Date Point: 4y 9m 1w 2d AV
Starship Sanctuary, deep space
Julian Etsicitty.
“It’s kicking harder than I thought it would.”
“How much harder?”
“Well, like…this gun’s kicking about as much as the kind you see in a movie, but the bullets are tiny.”
“Yep. Basic rule, Etsicitty. You don’t learn anything about guns from Hollywood.”
Sanctuary was a yacht, not built for transport capacity, so its cargo rooms were long and narrow afterthoughts tucked away in an unused structural space on either side of the power core’s equator. Aside from the slight curve, they were about perfect for use as a shooting range, and Allison had found a micrometeoroid protection foam that doubled perfectly as a bullet catcher, which she had sprayed all over the back wall. After that, the nanofactory had made it trivial to construct some targets.
“Okay, so you’ve got a feel for it.” she said, and stepped up to him, just a little bit too close for innocence, aiming her left foot downrange and miming the gun he was holding. “So just aim a little bit lower, and remember you want to squeeze the trigger…
+That’s not the only thing I want to squeeze…focus!+
He slowed his breathing a little and directed his attention to the weapon. This was no different than mastering throwing his hatchet had been, all he needed was repetition.
Aim a little lower….squeeze on the exhale.
“Woah.”
“See?”
“I hardly felt it that time.”
She stepped around him and this time there was contact as she indicated what he had done right. “You didn’t jerk the trigger, so the gun didn’t fly up like this, so the recoil didn’t make it worse. You see?”
He saw, and flexed his grip on the gun. He also saw the way her eyes flicked to the movement of the muscles in his arm. Then they flicked up and they made eye contact.
By some effort of will he held her gaze, and this time…this time, she was the one who finally broke eye contact and looked away, clearing her throat and pulse raised.
+< em>Jesus. Lewis is right.+
She took the gun off him, gently. “So, uh…watch me.”
Stance. Aim. Fire. Fire. Fire. Click.
She ejected the magazine, checked the gun was safe and set it down on the bench before pressing the button to recall the target.
Their paper Hunter had a trio of holes inside the ten-point circle of its razor-toothed mouth that Julian could have fit his thumb over.
“Show-off.” He said.
She smiled over her shoulder at him, confidence restored. “Jealous, Etsicitty?”
“Yeah.”
“Eh. With practice you might be half as good as me.” She teased, putting the gun back in its box.
“I wasn’t talking about the gun.”
She turned, and he was astonished to find that his own feet had carried him up behind her, so that when she did so their belt buckles were practically touching. She put her hands behind her, bracing herself on the table.
“That smooth son of a bitch upstairs?” She asked.
“Please. Like he’s half the man I am.”
She tried to laugh it off. “Ego, Etsicitty?”
“Planet Nightmare. Six years. Figure I’ve earned it.” He leaned just a little closer, watching her lips part and her skin flush. “Problem is, that planet doesn’t teach you how to be real with somebody.”
She swallowed a little. “Being real, huh?”
“Yeah.”
“H-how real do you want?”
+Fucking tell her you stupid son of a bitch!+
“How…” he cleared his throat. “How real have you got?”
+Good job, man. Way to wuss out.+
She blinked at him.
Then she kissed him.
+…!+
Sheer surprise almost stopped him from kissing back. Almost. Instinct saved him, driving him forward to meet her with a back-of-the-throat noise of delight that came out of nowhere, sending his arms around her waist. She gripped his hair with one hand while the other splayed on his chest over his heart, then moaned softly as he put a hand on her ass and pulled her hips towards his own.
Her own hand went straight down the line of his torso and pressed against the front of his jeans, gripping lightly and lingering there for just a second, before she broke the kiss and recoiled as if his dick had burned her. “Fuck…fuck! Too real!” She gasped. “Too real! Jesus! Whoah…”
They let go of each other, pulses pounding.
“Too real?” He asked, unsure what to make of that.
“Too…” she kissed him again. “Much. Too much, I meant too much. But real enough. God!”
“I’m confused.”
“I just…Can we go for real talk before we do any more…real anything else?”
He slipped his hands around her waist again, gently this time. “Talk.”
