Soundless Conflicts

by S. Walker

  Memories paraded by. Jamet winced. Perhaps there was some mileage to make up for. "Of course, Janson. I'm not sure how to help but I'd-" she thought about this. Smiled. "I'd like to try."

  He smiled right back, bushy red beard raising around the edges. "Ah thought so. Remember t' put your skinsuit up, lotta vacuum between here and the stores."

  Captain Siers broke in. "Just a minute, Engineer. I need lieutenant Reals for a brief bit, I'll send her out before you're into a skinsuit. Sorry for the trouble."

  Janson nodded agreeably and palmed the hatch controls. It swished open, swallowed his big form and closed again with a whoosh of compressed air.

  Paul took that moment to climb to his feet as well. "I am going to inventory the emergency pull-outs and check Environment controls. If we are without either for very long our supplies may be a priority. By your leave, sir."

  Siers nodded and waved, ushering the injured Paul outside.

  Whoosh, thump.

  Jamet immediately wheeled on the command chair. Asking to be held behind without witnesses never ended well for the junior Executive involved. "Sir? If I've overstepped or caused a problem I apologize imme-"

  He waved her down impatiently. "Easy, lieutenant. Nothing bad happened." Siers suddenly seemed to realize they were currently crewing a vessel that had more holes than a screen door, with propulsion offline and headed for a collision course. He grinned ironically, mustache twitching. "I take that back. But I needed to fill you in on a few things, just in case."

  "Can I participate in this conversation, captain?" Emilia's voice blasting from the overheads made them both jump. "It sounds wonderf- you stupid, overcranked son of a-". Something whirred, then broke with a sound like dropped metal filings.

  Captain Siers thumbed an icon on his console, killing the connection. Then he double checked the setting before dragging it to the Executive Locked folder. "There, our Comms technician won't be able to reopen that. I believe, anyways."

  Jamet warily reclaimed her workstation seat. "Should I say something here, or...?"

  "No, it's fine." He looked away, turning distracted eyes on the forward work surface. A map of the system still loomed across the forward arc of the bridge, callout boxes and icons drifting around slowly. "This isn't a talk I give often, lieutenant. I'll probably do it rather badly."

  Well that wasn't a reassuring way to start. "I'll suspend judgment. Sir."

  Siers ghosted a smile at the weak joke. "Don't we all. Alright, let me give this a shot. I suppose this is about the crew and the Kipper in general, but what I should start with is probably Corporate."

  Well wasn't that a huge range of discussion. "What about Corporate? Do you mean headquarters? Or our budget?"

  "Neither." He frowned, waving one hand in a catching gesture. "Rather, both. All of it. What do you know about how Corporate started?"

  "Oh. Um. Well Eblett was founded on an investment contract something like two hundred solar years ago. Although back then it was just a three-number, a resource extraction project-"

  "No, hold on. Not that. What do you know about Corporate, lieutenant? Not the system you were a part of on Eblett: The whole thing. The entire Corporate Expansion, everywhere you can travel to or from."

  "That's... that's a big question, sir." She thought. "Um. Eblett is the local headquarters for six investment systems nearby. Actually it might be seven now, there was a budget reshuffling months ago before I-" she choked suddenly. "Never mind. Anyways all the investment systems have Lower Management at their locations, although a couple will drop their numbers and get promoted to Middle in the next decade or so."

  He nodded and made a 'keep going' wave.

  "Okay, so they report to our Middle Management on Eblett. Taxes and profits come to our headquarters and we-- I mean, they-- allocate budgets and investments for more infrastructure and such. And we-- I mean, Middle Management-- report to the Upper Executives, who I guess report to the Board. There," she felt relieved. Test passed. "That's the whole thing."

  Siers frowned, still looking at the forward workspace. "Then who does the Board report to?"

  Jamet opened her mouth, then paused. This was a question that never saw the light of day. What did it matter, when everyone she knew was as far from Upper Executive as planets were from a star? Imagining something above her level was difficult, but even further? That was ludicrous.

  She started to say how impossible that was, but stopped. That didn't make sense. Eblett wasn't the top of the Corporate ladder. It couldn't be. Jamet even knew that, it was something she'd just said: Their entire system started as a three-letter name. That designated a resource extraction setup. Which meant, obviously, their entire setup and operation had to have been an investment for some other system. Some other Upper Executive branch, presumably with their own Board.

  Eblett reported to someone.

