Doctor Belq sighed as she looked in the makeshift mirror in her shabby quarters. She was no longer the fetching young Hunzk she was not that terribly long ago.

Then again, she should be grateful. She was still alive, one of only a handful of Hunzk still remaining.

She tried to tidy herself up as much as she could, running her feather comb, one of her few remaining possessions, through her tail.

She let out a sad whistle sigh as she looked at the magnificent white and gold peacock-like fan behind her, the unmistakable sign of “royalty”.

It had started appearing a few months after the disaster, when she reluctantly became the leader of the Hunzk people, such as they were.

Somehow, her body knew she was “queen”. She had absolutely no idea how.

She fluttered the shimmering crest weakly. She hated the thing. In another life, it would have made her special, beautiful, and quite wealthy. Now, it was a constant reminder that the fate of her entire species rested in her weak little tendrils.

Still, she fastidiously groomed it. It was a symbol, one that her people took as a good omen, a sign that while her people had to abandon the great heap, it had not abandoned them.

Besides, her husband, Captain Vexp, thought it was beautiful.

She looked down at a small swelling near her feathers and whistled a sad little sigh.

Oh, how she wished that it was his. How she wished that she could be with him instead of stuck in this ramshackle “colony” nothing more than a glorified broodmare, bearing another’s child.

Still, they were alive, and with careful breeding, their numbers were sufficient to be genetically viable... barely.

The Hunzk weren’t extinct just yet, even if it meant that they had to breed themselves like livestock, maximizing diversity. With enough crossbreeding and careful testing, they could just manage to preserve enough diversity and hopefully catch any defects before they were brought to term.

Crossbreeding…

She shuddred. The Hunzk mated for life. Of all the privations they had suffered and all of the concessions and compromises they had to make in order to survive, this was the most painful. Watching her love, her mate, go into another’s nest while trying to welcome the reluctant advances of the husband of another…

…coupling like animals with your eyes squeezed tightly shut because you couldn’t even bear to look at what you were doing.

Statistics replacing love, necessity replacing loyalty…

…and the keeper of those statistics and the creator of the schedule was none other than her.

She opened her laptop and pulled up the charts.

Young Slafpt was coming of age… biologically. She could now safely carry a child to term.

Hating herself, she pulled up Slafpt’s genetic profile. Fortunately, Slafpt was eager to “help save the species,” but she was far too young. Well, in another life, she was far too young. Now, she was an empty womb that shouldn’t be empty.

She also had not bonded with a male and certainly would with her first partner. Belq had decided that she would not rush Slafpt. If she delayed her first child by even a year or two, it didn’t matter in the grand scheme of things.

If anything, they had just about all the children they could handle as it was. Almost half of their number were children when they managed their escape from the wrath of the Belzzor.

Fortunately, most of them were unaccompanied, each one a valuable sample of their genetic code and a much-needed source of diversity.

She looked at the data once more. She really didn’t have to. She knew it all by heart. Praise the heap for slender threads. They had no serious genetic conditions and, from what she could tell, very few known harmful recessive traits. Oh, they were there, hidden away, but at least there were no serious genetic conditions among their tiny number. If she and those who came after her, did their job properly, it could be generations before they appeared.

She silently prayed that it wouldn’t happen until after her death. Hard decisions would have to be made, ones that she desperately hoped she wouldn’t have to make.

She started grooming her feathers again and tried to dispel the melancholy that was now as firmly attached to her soul as those royal feathers were to her ass. Today was the day. Today she would fire up their dangerously run-down hyperspace transmitter for long enough to actually see and speak with their ship and her mate, her real one.

Her tail perked up at the thought. Apparently, things were going quite well on this excursion. Her son, Beep, had taken quite the risk by acquiring two humans of all things. When he bought them, she had no real idea what they were save for some truly stupefying test results and the entirely too-good-to-be-real benefits they had brought their pitiful little band already.

Her round mouth constricted into a pinpoint of worry. When a routine email revealed their astonishing proficiency, she had risked firing up the transmitter to do a little research on their race.

What she found was… concerning.

She couldn’t deny feeling a kinship with the strange beings. They had suffered the same fate as her race, though to a lesser extent. She also took heart in the fact that they managed to not only survive but thrive in this hellish universe.

However, for every positive, there were far more negatives. Their Armageddon came not at the hands of another. They did it to themselves. They fell upon each other with a savagery every bit as great as the wrath of the Belzzor.