“You are…unbelievably sexy, you know that? All of my turn-ons in one guy, it’s crazy.”
“Good, I guess?”
“I just…I can’t…oh for fuck’s sake Julian, I really, REALLY want to fuck you.”
“I figured-”
“No, shut up and let me say this. I really WANT to, but we’re not GOING to, okay? Not so long as we’re on this ship. Not happening.”
+What a fucking tease!+
+No. Think, dumbass.+
It took an effort of will, but Julian wrestled his frustrated libido into the corner, and the logic presented itself. “…you’re worried about the ship, the mission?”
“Oh, fuck sake, do you have to understand as well?!” She exploded. “Yes. The mission. Being on this ship. Doing something with my life. Mattering. I don’t want to lose that.”
“So…what do you want?”
The question shut her down for a second as she thought about it. “I guess…I…what about you?”
“Are we just physical?”
“I…shit, I don’t know. We’re a pretty good team and…I like you.”
“Like me.”
“A fuck of a lot, yeah.”
Julian smiled sadly. “Have we ever done anything other than exercise and flirt? What about…what’s your favourite movie? Band? I don’t even know where you grew up or what you did before your abduction. I like you too despite all the taunting but…”
She shut him up with a kiss. “Okay. That’s enough real right there.” she said. “Let’s start with all that shit and…figure out the rest, yeah?”
“If that’s what you want.”
“That’s what I want.” she confirmed.
“Okay.”
“Great.”
“Yeah.”
“So, um…”
“So…what is your favorite movie?”
Allison froze, then glanced up at the ceiling. Julian frowned. “What?” he asked
“Just checking there’s no cameras in here.” she said. “I don’t want the guys to hear this.”
“So wait, you’d be fine with them watch-?”
She interrupted him. “It’s ‘Tangled’.”
“Tangled.”
”…Yeah.”
“I’ve, uh…Never seen that one.”
“Oh.” She cleared her throat, tugged down her shirt a little and put her hair back in its ponytail. “Uh…Do you want to?”
”…Sure.”
“There’s, uh…just one thing, yeah?”
“What?”
“I, uh…like to sing along.”
He blinked at her, then smiled. “I think.” he said. “That this is going to work.”
Date Point: 4y 9m 1w 2d AV
Folctha colony palace, Cimbrean, The Far Reaches
Sir Jeremy Sandy
While Sir Jeremy had always found Gabriel Arés to be an excellent man to work with—he wished all such senior police officers, superintendents, chief constables, or whatever equivalent rank he had dealt with during his career had been so reasonable. But long years of experience had granted him a sixth sense for when he was about to have a difficult meeting, and from the tone of the polite request that Arés had sent, today’s was going to be a tough one.
He knocked, poked his head into Gabriel’s office, and asked “Are you busy?”
Arés issued a humourless, monosyllabic laugh—hunh!—and beckoned him to enter.
Sir Jeremy sat down opposite his closest colleague. “So, what can I do for you, Gabriel?” he asked.
Gabriel finished up what he was doing, flipped a sheet of paper into one of the piles on his desk that, presumably, meant something to him, and gave Sir Jeremy his full attention. “You realise we’ve got an independently owned jump array allowing people onto this planet now, right?”
“Yes.”
“Run by an organisation owned by a man who doesn’t know about the Hierarchy.”
“I don’t trust Byron to keep it a secret. What’s the matter, aren’t your people screening the immigrants?”
“My people don’t know why they’re screening for neural implants.” Gabriel said. “And in any case that represents one thin blue point of failure, right here in Folctha. The traffic coming through the Scotch Creek array is at least being checked several times and properly by people who know why it’s so important.”
He frowned. “Why ARE we keeping it a secret, anyway? It’s no crazier than some of the other stuff that’s happened these last five years. You think people won’t believe it?”
“To avoid spooking the bastards into doing something rash.” Sir Jeremy replied. “The more people we tell, the more clear it is just how seriously we’re taking this threat. So long as the Hierarchy think that we aren’t really taking them seriously…”
When Gabriel frowned uncertainly, he pressed forward. “Besides, we don’t want a witch hunt on our hands. We can’t let the Hierarchy terrorize us into jumping at shadows.”