  In the blink of an eye her entire inner worldview exploded. It was like standing too close to a display surface, peering directly at a single detail for so long that it became all that mattered. Now Siers was telling her to step back and look around. But it turned out it wasn't just one picture, one piece of a puzzle: It was a collage. Endless. Pictures made up of smaller pictures, which had tinier pieces-

  Jamet realized she was holding the console in front of her in a death grip. "How far from the top was I?" No, wait. That was backwards. She tried again: "How far from the bottom was my Middle Management position?"

  Siers seemed relieved for some reason. Some of the tension eased out of his posture, although it was only noticeable after it happened. "Ah, good. Sometimes when I do this talk we end up cleaning the deck afterwards. You're taking it rather well, honestly."

  She didn't feel like it was going well. In fact her thoughts were screaming endlessly as Jamet contemplated Boards reporting to Boards reporting to Boards... "I might need that cleanup, soon."

  "Just focus on what's right here, try not to think about how far above it goes."

  "You are not helping me." Then, belatedly: "SIR."

  "Alright, let me change the subject. Have you heard of Shareholders?"

  She took deep breaths. Why were there floating lights on the bridge? "Shareholders? Those are... investors, I think? But without any position in Corporate. Not Lower, Middle or Upper. Or even Board. They just... exist."

  "Ah. Now that is interesting." He seemed to be leading her a bit while keeping a wary eye out. "A whole group of people with money to spend but no responsibility? Where would those people be, if you had to guess?"

  "Nowhere." Everyone Jamet ever met was a worker (indebted, mostly), in Management or an Executive of some sort. But now there was an entirely new category? It had to fit somewhere. She took a stab at it: "Everywhere?"

  "Good guess, but there are actually fewer than you'd think would be possible." He manipulated the console, bringing up a miniature version of the entire Corporate space. It looked like a lumpy cloud, if every single fold was four or five entire star systems all at once. Put together even a small map barely fit on the display.

  Siers tapped Eblett once to make it light up, then used his fingertip to draw a long jagged line across the map. It ended somewhere on the far side, at a system that didn't register with a name. "There. That's roughly the direction the Corporate worlds expanded in. Although a line doesn't do it justice, not really. You're looking at easily several thousand years of progress."

  Jamet realized her tongue was dry bare moments before she closed her mouth. "We report to all of that?"

  "In a very long, roundabout way I suppose." Siers seemed casual about this mind blowing revelation. "Although after three or four Boards it's mostly meaningless. It takes dedicated stations of computing power to process all the system interactions at once. But that's not important." She almost threw up right then. "What's important, lieutenant, is this: What is it all for? Who benefits?"

  "The... Board?"

  "In the short run, sure," he agreed, looking her way. "But look at the size of Co
rporate space. Even if there were ten Board per system that would only be, what? Forty, fifty thousand people? Versus billions and billions?" He stroked his mustache thoughtfully. "That seems inefficient, don't you agree?"

  There was only one group that could be labelled as 'billions'. "The workers? It's all set up for the workers?" It was like being told rats could not only talk, they were the best singers ever discovered. "That can't be true."

  And suddenly Siers looked old. Tired. "Not now, perhaps. But it wouldn't be a lie to tell you that once, long ago when it all began, that's how it really was. This all started as an investment in a way of life, lieutenant. Something new that benefitted everyone who bought into it, who invested. Did you know originally even workers were encouraged to be Shareholders? But somewhere along the way it got twisted." He abruptly closed the map with an angry gesture. "Now only the top ever sees any benefits."

  Jamet was still struggling with workers as Shareholders. That seemed obscene, somehow. Did that mean as Middle Management she would be working for the workers, at least in part? Did her profits go to the indebted workforce? How did that even make sense?! "This is... quite a lot. Sir. But how does this matter, to me? To this?" That didn't come close to encompassing the lack of purpose spiraling out of control inside her at the moment. "What am I supposed to do!" There. That was better.

  "Well, for a start: If I'm unable to finish this trip you'll need to take command." He said it with a grin, like it was an easy thing.

  "I'd be captain?" That didn't happen. Executives never gave up power, prestige or authority. Even when they died the position often just simply... went away. Budgets broken up and reallocated, resources shuffled into a blend. The personnel fended for themselves or ended up putting their contract on the open market, to be snapped up by anyone looking to build a power base.

  Then the obvious occurred. "Wait, are you planning not to finish this trip, sir?"

  He laughed, then glanced around. "Is this a hypothetical, Jamet?"

  "Yeeees...?" She said it with an upward scale, rising until the final 's'.

  "You aren't thinking about a little forcible promotion?"

  A smug voice echoed through her thoughts. I want you to head a division, J. She grit her teeth. "If you're trying to be funny..."

