Once the Second indicated that she could take her helmet off, Oela pressed the release at the base of the helmet and pulled it off, tucking it beneath her arm. She was average for her kind, with a short shock of dark hair shaved to the scalp on either side, skin of a true black shade and patterns of deep blue striping. Eyes were narrow and tilted at the corners, the same shade of blue as her stripes and with no discernible iris or pupil. Her features were angled, hard, and thin, and lacking any of the common traits that would help to estimate age.
She stared at the Second for a moment, then keyed a code into the apparatus on her wrist, powering down her suit manually before it could scream another warning at her. From there, her gaze drifted to the hologram currently on display. She could make out the symbol for the ship easily enough, and she suspected that the deltas may represent her crew—only two of them out of the four. She couldn’t make sense of what it was saying to her, but her brow furrowed and she leaned forward a touch when the ship began moving towards the deltas in question.
When the second pointed at the screen, Oela started and directed her attention at it, mouth thinning slightly as she pieced together the images. It was straightforward; speech bubbles translating from one language to another. Did it want her to speak? Frowning, Oela gave it a short nod.
“I am Oela, Captain of Kashka’s Pride. We are…were a trading vessel based out of Taanwi, of the Gaeiki star system,” she murmured. To one who was unfamiliar with her native tongue, the language was harsh and blunt to the ears, almost painful in the sharpness of its consonants intermingled with its rambling vowels. “We were overtaken by thieves approximately twenty hours ago. They initially planned to just steal our cargo, but their leader decided he wanted our ship as well. He put my crew and me through the airlock and left us to die.”
She paused then, looking between the stellar map and the other hologram it had used to indicate translation. It was uncomfortable, talking about what had happened. As Captain, her cargo, ship, and the lives of her crew had been dependent on her abilities and skills. There was no greater failure than losing all three.
Oela was not accustomed to failure. In all the lifetimes she had lived so far, never had it been so complete.
“I am grateful for the rescue. It was…unexpected,” she added, eying the translation hologram for a moment before she returned her attention to the stellar map. Her posture was stiff and her features tight while she watched. She was not a talkative person on her best day, and today was as far from her best as one could get. “Shall I continue speaking, or has your translation program caught up?”