“That’s a dangerous game.” Gabriel said. “A known security hole versus the possibility that they’ll get more dangerous if we take them seriously? They know we’re onto them already, and for fuck’s sake they’re trying to genocide us.”
“It’s the considered opinion of the GRA, the UN and NATO that keeping the existence of the Hierarchy a secret is, for now, the best course of action.” Sir Jeremy stated, firmly. “I am inclined to agree.”
“And, sure, they’re right.” Gabriel said. “But Jeremy, if even one of their agents gets through that Array undetected then we could lose people. We could lose the whole planetary reclamation project. As the closest thing you have to a spymaster right now, I’m telling you—Byron needs to know.”
“Byron’s a loudmouth.” Sir Jeremy responded. “Gabriel if I thought he was at all trustworthy with the secret, we wouldn’t be having this conversation—it would already be done. But we are speaking of the literal survival of our entire civilization and species here—caution must rule the day.”
Gabriel sat back, sighing. “He’s really that bad?”
“His exact words to me were ‘Ethical is a brand’. I think he thought he was making a witty commentary on human nature and being so famously honest.”
”…I see. That’s a tough call.”
“One that I’ve made. I just hope that your men are vigilant.”
“Vigilant isn’t the problem. Overworked is the problem. Our ratio of cops to citizens is way too low right now.”
Sir Jeremy sat in silence. “Gabriel, I’ll…see what I can do.” he said. “Maybe Byron can be persuaded to tighten security on his side without being told why. I wouldn’t hold on to much hope, though.”
“Do what you can. I’ll do what I can.”
“And God can take care of the rest.” Sir Jeremy said. “Very well. Thank you, Gabriel.”
“Sure.”
Sir Jeremy paused outside Arés’ door and, despite not being a praying man by inclination, still took the time to glance upwards and offer a silent “please” to the heavens.
Frankly, he was quite sure that it was the most he could do.
Date Point: 4y 9m 1w 2d AV
The Lake, Cimbrean, The Far Reaches
Sara Tisdale
They didn’t have long left before sunset, and Adam was putting in his two lengths to the submerged wreckage of the big ship and back, leaving the girls on the bank to enjoy the last of the sunlight.
Ava was quiet, watching the lake, the sun, the trees and the little animals that were flying, climbing and occasionally jumping between them, all singing a quiet chorus that wasn’t quite like any birdsong ever heard on Earth. Sara didn’t want to intrude; her friend’s expression was serene, her lips curled up at the corners. Ava looked completely at peace.
Sara just wished she could have taken a picture without disturbing her.
It didn’t last. Eventually Ava noticed that she was being watched, and fidgeted a little, though she acknowledged the attention with a smile rather than with awkwardness and said. “Sorry, I was…miles away.”
“You looked really happy.”
Ava tucked a rope of wet hair behind her ear and looked up at the painted sunset sky, still wearing that faint smile. “I feel…lighter.” she said.
“Well, yeah. Your jacket always looked heavy to me.” Sara joked.
“Not just the clothes.” Ava laughed. “Just…I don’t know.”
She looked out across the lake again. “…Lighter.”
Sara’s curiosity had always been her weakness, and her resolve not to intrude on Ava’s peace finally gave in. “What changed?” she asked.
“Huh?”
“Well, I’m really happy you’re here, but a couple of weeks ago you were freaking out over this and now…” she waved a hand at both of them to indicate their mutual skyclad condition. “What changed?”
Ava put her head on one side, thinking. “Being high was really scary.” she confessed.
“Oh yeah.” Sara agreed, glad that Ava’s experience had mirrored her own. “It is, isn’t it?”
“You’ve been high?”
“Yeah.”
“I never thought it would be frightening.” Ava said. “Mom and Dad always made it sound like a horror story anyway, but not, like, a scary horror story. More like a kind of mind-control horror story, where the drug makes you do bad things.”
“Oh yeah. I tried some of…” Sara tailed off and dismissed the rest of the story with a wave of her hand. “…But I got so scared. I thought I was going to die.”
