Author's note; I have been abusing a website called fantasynamegenerators.com, which helped finish the last arc when I got bored of mix and matching names (Liû means Willow, btw and Yu Long is supposed to be jade dragon and Jie Long heroic dragon. Whether that works or not...) and I've lazily used it to inspire names, surnames and even ship names for this arc! So I thought I should plug it a little.

"Captain!"

The rugged looking man, glanced over at his first mate from where he sat in his office aboard his ship.  "Well, what's the verdict?" he asked, his voice was gravelly and deep.

"Song says that she was telling the truth!" 

The slashed leather trousers on his legs creaked slightly as he leant back in the chair.  He rubbed at the stubble upon his face.  "Well, I'll be damned."  He hadn't believed the little princess when she had given them that tidbit of information on top of the stack of credits she was willing to fork out for transport across the border.  Still, he wasn't gonna risk his crew on the teeny tiny chance she might be for real, so he had his second pilot, Song leave a drone to check things over when they had left the area.  "Have Song blow up the drone."

"Tch, she ain't gonna be happy," his first mate, Haig Tidus, also known as Sly mentioned. He was a wirey man and slightly bow legged, but more agile than his awkward form let on.

"She ain't gotta be happy," he growled, "she's just gotta do as she's told."

"Yeah, but you ain't the one that Sing is gonna piss on, cos his lil wife is throwing a fit!" The man grumbled as he went to follow his Captain's orders.

"Well fuck them and their marital bliss!" He retorted, before bringing up the hidden network for news. With a nod of satisfaction, he noticed that the rest of them got away as well.  No spoils for the Armada this time.  Stretching his long, thick limbs, he rose from his chair and walked the three steps it took to walk into his bridge.  The moment he revealed himself, the feisty red head had already bounced up from her control panel, ready to rage.

"What the fuck, Captain!" Song cried out, her husband, who happened to be his first pilot did nothing to calm her down. 

"Get over it Song," he advised, snappishly,  "it's the fucking Armada.  You really want them tracing us cos you refused to blow up a freaking drone?"

She huffed, before tapping out a few instructions which would signal the drone to self destruct.  Of course she understood, but it didn't mean she wouldn't let the universe know how unhappy she was with the decision.  Those drones were structured and programmed by herself, they were her babies!  She sank in the pilots chair and proceeded to sulk.  Captain Maerlon Sarvian chose to ignore her.

"Ah, I didn't get to meet up with Hershey from the Fortunes," Rylan Yao, his second mate complained suddenly.  Rylan was an odd one, he had the face of a fairy tale prince with the golden hair to boot. He also had a fondness for the colour green, not a colour often found inside a rust bucket of a ship like theirs, just held together by spit and thumb tacks. "That guy owes me 50 credits still."  Sing chuckled.

"We were all looking forward to a little down time, right, Captain?" Sing said, with a slightly proactive undertone. That wasn't his real name, of course, pirates seemed to traditionally refer to others by nicknames rather than birth ones.  After all, it was all to easy to be overheard in bars and clubs or just on the street, better to stay anonymous in this line of work.  It also had something to do with trust and comradely. Of course, there were always exceptions.  Their quartermaster, for example, call him anything but his name and he'd rip you a new one.

"I heard that the Wailing Widow was due to dock at the station," Rylan or as his shipmates knew him; Swab mentioned, latching onto the theme.

"Oh so that's why your so bitchy today, Captain," Song's freckled face sparkled in the artificial lights.  "You missed out on a chance to get into Captain Cheney's panties!"  The Captain sent her a harsh glare, but she continued to beam happily.

"Enough," he warned.  "The San Mahara will be incog for a while, so we'll have to use other bases.  In the meantime, set a course for the Imperial border.  We have a princess to deliver."

"Speaking of which," Sly said, suddenly, "shouldn't someone check in on her, I mean she was rather round... ready to pop, so to speak."  They all turned at the same time and offered him the same expectant smile.  He swore, then stomped off of the bridge.

*****

The Sabine was a pirate, it's Captain, Maerlon Sarvian, a bit of a bastard, who with his crew, pillaged transport and cargo ships, smuggled contraband and did whatever else he felt like with no regards to the military law within the Empire.  The only thing he didn't indulge in was probably slavery; very few Pirates did considering many of them had friends or ancestors who were former ones. His crew were loyal to him, having been picked up here and there from various planets and space stations, a few had been born pirates, like him, others fell into it after they had fallen out with officials or such like in the Empire.

They had been due to dock at the San Mahara, a unique moving station that set up shop where spatial traffic tended to be low for a short period of time, before 'raising anchor' and slip streaming to a new location.  It was not a legal and official station and most of the business tended to be black market or not strictly legit.  It was a good place to trade or switch cargo when smuggling.  It also served great taco's.

