... what do you think of the passengers? And be honest, I’m considering taking them with me to the celebratory pub crawl.”

“!!!”

“Hey I promised there would be only the one, not that there would be none of them! So I want to make it count, and I think bringing them along would be good right? Show them a good time in the alien port after they get done staring at whatever it is that amazes them about the place?”

“◸⑆◴ ↝⌔ ↺⌒▃█▙ ▽⑉”

“Oh yeah I heard you liked her jokes, she’s a nice little kid larval thing I think? The Terran life cycle confuses me to be honest. They have some kinda symbiotic or cultural weird thing about what defines their identity? I can’t figure it. But she’s the youngest of the three at least.”

Pylo finished her refuel break then got back to restoring the feathers. Working her way along. Glacially dragging from tip to root of each feather. Then turning off the comb and moving to the next one.

It was going to take a while but Tunie loved it so how could Pylo refuse? Also it saved them a massive amount of grist in feather shedding and the subsequent nutrient restocking needed to regrow them.

Pylo knew the feathers and the analogous fibres inside of Tunie’s drive were literally the most expensive and complex part of her anatomy.

One did not obtain the ability to push against the aether at the very limits of speed with simple arrangements of matter.

Nore did the energy needed to do so come cheap or without wear and tear on the structures involved.

That said the comb was not suited for work on Tunie’s drive core.

Very little was actually.

It was a densely packed furnace of zero deviation precision whirling fibres if Pylo remembered her care and safety manuals.

The only care and maintenance possible for that instrument of wonder was proper care and feeding for the rest of the ship and maybe some divine gift from one of the capitals if there was a serious injury or breach (that some how did not also rip the entire ship apart at cruise speeds).

Pylo gave her head a hard shake to stop thinking about how delicate and precious nature of Tunie’s core.

She actively tried to squash memories of how coveted a void courier core was.

There we many who would go to horrific lengths to acquire them. Wiith or without the rest of the ship and it’s living tissues attached.

Augh no, she needed to focus on happier things.

This was brushing time and that meant it was a time for joy and relaxing and calm!

“So you approve of me bringing them along after we are done with your brushies? No recriminating me for being reckless or silly?”

“ ↹◸⑆◴ ↝⌔↺↷”

“What’s that supposed to mean?! Wait...”

That slight lilting hint of course correction with a smug roll?

“You think they will be a positive influence on me?! I am a perfect lady of conduct regarding my bar excursions! I always strive to be honorable and dutiful”

“▁”

“Well I’m respectful and honorable to you!”

“▁”

“Okay fine, I’ll be nice to the locals, but only because they gave us a really good deal and because you asked. Not because the flatlanders are coming with”

“◢◎◣”

With that conversation settled into just the comfortable hum of relaxing and delighted Ship and silent contemplation of tender.

Pylo liked the simple peace of it all.

Nothing to focus on or deal with but slowly maneuvering herself either down each shaft to the root. Or when finished moving out to the tip of the next one. Which Tunie always dutifully furled out and extended for her.

Slowly working over each one individually and completely so that every break, crack or misaligned tine in the f’teropods was corrected and reforged anew.

It made the bustle and horror of the rest of the reef fall away and brought Pylo to a calm little center of just the two of them back home before all the trials and travels.

Her and Tunie having a moment that promised to stretch out a nice long while as she worked down the behemoth of a goof’s each individual feather.

This of course made it perfectly reasonable for Pylo to be annoyed that she was being pinged by the local administrative port authority ministry whatsits.

“Excuse me, I am in the process of giving my ship the proper care she deserves and requires after a transit... I’m sure it can wait”

She continued focusing on working her way down the tines in just the right manner that the destruction and restoration of the feathers did not cause any serious discontinuities.

The pinging however returned despite her incredibly polite response.

“...”

The pinging hitched onto a higher priority protocol and added an annoying distress lilt

“Fine... What is it? What is so important that you need my attention NOW?”

The message hummed and buzzed a moment before coming coherently in a stilted dialect of gene-scratch. The kind of thing that Siren children everywhere (okay so Pylo and a few of her sisters hardly counted as the entire species) lamented ever having been invented.