“Yeah…” Ava looked at the lake again. “That’s exactly it. I thought I was gonna die. And then there was the hospital, and I felt REALLY sick for days, and the doctors were all serious, and some of them looked really worried, like they were out of their depth. That was scary too.”
“And then?”
“And then I…I kind of accepted it.” Ava said. “Like…I dunno. Like, I wasn’t happy about it, but I guess I…”
Sara did something uncharacteristic and shut up, letting Ava finish the thought.
”…I guess…I realised, like, everyone’s going to die someday, aren’t they? Everyone. Everyone. So why be scared of it? Its going to happen one day, and then there’s Heaven waiting on the other side, so…”
Sara very carefully didn’t snort or roll her eyes, or give any indication what she thought of Ava’s naive belief in heaven. Instead, when Ava drifted off again, looking at the distant black dot that was Adam turning around and beginning the last return leg of his swim, Sara prompted her to continue. “…So…?”
Ava shook herself out of it. “So…I’m alive, aren’t I? I’ve got the chance to do some of the things I’d regret not doing, and this was one of them.”
She looked back at the sunset. “Im glad I did. This is…” She smiled a little bashfully. “If I died tonight, my Heaven would be right here, exactly as we are.”
That sounded like one of the most Hippie things Sara had ever heard, but it wasn’t a cynical thought: Instead, she felt a swell of vicarious happiness and, apropos, she scooted over and gave Ava a sideways hug. “Thanks for being okay.” she said. “You really scared us.”
Ava returned the hug with extra warmth. “Thanks, Sara.” she replied. “I’d never have had this without you.”
The sun was just coming into contact with the top of distant hills when Adam reached the shallows near the shore and stood up to wade the rest of the way. “Got some bad news.” he reported as he shook himself off and used his hands to scrape water from his limbs and trunk.
“What’s up?” Ava asked, standing up and offering him a hand to help him up the bank.
“Some of the trees on the west bank are looking kinda yellow, and they didn’t look like that yesterday.”
Sara broke the silence that greeted his news. “…That’s it then, I guess. No coming back here.”
“That’s life.” Adam said, causing Ava to nod in agreement. “You’ve just got to enjoy what you’ve got while you’ve got it.”
To Sara, that seemed like a very sad thought, but neither of her friends seemed to be very upset. Instead, she watched them watch the sunset, holding hands, before Ava took a huge breath, flapped her arms in a kind of little shrug, and turned away from the lake to retrieve her clothes. Adam paused a few seconds longer before following her.
Left alone on the shore, Sara took a moment to squint at the far treeline, just to confirm that, yes, there was a patch of sickly yellow over there.
“Sara? You coming?”
She glanced back just to acknowledge that she was, then curtseyed to the landscape.
“Goodbye, lake…Thank you.”
She spent most of the trip back wondering why she wasn’t crying.
Date Point: 4y 9m 1w 2d AV
HMS Caledonia, Orbiting Planet Gorai, Gaoian Space
Regaari
“Human starship Caledonia, this is Whitecrest clan personal transport three hundred and thirty-seven, requesting permission to approach and dock.”
“Copy three-three-seven, hold distance and stand by.“
There was a long pause before the human flight controller’s voice returned. “Whitecrest three-three-seven, please state your business.“
“Caledonia, I am a personal envoy of Mother-Supreme Giymuy, my mission is a diplomatic one. I have no cargo or passengers, and this vessel is unarmed.”
Again, a long wait. Finally, his anticipation was rewarded. “Whitecrest three-three-seven, power down your engines and shields and prepare to be tugged into our port flight deck.”
“Complying.”
Anybody else would have probably felt that the humans were being paranoid, but Regaari knew there was no such thing. In a way, their caution was comforting. It was like being surrounded by the terse professionalism of his own clan.
He was met on the deck by a squad of male soldiers and a female in a more comfortable dark blue uniform with some kind of rank marking worn on her chest. The former watched him like a hawk as he alighted, clearly alert for danger and unwilling to relax even though he was plainly unarmed—he approved. The latter, however, held out two pieces of equipment—one was plainly a translator device, which she handed to him. The other was a flat paddle of some kind.