However, unusually enough, a young woman whose clothes labelled her from the start, had shown up and begged passage across the border.  This woman was clearly from some elite family and on top of that, very pregnant.  No one had wanted to deal with her, least of all the Captain of the Sabine, who was a little horny and looking to blow off some steam.  It was the Quartermaster who had found her and when he spoke, the Captain listened.  The woman had told him very clearly that she could pay generously for her passage, but they needed to leave soon as the military were on their way to apprehend all of the Pirates in this area.  Hall had instantly trusted her word and brought her to see his Captain.  Reluctantly, he had recalled his crew and stowed the princess aboard.  He had also sent word to the other ships in the area as well as the station. They heard him and would make their own decisions.  But a Pirate did not survive if he didn't have his wits about him.  They all slipped from the military's grasp.

Now they headed to the border for her.  They would have to cough up a few credits to the patrols, those bastards used Pirates for pocket money.  Still, it beat an all out fight where top of the line shields and weaponry were usually in enemy hands, not their own.

Sly was making his way to the cabin assigned to the princess, when he heard a loud and painful scream. A shiver of dread ran down his spine and he sped down the corridor, bypassing the cabin and heading towards the ladder that lead to the floor above. Scaling it quickly, he turned to stern and to the large space hidden behind electronic, sliding doors; the med bay. Sure enough, with just a few thrown up curtains to give patients privacy, Doc was there, telling his patient to push.

Less than thirty minutes later, there was a slight whimper and a few soft sobs as Doc announced; "congratulations, it's a healthy baby boy."

There were a few nicknames that were found in most ships, Captain or Cap, Doc and Cookie. Pirates respected their Captains, Doctors and Chefs more than any other crew member. The Sabine's Doc was especially respected, he'd actually graduated from the Imperial First Medical College. He was rumoured to have been born in wealth, but no one asked why he had become a Pirate. That was his own business. He was now fifty, but in an age where men and women lived to an average age of 275, he could still be considered young.

He assumed he would have to deliver a baby at least once in his career, there were women aboard the ship and one was half of a wedded couple, but he hadn't thought the first would be the child of a paying 'guest'. The baby in his arms was small, pasty white with rosy little cheeks. He had a tuft of silver-white hair upon his head, matching his mother and his yet to turn blue eyes were open and alert. Apart from his first whimper, he did not cry. "He has your colouring, ma'am," the doctor told her as he wrapped the child in a towel. He hadn't a stock of baby blankets after all.

The woman said nothing, just offered a soft, slightly saddened smile, before pain gripped her once more. The Doc thought nothing of it, he knew women had to pass the placenta after all. Noticing the First Mate standing there like a space whale caught in a ships bow lights, he handed the baby to him to hold, while he dealt with the mother. The man looked shocked, freezing up like a statue, but was careful not to drop the little bundle. He only felt the blood return to his fingers when the woman let out another loud cry.

The Doctor frowned. He didn't recall reading that passing afterbirth would cause the patient this sort of pain. Of course, these days medical technology was such that midwives had medication to ensure it could be removed with ease. In the best and most expensive hospitals, laser technology could remove it cleanly from the womb with no scarring. But he did not have such resources to hand, having not expected to be delivering babies so soon.

When he saw a little white head crown, he realised his mistake. This woman had actually carried twins! Such things were unheard of! Giving birth was considered stressful enough on a woman's body, so second foetus's were generally aborted early... unless... apart from screaming at the top of his small lungs, the small baby was the perfect image of his older brother. Doc swallowed. Identical twins. Not good.

"Ma'am, you have twin sons," he whispered. She nodded, tears trickling down her pale face. She hadn't expected to give birth almost a month before her due date, but she had known the risks. She had planned to have the boys on a planet across the border and to just return home with one, but... suddenly drowsy, her eyes closed as the Doc carefully wrapped her second son in a towel and hushed the screaming boy, rocking him gently. A short while later, the man came to realise that the woman was not going to open them again. He tried his hardest to save her, but...

****

Oh! He was a baby again! He didn't like being a baby; it was boring and there was no bladder nor bowel control meaning he'd have to lie in his own waste until someone realised there was a problem. That and mealtime was monotonous. He gave a slight yawn, he hoped that there would at least be decent nappies this time instead of cloths that did nothing but leak.

The screaming disrupted his musings. He tried to frown, but he didn't have that much control over his tiny face yet. It seemed that he was a brother again, a twin and the other baby was younger by a few minutes, but the little brat wouldn't stop crying.

Don't like this! This is weird! Master? Why did you do this to Yang?

Aidan was suddenly alert. What the hell! Yang?!