In some ways, they were worse. The Belzzor “just” destroyed. The humans indulged in practices that even the Belzzor horde would decry as monstrous. Not the least of these was outright cannibalism…

…not that she could condemn them for that, one more painful concession and a dark secret known only to a bare few of her band, one that she would carry to her grave.

However, there was a big difference. What they did was out of grim necessity in those first dark days and only to those who had already departed. The humans hunted each other.

And that wasn’t the only thing she had found out about their “miracle workers”, either.

The words “humanity” and “violence” were as tightly bound as a Hunzk and its feathers, and humans were every bit as proud of it.

Her humans claimed that it was all an over-exaggeration, and their overblown reputation (for all things) was the result of outliers, that the bulk of their population was every bit as peaceful and harmless as she was.

However, she and her husband were less than convinced. Not only were humans intimidatingly strong and fast, but there had also been... incidents. Now, the humans always had perfect alibis, and they were never officially a suspect for anything...

Of course, any suspicions she had were definitively confirmed by the arrival of humanity’s “ambassadors” to the [email protected]’an.

Again, her humans insisted that this was, yet again, a “small” group of outliers that were sent as shock troops to bring an end to the victimization of humans in what they colorfully called “The Asscrack”.

Her investigations seemed to corroborate this…

…but there were starting to be a whole lot of “outliers”.

She wished they could simply eject the pair of them and be done with it, but their ship was on the verge of complete breakdown, and they were on the brink of bankruptcy.

The humans Alan and Grace were bringing an end to both fates. The only thing that rivaled their engineering expertise was their affinity for trade. They had vastly increased the profit of this single trip alone and, more importantly, ensured her beloved’s safe return.

Unfortunately, they had also taken over the ship. The other workers now deferred to them and followed their orders, not the captain’s, and even her husband was slowly ceding more and more authority to them.

One couldn’t argue with the results, but she was not thrilled at being “taken over” by the humans.

Yes, there were only two of them, but that was today. What if they decided to bring in more of their kind?

Would they be able to stop them if they did? Even if her humans were as harmless as they claimed, there were plenty of their kind who weren’t. They could be overrun and subjugated from within, and that could very well doom their entire species.

Were they just trading one fate for another?

However, her husband, son, and her fellow Hunzk on board that vessel trusted them, and she should trust her people.

Then again, it was her job to mistrust, find fault… to be the coarse bristle. There was too much at stake for even a single error in judgment. But what was the error? If she drove off the humans and they were what they claimed to be, she would throw away the single biggest and maybe the only chance they had.

Then again, if the humans weren’t what they claimed and they actually did have ill intent, she could be dooming her kind by allowing her people to trust them.

She whistled with frustration.

Why didn’t they have a real leader? Why wasn’t someone more capable standing beside her (or even in her place) when the fires of hell claimed her people?

Why didn’t someone else grow the fucking feathers?

***

“Oooh, Cap!” Grace exclaimed as she sauntered onto the bridge. “What you all lubed up for?”

“What do you mean?” the captain asked a bit defensively, “I just applied a little skin lotion. Well, okay, it was a little oil from the galley.”

“A little?” Grace laughed. “You look like my mom’s dildo.”

“I am certain that I don’t,” the captain replied, “And I’m even more certain that I don’t want to know what that is.”

“You are correct about that,” Alan said as he walked in.

“So, what’s the special occasion?” Grace asked.

“He has a video call with my mom!” Beep fluted as he wiggled in alongside Alan. “He wants to look pretty for her!”

“There is nothing wrong with wanting to be presentable every now and then,” the captain said defensively as his tail twitched with annoyance. “Do you two have anything to add to my status report?”

“We completed construction of the environmental armor this morning,” Alan said. “We should be able to restart work on the secondary cooling loop this afternoon.”

“We were also able to get those tubing runs fabbed up at that last stop,” Grace replied. “And we got actual rebuild kits for the valves as well. And, yes, we did have to pay that much for them. You don’t want to fuck around with your cooling loops, dude.”

The captain made an unhappy little whistle.

“Hey, the profits we made from that last deal should cover it,” Grace shrugged, “mostly…”

“For every credit you make us,” the captain grumbled, “you spend two more.”

“Credits that you should have spent a while ago,” Alan replied. “You’re lucky it’s only this bad. You’re also lucky that we’re working for free.”