“I’m subjecting you to a quick search.” she informed him. Regaari ducked his head in acknowledgement and then stood with his arms and legs outstretched.
Curiously, she began with his head, grunting as the wand beeped. It beeped a few more times as she ran it over him, wherever it passed over a metal fastening on his coverall, but she seemed to find that acceptable.
“You have neural implants.” she said. It may have been a question, but Regaari didn’t detect the uptick at the end of her sentence that was characteristic of the way Xiù had asked questions, and which he assumed to be a standard human vocalization.
“Yes…” he confirmed, wondering where she was going with the statement.
“So long as you’re aboard ship, you will remain under marine escort. These are for your protection as much as anybody else’s, this is a working warship and we don’t want you getting lost or injured.” the officer informed him, in an apparent non-sequitur. “the gravity in sections of the ship you’ll be visiting has been turned down, but you could seriously hurt yourself if you stray outside of those areas.”
“Thank you.” he said, agreeing that the escort seemed safest.
The officer relaxed, and extended a hand, shaking Regaari’s paw with a human’s trademark firm grip, but not with their equally trademark crushing power. “Welcome aboard. I’m Lieutenant Ellen McDaniel, this ship’s First Lieutenant. Captain Bathini apologizes for not meeting you in person—you come very highly recommended, but he does have a ship to run.”
“Thank you.” he repeated. “I completely understand.”
“Will you come this way, please?” McDaniel gestured towards a hatch with one hand.
The ship was not originally of human construction, Regaari could tell. There was a clear mismatch.
The human technology was like stepping into a museum. It was all sturdy metal painted a dull and hard-wearing grey, with visible and almost shockingly low-tech dials and physical controls. Sturdy bulkheads had been installed, lined with easily accessible pipes, power lines and conduits, every one festooned with bright warning labels, simple diagrams demonstrating their use, and terse blocks of text.
Visible below all of that functional steel, however, was something altogether more ornate and elegant. The corridors seemed to be surprisingly wide and tall, as if built for the galactic average, which was decidedly at odds with the small, narrow pressure doors that had been spliced in at regular intervals. The deck plating was totally standard, the product of any shipyard in the Interspecies Dominion . The firefighting system in the ceiling, on the other hand, had clearly been ripped out and replaced for some reason.
The bit that really surprised him, however, was that every last scrap of electronics had been replaced. There wasn’t a single recognisable wall screen, processing unit, terminal or display to be seen. The humans couldn’t possibly have computers that were on par with those of a more established spacefaring civilization. Could they?
McDaniel made a familiar amused noise—a lot of her mannerisms were very much like Xiù’s, though possibly that was just because she was a fellow human female. She was, after all, only the second such that Regaari had ever met. But there was a lot to differentiate her from Xiù. McDaniel marched, moving at an efficient brisk pace that Regaari could feel in the deck. Xiù had always glided, disarmingly soft and silent. Xiu’s head-fur had been long, shiny and dark black. McDaniel’s was much shorter, and a kind of matte yellowish hue that Regaari couldn’t remember ever seeing in Gaoian fur, and where Xiù had gone everywhere with her head bowed a little and hunched inwards, making herself small, McDaniel moved like she owned the place, and to judge from the deference shown to her by the ship’s crew, she very nearly did.
“Impressed?” she asked.
“Intrigued.” Regaari admitted, conscious that while everything he spoke and heard was reaching him in perfect Gaoian, the human would be hearing them in English thanks to the targeted interfering sound waves the device was emitting. The effect had always disconcerted him. “You’ve clearly taken somebody else’s ship and reworked it to your needs, but I don’t recognise the design.”
“I can’t discuss the details.” McDaniel told him. “but yes, this ship was captured and repurposed. A large part of its internal systems are back on Earth now, being reverse-engineered.”
Regaari glanced around. It was hard to gauge the level of advancement that the ship had originally been built at thanks to the human replacements, but he got the impression that it had originally matched or likely exceeded the very cutting edge of Gaoian hardware. Earth had achieved impressive results with just a few mangled scraps of Hunter technology—he wondered what they would achieve with these new, intact trophies.
