As the tension has thickened, the bird's been glancing back and forth between Gaeta and Hoshi with mounting worry, making more tiny, rapid plocks as if to say oh no oh no oh no. This other person, apparently, is Not A Friend of its Nestmate after all. What is it gonna do?

What Gaeta's going to do, meanwhile, is seize his crutches, jab them at the floor, and haul himself off the bed. "You are honest to gods," he says, "comparing me to somebody who frakking murdered and tortured people on her ship.