“You’re getting paid,” the captain tooted.

“Whatever you say, man,” Grace snorted. “Hey, don’t forget to talk to the boss about that equipment I was telling you about.”

“The equipment that we can’t pay for?”

“The equipment that will pay for itself in about a week.”

“By week,” Alan added, “she means a year, but it is a good investment.”

“Year? We’ll make a mint!”

“We should make a mint, darling,” Alan replied, “But even I have to say your proposal is a tad excessive.”

“That’s if you look at it all at once! We can just start with some of it and add as we go!”

“Even the some of it is far too expensive!” the captain whistled. “We have to repair the ship, supply the colony, pay and feed the workers, and still meet all of our other expenses.”

“At least talk to her, alright?” Grace implored, “Dude, we can actually turn this bin-picking operation into a real business. Have you seen the current rates? Dude! We can make bank!”

“At least discuss replacing our waste storage and disposal equipment,” Alan said. “Venting all our shit into space is just… wrong. We are wasting all of that organic material and water.”

“That part makes the least sense of it all,” the captain replied, “Water is cheap.”

“And organics aren’t,” Grace said forcefully, “Besides, you don’t waste water. It’s wrong!”

Grace’s face darkened, and she crossed her arms.

“…wrong…”

“Captain,” Alan said tactfully, “this ship was never designed for extended occupation. A proper waste treatment and reclamation system is essential, and we haven’t even started to discuss your life support.”

“We have a problem with life support?!?” the captain shrieked.

“It is functional with sufficient redundancy,” Alan replied, “but we aren’t fully self-contained. We need a fully enclosed system that does not require periodic replenishment. It’s a liability that could really come back to bite us in the ass, hard. We need this ship to be able to remain in space indefinitely with fuel being our only concern.”

“How is that even possible? We need food, water… air…”

“And that is our point!” Grace exclaimed. “We need to be able to produce all of that and more! Food can be a pain in the ass, but water and air? Dude! If we get caught out in space or have to make a real long haul, we are in trouble!”

“I fail to see why we would ever need to do that,” the captain replied.

“We failed to see Yellowstone,” Alan said grimly, “Shit happens, and when it does, it is too late. Any vessel should be able to perform extended operations, especially one in your position.”

“What do you mean, ‘our position’?”

Alan looked over at Beep.

“Perhaps we should have this conversation later, Captain.”

***

“They want to do what?” Belq asked.

“They want to turn this ship into a factory ship,” Captain Vexp replied. “Actually, they want to turn it into what they call a ‘homestead vessel’. They claim that they can make this our colony.”

“Oh, that’s way too dangerous!”

“That’s what I told them, but they said that it was more dangerous having us all spread out like we are. I would dismiss the whole idea as yet more of their madness, but their madness has been disturbingly accurate thus far… And it would be nice to be able to spend time with you…”

“It would simplify the ‘schedule’…” Belq mused.

“The big issue is the expense,” Vexp said, “We are bleeding credits everywhere. Yes, we are earning more thanks to them, but every other word out of their mouths has a credit sign next to it.”

Belq let out a thoughtful whistle.

“We need your ship in as good condition as we can manage,” she said, “That’s a given… About this ‘factory’…”

She paused.

“I’m not an engineer, and neither is anyone else here. What do you make of their actual plans?”

“It’s some weird anachronistic madness with tech more advanced than I’m used to thrown in the mix. It looks like a product of the void that they worship, but they claim that it will work. Well, Grace claims it will work. Alan says that if Grace says it will work, it will work. They also claim that the Ughterrans make a lot of money with the same equipment.”

“The Ughterrans?”

“Beep says that they are the same species but that they are from a separate population, and that they hate each other.”

Belq paused.

“Darling,” she said, “What do you think of the humans, really think of them?”

“They are a puzzle, to be sure,” Vexp said thoughtfully, “Of all the beings we have met out here, I think they may be the most alien… I… I think that the best way to describe the human race is that they are ‘tame’ but not ‘domesticated’. I can’t help but feel that I have a pair of feral beasts on board, dangerous ones. That being said, they have been nothing but reasonable, kind, and helpful since their arrival. In fact, they have undertaken tasks that are so difficult and outright dangerous that I would never think to ask them to attempt. If anything, I have to hold them back… As odd as it sounds, I think they are a lot like us in a way.”

“Whatever do you mean?”