One thing he did notice was that it was eerily quiet. A warship this size should have been permeated by the background hum of its power cores. On Caledonia, the sound came from the crew and the air systems, neither of which were loud.
After they had gone down a flight or two of extremely steep stairs—almost ladders, really—McDaniel opened a hatch and politely gestured him into a meeting room of some description, where he sat down. The chairs were a little awkwardly shaped for a Gaoian, leaving his feet extended outwards well above the ground, and sliding his hips forward so as to bend his knees comfortably only induced an uncomfortable bend in his spine. he eventually settled for swivelling the chair a quarter-turn and sitting on it sideways.
The marines had remained outside.
“So. To business, then.” McDaniel said. “Would you like some coffee? How does caffeine affect your species?”
“I don’t know.” Regaari confessed. “I don’t know what that is.”
“Probably best not, then.” McDaniel said, ruefully. “You don’t mind if I have a cup, do you?”
“Not at all.”
McDaniel opened a thermal flask and a strong scent assailed Regaari’s nose as she poured out a steaming, blackish-brown liquid. It smelled…quite nice, he decided. but it also promised that the substance itself probably wouldn’t taste as good as it smelled.
At least, not to him. McDaniel sipped it and seemed very pleased with the result. Then she set the cup aside. “So, your diplomatic assignment.”
“A plea. One of our own has gone missing. One of your own, too.”
“I don’t follow.”
Regaari scratched behind his ear. “How much do you know about our clan of Females?” he asked.
McDaniel shrugged. “less than I would like to before drawing any conclusions.” she said. “They’re certainly—no offense intended—the most powerful of your clans by dint of sheer population, and control over the breeding rights, but I can’t say I know much more than that.”
“Well, one thing you may not appreciate is that you don’t necessarily have to be Gaoian to be part of a clan.” Regaari told her. “Though that precedent was actually set by a human.”
“Really?” McDaniel looked intrigued.
“Oh yes. She saved a colony group of Mothers, Sisters and cubs from an illicit Corti science facility some five homeworld years ago, before your species’ first faster-than-light flight. She couldn’t go home—we didn’t even know where Earth was at the time—so the Females declared her one of their own and took her in. She’s officially a Sister.”
“And she’s gone missing.”
“That’s right. I think in your terms, I last saw her just under two years ago.”
“You last saw her?”
Regaari ducked his head, ears rotating slightly. “Shoo is…a friend.” he confessed. “I was tasked with looking after her and did so for more than a year.”
“Shoe?”
“Her name is just impossible for Gaoians to pronounce correctly. Shoo Shang is the closest I can get.”
“And she just…vanished?”
“I think I had better tell you the whole story from the start.” Regaari told her.
Some minutes later, his account was briefly interrupted when a junior of some description arrived and handed McDaniel a hardcopy file—little more than a brown folder and a few sheets of paper, but the face looking out from the first of those pieces of paper was definitely Shoo, albeit looking younger, a little rounder in the face and a little less stressed than Regaari remembered her.
“Xiù Chang.” she said, also mispronouncing the name slightly, making it sound like ‘jew’. “Abducted from…huh, Vancouver, three days before the Hunter attack there. Turned twenty-four last month. Was studying acting at UBC at the time of her abduction. Last known sighting…nearly two years ago. Pretty much a full year before the Abductee Reclamation Program really swung into gear, aboard a private corporate cargo relay station.”
“That station was handling hundreds of ships a day.” Regaari said. “By the time we woke up and found her missing, dozens had come and gone. She could have been on any of them. And from there…” He made a helpless gesture, ears downcast. “I’m the one who taught her how to cover her tracks. Apparently she was a good student.”
“It says here that she’s known to have been wounded by a Nervejam pulse.” McDaniel said.
“Yes. It nearly killed her.”
“That’s good-bad news. At least it didn’t kill her, but those weapons have some terrible long-term effects…How did it happen?”
“Well, as I was saying. We were having a tough fight of it…”
Date Point: 4y 9m 1w 2d AV
Starship Sanctuary
Docked at Free Trade Station 1090 “Endless Possibility”
The Mwrwkwel system, the Signal Stars
“Kirk”
Zane’s dense patois, fortunately, was handled perfectly well by the translator, though only after Lewis was instructed to reprogram it. Apparently Zane didn’t approve of having his own creole echoed back at him. It certainly made conversation much easier.
