The Captain had a plan.
Many wished for a villaging of humans to take residence upon their vessels. Few succeeded. She, however, had an advantage that her seniors lacked, and was determined to make no mistakes now that she finally had a ship of her own. She was, after all, of the first generation to be born on a vessel containing humans.
In the Captain’s youth–when she was yet small enough to be carried about in a human’s hand–she had spent as much of her time as she could in the human habitat. She had observed the villaging, and in turn been observed and even befriended. She had even been gifted a human name, Riki, and carried it close and treasured.
Captain Riki outfitted her ship very carefully. The dedicated human habitat was lavishly appointed, with optimal lighting and temperature fluctuations and a multitude of private individual nooks for familial units, as well as expansive shared spaces which could be decorated in any number of ways. The nooks were supplied with plentiful clean water and human-crafted ‘basic amenities’ that the humans could very easily change out for things they liked better on their own.
This, of course, was not much different from what trail and error had discovered to be good ways to entice humans to both take up residence and choose to remain in residence. (To try and keep a villaging of humans who wished instead to leave was to tempt fate. In the best case, they were astonishingly adept at escape. In the worst… well. It was learned that the most terrifying words in the human tongue were ‘you’re going down with me’.)
No, the human habitat was only the first step of Captain Riki’s plan. The second step was to outfit her ship with long mesh tubes traveling through all the major thoroughfares and into all the areas of the ship–creating safe passageways for the humans to explore all of it, and set with doors that they might easily open and close on their own. They were fantastically curious creatures, humans, and she wanted to offer them security as they inevitably explored. If they felt that they were a part of the ship, true members of the crew and welcome everywhere, the villaging was more likely to remain loyal.
Captain Riki set the stage, and made her preparations. The final part was the riskiest. Hers was a long-haul cargo vessel, and as she transported goods from sector to sector, she kept a channel tuned for emergency broadcasts. It was not so long, compared to how long she had taken to put her plan together, until she heard a call for help that she was close enough to answer. Captain Riki logged her change of flight plan, informed her buyers that she would be delayed, and contacted the source of the call to volunteer her vessel.
Her ship landed on the surface of a planet that was wrecked–pitted and pockmarked, smoke in the air. By far the most expensive custom alteration to her ship were shield-generators capable of withstanding even orbital bombardment, and Captain Riki raised them in a glowing arc above her ship and extending out to the damaged building she’d been told to land at. Over the external speakers she projected her message in synthesized voice that was made to sound warm and welcoming to their ears:
“This is Captain Riki of the cargo ship Obsidian-Gold 779, offering refugee transport to the Azuli system, Helios X, and Viridian Central Station.”
Even as she spoke, the humans were organizing an exodus to her ship. The great bay doors were thrown wide to welcome them, and Captain Riki flowed down the largest artery of the ship and then also in an arc over the ceiling of the landing bay. As the tiny humans scurried in below her–in their family or friend groups, with their injured carried in and tended by their medics–Captain Riki flexed her chromatophors to send slow waves of iridescent gold and inky black flowing down her body. A few of the little ones, the children, stopped and stared, pointed, smiled or laughed with faces that had only just before been frightened and grim.
Captain Riki painted new patterns across herself, flowers and starbursts and wiggles, to delight them. She could even make a simple approximation of a smiley face, and make it wink one eye. It had been a favorite of the friends of her youth, and these new children were no less entertained.
“Be welcome aboard my ship,” she said, in her synthesized voice. “Please let me know if there is anything more I can supply for your comfort.”
Soon, Captain Riki had a habitat full of humans, and returned to the black and her cargo run. They were not permanent, these humans, or at least, not all of them were. Most would be disembarking along the way, but she had set their habitat and her ship up so carefully that she hoped a few of them would remain on. A few here, and a few there, and over the course of perhaps a few dozen refugee transport missions, she hoped to have gathered enough of them to have a stable villaging of humans for her ship.
The Captain had a plan. It was not a quick or an easy plan, but she was certain of her eventual success.