“They don’t have a home. From what I understand, they have been completely disavowed by their own kind, lost all of their possessions, and have nowhere else to go. They want to make their new home with us… I trust them… mostly…”

He laughed a flute-like laugh.

“I am not sure if I completely trust them,” he snickered, “but I am sure that we absolutely need them. It’s not just their technical expertise. They don’t just know how ships work. They know how the galaxy works. As frightening as their species is, I honestly think we have a chance with them on board.”

“Puelq is a sociologist,” Belq said, “and I’ve had her look into the humans. Vexp, they're dangerous. Are you certain that we need them?”

“The only thing I am more sure of is my love for you. We need them, Belq. They are strange, and I’m fairly sure they are killers, but… we need them. Even with all of the extra expenses, we have one heap of a shipment for you guys. Food, good food, medical supplies, repair parts… things we wouldn’t have had a hope of getting in a dozen runs… Heap, Belq, they’ve saved us.”

“I know,” Belq replied, “but what are they saving us for?”

***

Seenit! You know why you are here. We know why you are here… pervert.

Group: Muckmunchers

Post: Getting Started

User: （ω・*）ノﾐo­_GarbageGal­_（ω・*）ノﾐo

Hello all!

I’m interested in getting started in the waste processing and recycling game! I have a small gang and a small budget and will have to make a lot of our equipment from scratch. I was wondering if you guys had any recommendations for a small outfit just getting started. In particular, I am interested in processing retail consumer e-waste as well as setting up a municipal mixed solid waste sorting line.

I have around twenty guys, and we aren’t above manual sorting, at least at first.

If you guys have any equipment recommendations (or schematics lying around 😉), I would love it.

I have a solid technical background. It’s mostly ship engineering and chemical engineering based, though.

I also don’t have any welding skills, nor does any of my gang. Hopefully, that will change, but right now, our welding and fabrication skills aren’t all that great. Something that can be printed and bolted would be ideal!

You are the masters of trash! Help a girl out!

Thanks!

Edit: Thanks for the job offers, but I really want to stay independent at the moment. I am just hunting for info ATM.

User: DiggyMomma

Well, shit, if you want to get started, just come over to the Republic of California. We are elbow-deep in El Sobrante, and it’s some premium shit. I could put you to work tomorrow, and if you want to learn the business and aren’t afraid of real overtime, we can make that happen. I had an apprentice pull a midnight run on me last week. DM me.

User: VladTheRecycler (㇏(•̀ᵥᵥ•́)ノ)

Get your ass up here to Moscow! We are doing a major excavation, processing, and remediation project! We just hit a rich seam of PCB’s$$$!!! You have chemical experience? Bring it, （ω・*）ノﾐo­_GarbageGal­_（ω・*）ノﾐo. Not only is a lot of our equipment custom-built in-house (so we have all the drawings), but there is an excellent welding school nearby. If you aren’t afraid of a little hazmat and want some serious cash, DM me your resume.

User: RedDrtDrtDude

Hey, want a consortium gig? If you want to play with garbage and want some of that sweet dome life, shoot me a DM. We are doing a deep salvage of some old tunnels! Hands-on experience and Martian residency!

User: Zeus-Industries-Facilities-Division

We’re hiring. Hit up our web portal.

User: TrashPanda!!!

We are a small outfit working a claim just outside of old NYC. We’ve found a deposit of twentieth-century waste, and it’s premium materials. You and your guys can come, especially if you are cool with manual sorting. You’ll learn a lot more from us than some of those bigger outfits, and we are a lot more fun (and generous with your cut).

User: DiggyMomma

> Edit: Thanks for the job offers, but I really want to stay independent at the moment. I am just hunting for info ATM.

Hmm… Want to stay independent or have to?

Fucking Zeus is hiring. Hell, I’m halfway thinking of jumping ship, and I’m the owner! And a Martian Consortium team rolled out the red carpet? Lurkers probably already buried his ass in resumes, and you aren’t interested?

What’s your deal?

User: Everythingsanail

Yeah, where are you, exactly?

User: Stanky

What are you? Every Terran I know in this business apprentices with an established firm before they just go out on their own. It’s how you learn the trade. In fact, you would be hard-pressed to get a license and a claim without the industry-specific knowledge you can’t get any other way… At least you can’t in the Republic.

That doesn’t mean I won’t help you, but I do want to know exactly what I’m helping.