“So where did she go?”
“Flight deck four-oh-four. I nearly didn’t find it.” Lewis snickered. “We got real lucky there, these things only log the deck plating power draw about every half hour, but the last log was on that deck aaand…flight log and itinerary for a light bulk transport headed for the Aru system, departure time five minutes after that deck plate log.”
“The Aru system?”
Vedreg had woken from his nearly three-day-long sleep cycle, and was fizzing with energy, or at least as much so as an alien the size of a Big Rig cab could fizz. He couldn’t fit into the flight deck itself, but was filling most of the corridor behind it, peering in eagerly. They were still figuring out what his colours meant in the absence of translator implants, but the medley swirling all over him almost certainly denoted fascination and awe.
“Curioser and curioser…” Kirk mused.
The three human men glanced at one another before Lewis said what they were thinking. “So, uh, care to tell the ignorant monkey dudes what’s special about the Aru system?” he prompted.
“It’s the home of the OmoAru, the oldest remaining civilization.” Kirk said. “Nearly two hundred thousand Terran years old.”
“So, younger than the Igraens and Hunters then.” Amir said.
“I’m quite sure I said civilization.” Kirk replied, a touch frostily. “They’re in late decline nowadays, and will most likely be extinct within a few decades.”
“Why?” Lewis asked. “What happened?”
Kirk and Vedreg exchanged a glance “We…don’t know.” Vedreg admitted. “Species die eventually. They stop building, they stop expanding or trading, eventually they stop reproducing and just die out. Nobody knows why.”
“Isn’t that kind of a huge problem?” Lewis said. “I mean, shit, EVERY species does this? Why isn’t…shit, why isn’t everyone looking for a cure?”
This was met with the mutual equivalent of unknowing shrugs from the two aliens, who then shared another glance. “Maybe we should look into that.” Kirk admitted. “It does seem strange.”
“Now that you mention it…yes it does.” Vedreg agreed. “Anyway. The OmoAru are one such species in the last years of their existence.”
“So who goes to their home system?” Amir asked. “Psychologists? Counsellors? Suicide hotline workers?”
“Scavengers. Picking over the artefacts, artwork and advanced technology of the most ancient civilization in the galaxy. Exactly the sort of work where a human’s brawn would come in useful, actually.”
Zane nodded. “Well, let’s get after her then.” he said.
“Peace.” Amir said. “Degaussing is going to take another three hours.”
Zane paused. “I’ll go…pick a bed then.” he said, not bothering to say any more as he stalked out.
Amir watched him go. “Something seem off about him to you?” He asked Lewis.
“Dude, we ship with a white zebra-giraffe-dude with four arms named after a Star Trek character, a two-tonne Mr. Snuffleupagus who glows in the dark, and two of the most sexually frustrated badasses in human history.” Lewis said. “What does ‘off’ even mean on this ship?”
“Seriously though.”
Lewis glanced back down the corridor, past Vedreg. “…Yeah. Something’s off about that guy.”
Date Point: 4y 9m 1w 2d AV
HMS Caledonia, Orbiting Planet Gorai, Gaoian Space
Regaari
“That’s…” McDaniel wiped her eye. “Dammit. I’m sorry.”
Regaari ducked his head. “Please, don’t be. Thank you for caring so much.”
McDaniel nodded, taking a sip of her coffee to recover her composure. She was too professional to speak poorly of the Dominion while in her official capacity as an officer of the Royal Navy, but the story of how they had apathetically kicked that poor confused slave from pillar to post rather than putting her on a shuttle straight back to Gao had frankly disgusted her. How could ANYBODY have that kind of a lack of compassion?
She realised that Regaari had meant two things by thanking her for caring.
“Officer Regaari…do you know how many of our people are scattered all over the known galaxy?”
“I don’t.” He conceded. “Not many, I assume.”
