An orphan roamed the streets of Charleston. Carrying a meager pack with his worldly belongings on his back, Sam Jones had had enough. He was 10 years old now, his expiration date had arrived. Chances of adoption drop by 90% once a child hits 10 years of age. He knew he would never find a family now. So he had struck out on his own, to find his fortune.

He had stopped in a park to rest, he had been walking for a while now. Taking a moment to sit on a park bench, he looked up at the stars. Sam had always been fascinated by space. Space was infinite, after all. Maybe there was a family out there for him. He saw a falling star and made a wish; ‘send me a family.’

The moving point of light grew brighter and bigger, and he realized with a start that it was coming towards him. Slack jawed, he watched as the object, a living mass the size of a small Winnebago, crashed into the woods bare yards away.

Fear warred with curiosity in his mind. Should he investigate, or should he run. It was the singing that decided him.

It was beautiful! A haunting paean of sadness, loss and pain. A wordless song of loneliness and separation, a call for companionship that spoke to Sam on the deepest emotional levels.

An orphan fell through the cold blackness of space.

Starlight was despondent. She had witnessed the pods slaughter first hand, the carnage and the painsongs as the Great Matriarchs were violently sent into the next life. In a panic, she had made her maiden Leap, her inexperience dumping her out too close to the gravity well if a strange planet. As she smacked into the ground, tearing a furrow into the topsoil, she allowed herself to fall into despair. She poured out her emotions in the only way she knew how, the plaintive weeping of a child for its mother.

She froze in fear, however, as her sensors registered a life form in her close proximity. ‘So this is how it ends? I escape the Tormentors only to be eaten on this alien world?’ She wept even louder with the unfairness of it all. But then, she felt the contact on her hull.

It was soft, gentle. Comforting. She reached out with the psionic comms net that her species used to communicate with passengers, and what she found when she brushed the creatures mind surprised her; sadness, concern, pity. A question bubbles forth from the mind of this being, a wordless inquiry, as they had no words in common. How can I help you? What can I do?

As Sam continued to stroke the skin of this creature, this beautiful starchild, he could feel her, as he now knew she was female, softly touching his mind, learning him as he learned her. She was beautifully fragile, a smooth lozenge shaped creature, all smooth lines and sleek curves, an organic cluster of pods at the aft end. She was a gentle red color, with a green stripe on the dorsal surface. She was small and vulnerable.

He could feel them trading each other, and in the process, forming a deep and lasting connection. He felt her pain, her injuries were pretty bad. Without knowing the words, he asked her how he could help. The response was unmistakable. ‘Touch me. Comfort me.’

An opening quivered into being on the side of this creatures hull, and he went inside. As he watched, she formed her internal structures to match what she read from his mind, a cockpit with wide viewing ports, a cabin with a soft sleeping platform and spartan hygienic facilities, a cargo hold, currently empty. Taking a seat at what could only be the captain’s chair, Sam began stroking the arms of the chair, trying to offer comfort where he could. He jumped as a mass of tendrils caressed his skin, tracing the unseen lines of his nervous system.

As Starlight began the First Interface with her chosen captain, she began taking biological readings, as Starchildren had done since they first took a passenger. What she found astonished her. This species was fundamentally different from any she had encountered before. Their high protein diet gave them boundless energy, their biological and mental processes were surprisingly efficient. This was a race of predators, their minds specifically geared towards the complex decision making processes of stalking and taking prey. A set of processes that was uniquely suited towards administrating her various systems.

She asked, and was granted, a deeper access to this ‘sam’s’ mind. The result was an interface far deeper and more solid than any her species had ever recorded. She began to feel healed as Sam eagerly shared his life energy with her, repairing her damaged systems. The two lone souls communed like this through the night, and when the morning sun rose through the trees, they were no longer two orphans. They were a partnership.