User: PalgLover

I know what she is. She used underscores in the username for her brand-new account. She also calls herself a “gal” in the way that she does.

She’s a porkie. Go away.

User: DiggyMomma

They use underscores a lot? And a lot of women aren’t afraid to say that they are, you know.

You don’t call someone a porkie over here unless you know they are, dude. It’s a good way to get stabbed.

User: PalgLover

I’m telling ya, she’s a porkie. Those underscores are a big tell. I worked for those assholes on Zaran. That, plus the “gal”, not “woman”, not “momma’, not “babe”… gal… is telling.

Add that to the fact that she isn’t already apprenticing means she’s not in the Republic and used “gang” instead of “crew”?

If it isn’t a porkie, it’s a Fed who learned their “Terran” from one.

User: （ω・*）ノﾐo­_GarbageGal­_（ω・*）ノﾐo

I can’t believe I actually used the word gang, LOL. I really should have gotten some sleep before I wrote this.

Okay, busted. I’m a porkie… sorta…

And, yeah, I’m not in the fucking Republic. I’m waaaay out here in the Asscrack if you must know. My “gang”? They aren’t porkies. They are a bunch of guys who are so down on their luck that they took in two porkies, for fuck’s sake, two disavowed porkies. So, technically we aren’t porkies anymore.

We’re what the porkies consider too bad to be porkies. I’m kinda proud of that, BTW. Do you have any idea what you have to do to get kicked out? :D

Look, we are all so deep in the shit that I’m asking Terrans for help. These guys don’t have a goddamn thing except for one ship that is falling apart and just enough money to buy scrap and garbage. They can’t even haul cargo because their ship is so bad, completely unarmed, and they don’t have any protection or backup. Nobody is going to trust them with a cargo.

And when I say “down on their luck”, I fucking mean it! Compared to what these poor assholes have been through, Yellowstone was a fucking picnic…

…and all they have between them and the void itself is me and my man…

So, yeah, I’m a porkie. But I’m not doing this for me. If it was just my husband and me, we’d boost a ship that isn’t one fault away from blowing up and jet. I’m doing this for them. Look… They are actually good people. I’m not kidding. They are… good. In this fucked up universe, they are actually kind, decent, good people, even after everything that has happened to them.

I don’t know if it’s a good thing or a bad thing that they’ve taken us in, but it is a thing, and I’m not letting them down. I’ll do anything to help these guys… including begging fucking Terrans for help.

So, please, help. I’m not asking for money. I just want a lead on some basic tech so I can maybe turn a little “gang” of guys picking through other people’s rubbish into people who can actually feed their kids.

I can’t go into more details here, but these guys are fucked. I just found out that they are it. They are the last of their kind… possibly anywhere. I can’t let them die out. You don’t understand. They’re good.

I’m not good. I’m not even close. When I say I was a porkie, I mean I was a real porkie, the kind of porkie that gets disavowed by their family porkie. I’m not old, but I’ve already done enough to deserve whatever happens to me.

These guys… They don’t deserve what’s happened to them, and they don’t deserve to die out. They are so kind that they didn’t run us off after they found out what we really were.

Pardon the pun, but “The Terrans are at the airlock,” and these guys don’t have a prayer without my husband and me. Help me. I have to get good at what you do, and I have to do it now.

Help me, please.

User DiggyMomma:

Go to hell. I hope you watch them die in front of you, exactly like I watched my brother die, porkie.

User PeaceAndLoveHappyDude:

Suck Vacuum, Porkie.

User PalgLover:

See ya, don’t want to be ya.

User: RedDrtDrtDude:

Upon further consideration, we withdraw our offer of employment.

Regards.

DiggyMomma:

Dude!

You didn’t have to “regards” the bitch. That was just mean. :D

***

That evening, Grace walked into her cabin and flopped onto her bed.

“So?” Alan smirked. “How did it go?”

“Exactly as I suspected,” Grace replied, “Hours of abuse…”

She then pulled out a data crystal and grinned.

“And a couple of contacts who weren’t complete assholes. Printable hammer mills, modular conveyor systems, metal exclusion and sorting tech, control systems, scanner programs… the works… and a couple of emails where I can send questions.”

“So, your first waste sorting job went well, then.” Alan smiled.

“There are some really decent souls over there,” Grace said.

“…I’m really happy we didn’t eat all of them.”