“We’ve managed to contact, recover and bring home a few dozen, and there are about three times as many that we know for certain are dead. That still leaves more than ten thousand unaccounted-for, taken over the last forty or fifty years.”
His ears pricked up and forward. “That many?”
“I suppose as Deathworlders we were particularly fascinating. But it’s a big galaxy out there. How many stations are there? Of all kinds?”
“I don’t know exactly. Millions.”
“Ships?”
“FTL-capable ones of all sizes? Billions, easily.”
“And sapient beings in the trillions. And that’s just in and around Dominion space which takes up…what, a third of the galactic habitable ring?”
“The whole galaxy, officially. But yes, in practical terms…about a third.”
McDaniel nodded. “We have an expression. A needle-“
”-in a haystack. I’m familiar with it. It’s an understatement.”
“Then you see my point. We have only a tiny number of ships, and you’re asking us to look for one specific needle out of the thousands of needles scattered across an entire continent’s-worth of haystacks.”
“Yes.”
“You must appreciate that that’s…not exactly feasible. I admire miss Chang a lot from your description of her, but I can’t treat her as being any more worthwhile than any of the other abductees.”
Regaari lowered his head, crestfallen. “I suspected you would say that.” he said. “But, Ayma insisted that I had to at least ask.”
“From the way you described her, I’m surprised she’s not here in person.”
“She would be, but she…our cub was born a few days ago. The timing was just wrong, so she asked me to come.”
“Shouldn’t you be there with her? I mean, your child…”
“It doesn’t work like that for us.” Regaari said. “We don’t do it the way you do. I’m happy, I know the little one will grow up and be an excellent Gaoian, just like her mother. That’s where my involvement ends.”
That sounded cold and tragic to McDaniel, but she held her peace. Refraining from commenting on alien cultural differences was one of the basic rules of diplomacy. “Well…I’m sorry that I can’t offer more than we’re already doing.” she said.
“I understand.” Regaari assured her. “Knowing the scale of the problem…doesn’t help, exactly. Xiù is important to me, and the Mother-Supreme has taken a personal interest in her as well. But I understand.”
“Perspective’s a bitch, isn’t it?”
Regaari wrinkled his nose as he interpreted the painfully literal translation of that sentiment, then he gave one of those Gaoian nods. “It is.” he agreed, and stood. “Thank you, Lieutenant.”
“No, thank you for helping us. If nothing else, the Chang family can be told. And now that we know she’s likely to be in disguise and what that disguise looks like, it might just help the search.”
“I hope so.” Regaari agreed, keeping his private doubts private. “Please, don’t let me use up any more of your time. You have a ship to run.” he stuck out a paw, keeping the wince off his face as McDaniel shook it a little too hard.
She opened the hatch for him. The two marines waiting outside snapped to attention. “Bon voyage, officer.” she said. “I hope we’ll have good news for you. Gentlemen, please escort our guest back to his ship.”
“Aye aye. This way, sir.”
Date Point: 4y 9m 1w 2d AV
Scotch Creek Extraterrestrial Research Facility
British Columbia, Canada, Earth.
Brigadier-General Martin Tremblay
“You’re sure about this? I don’t exactly trust the Byron Group to know what they’re doing.”
“Browning my pants, but…yeah, I’m sure. And they’re never gonna get better if no fucker’s dumb enough to fly with ‘em, right?”
“Yeah, well…watch yourself out there. Our very first scout ship went missing on its first mission.”
“The Governess? Yeah, I know. But I’m gonna be one of a crew, that’s gotta make a difference…”
“You hope…” Tremblay cleared his throat. “Be careful.”
“Dammit, Martin, I don’t wanna tear up…”
They shook hands. It didn’t seem personal enough, until Kevin shrugged, and turned the handshake into a hug.
“Gonna miss you, man.”
Tremblay laughed a little, and broke the hug. “Same. The place won’t be the same without your coffee and pancakes.”
“Just don’t let Maurice change the name.”
“You’ve got it…Goodbye, Kevin. Thank you for everything.”
“Take care of yourself.”
Tremblay sank back into his chair and allowed himself just a moment’s peace as the door shut behind Kevin, but he allowed himself no more than that.
There was still a research facility to run.