It was dry, it was cumbersome, it was bereft of nuance and horribly lossy. And honestly Pylo did not know under any reasonable situation that it would be useful when you can properly package a load of pollen spore for gun times the information density and hardly any decay.

It’s not like they were sending this message to her unknowably far in the future!

Still whatever, stupid locals always did this with her if they were familiar with sirens.

So she rumbled and gnawed viciously on the content of the message as she dragged the comb along the outer edge of a feather.

“passengers complication-stop-assigned guide reassignment for better needs satisfaction-stop-require authorization and confirmation of passenger safety-stop-investigative inquiry to well being and accommodations of passengers aboard transit and contract review cordially requested-stop”

Pylo tilted her head.

Then looked down at Tunie.

This could be bad.

“What precisely is the complication with my passengers? I entrusted their safety and well being to YOU specifically because you were so earnestly certain they would have their safety looked after. I was promised the best you could assign for that task and now you are investigating me? What did you DO too THEM?!”

There was a jolting up of the urgency and a hint of panic to the next transmission.

“Highest rated servicer at ministry was assigned-stop-servicer guide evaluated situation poor match, filed concern over contract executor, requested reassignment to best fulfill need-stop-passengers left in care of trusted expert affiliate-stop-replacement servicer dispatched-stop-replacement servicer arrived to passengers in dire need of emergency medical attention and civil safety services-stop-passengers still currently at large in spite of attempts by civil safety services and investigative efforts to isolate and contain them for medical attention-stop-cordial request review of safety accommodations and contract details-stop-desire to disprove internal minister hypothesis that passengers are viral weapon by parties hostile to redweed”

Pylo focused on finishing the work on restoring the current f’teropod down to the root before she de-activated the comb.

“Tunie deary, I’m going to need to interrupt the brushing for a little bit, the port appears to be having some problems with our passengers and I need to deal with it more directly then we can handle over simple message feeds. Is that alright? It’s really important and I promise to get back to you as soon as I can”

“↺! ↹”

“Yes I know Tunie, but this sounds really serious, don’t worry I’ll make sure they pay us back for the trouble. But Aleph, Omega and Quarti sounds like they could be hurt... or at least in trouble. I need to figure out what happened and get this resolved. Don’t panic or do anything rash I’m sure I can handle this”

“!”

“I’ll check in periodically while I’m working it out, if I say so or go silent or you can’t reach me you can start doing something bright and loud over this”

“▁”

“Tunie, I need you to promise you won’t get noisy and mean unless the locals actually try to pull something!”

“◢◎◣”

“Thank you, I’m upset with them too for interrupting the brushies but this is for our passengers and the contract, that’s important okay?”

“◢◎◣”

Pylo huffed and moved to put away the comb somewhere in Tunie’s holds (where she could find it again on short notice of course). Only then did she call to the incessantly pinging signals from the Redweed Ministry of external affairs.

“I hope you people appreciate the gravity of your failure to me and Tunie that I will be informing every trader I meet in detail how you proceed with this.”

“please confirm passengers-stop-not indirect munitions preceding attack-stop-please confirm passengers-stop-not opening salvo of pathogen attack-stop-documentation insufficient to explain degree of disturbance in locality of Petalweft Salts-stop-PLEASE cordially allow access to contract and local storage for review-”

Pylo had enough.

“I’m coming up to speak with someone who won’t drag this on in dry stonefucker language! And I will not surrender contract information or let you board Tunie when you seem to be acting in a manner that suggest you have taken my contracted passengers hostage and wish to lock down my ship so she cannot retaliate to this coercion and attack!”

She turned her attention to Tunie.

“Tunie, be a dear and relay the following to the current traffic of ships while I am going to meet with these idiots?”

“↺”

Pylo snickered herself at what she conveyed for relay.

“Attention incoming and outbound Trade vessels of Redweed, the local dock authorities are harassing me and making demands to board my ship. I am Pylo of House Courtesan and my ship is Tunie a Lesser Void Courier. Consider with your own discretion!”

That should terrify the locals enough to not do anything particularly rash.

Now, time to find out just what her stupid passengers had gotten themselves stuck in.

“I swear if this is some stupid misunderstanding I’m charging them a full round trip of grist store for interrupting brushie time”