  "I was. If I had any doubts about you I wouldn't have offered an assignment. Point of fact," he was working the console now, going through menus. "I was planning to have this talk at our next layover, preferably over drinks. But things being as they are, well. It's necessary to abbreviate." Something that looked like a banking interface popped onto his display surface. Jamet knew the look; she'd watched hers for several months like an anxious mother with a newborn. But Captain Siers' display was monstrous, with tabs upon tabs of line items and a balance at the top that included letters between the numbers.

  "There." He leaned back, closing the display with a satisfied look. "Just in case, that's taken care of."

  "What is?" How did one put letters in a balance total? How much was that?

  "Whenever the Kipper gets back to Corporate space, you'll be a Shareholder. With exactly one share." He toasted an invisible cup. "Congratulations."

  She had know idea what that meant. But a rising feeling of excitement couldn't be denied. "Thank you?"

  "Quite welcome. Although if we live through this we need to have another talk about what that means, exactly. Or I suppose Janson, Paul and Emilia could walk you through it if things went very poorly for us. In the meantime," he indicated the hatch behind them. "I believe our Engineer might be waiting for you, lieutenant."

  Jamet numbly stood up and clunked towards the hatch one oversized boot at a time. She felt a bit like an overloaded console at the moment, struggling to process everything at once. "I'll... I'll be right there."

  The hatch whooshed open, letting her out. Before it closed she looked back one last time to see Captain Siers staring straight ahead once more.

  The map of Corporate space was back on display. He frowned at it like a disappointed parent.

  The hatch whooshed shut. Jamet went to give whatever assistance she could to prevent everyone from turning into high speed pancakes.

  Chapter 13

  Repairs and Shipping

  Lieutenant Jamet stared down the ship corridor, then keyed the radio on her skinsuit. "Those are very big holes."

  Her speakers crackled back, making Janson's baritone voice sound like he was inside the helmet. "Biggest ah have seen, ma'am. Watch the gap."

  The holes in question were a paired series on either side of the ship's corridor. It looked like something the size of herself punched through the hull, broke apart and angrily blasted through the other side. All that was left behind was massive curls of metal and half melted shards, angled inward from the left and torn outward to the right. Jamet tried to imagine standing between the two when it happened and had to quickly redirect. Things like 'jam' and 'finely diced' should never be applied to the human body.

  Looking outwards she could see a cross section of the honeycomb hull material, some mangled relay circuits and, worryingly, stars. Turning to look the other way was even less reassuring-- the hole continued through bulkhead after compartment laterally the entire way through the Kipper. Jamet could measure the width of the ship just by looking at the black empty circle at the end of that trail of destruction. Ruined scrap and random debris coated everything, held down only by local gravity.

  In fact, that was a worrying thought. "Engineer?"

  Janson stopped for a moment, looking back. "Ma'am?"

  "Is there any chance local gravity is going to stop?" The idea of floating through one of the holes and flailing into oblivion was suddenly very real.

  His helmet cocked slightly to one side, a sure sign he was consulting the implanted chip. "Weak force generators are fine, ma'am. They were one deck up, hits missed 'em."

  She nodded and followed the larger suit through the corridor, carefully keeping one gloved hand on something solid until the holes were safely past. "Can we fix the hull?"

  Janson was busy opening the emergency seals on the bulkhead. "Not likely, goin' to need a shipyard for that. Or a drydock and a lot of time. Grab those lower seals, would you?"

  She knelt, hesitantly feeling for the latches that ran around the edges of the sealed hatch. This wasn't something she had ever done before. "How do I- oh." Her fingers found the latch, then twisted counterclockwise to disengage. "There, I got one." She worked along the deck on her knees, popping three more. Janson used his height advantage to handle the top seals.

  "There, that's got it. Stand back a little, ma'am."

  Jamet took several careful steps away, watching while he grabbed both edges of the large emergency hatch. With a grunt, Janson planted one boot on the bulkhead and heaved backwards, putting his full weight into pulling. With the latches disengaged the entire frame slid out of the wall around the closed door, extending several feet into the corridor towards them. A rigid metal door popped out as well, folding entirely around the frame on heavy hinges.

  Pulled out and put together with the door the emergency bulkhead turned into a functional, single-person airlock. "I've never seen it used before."

  "Same, ma'am. Remember how it's done, though? Pretty simple." He pointed to the pictures helpfully printed on the inside of the flimsy looking shell.

  "I can figure it out. Wait, am I going through first? What do I do?"

  "Yeah. Well, um, y'see it might be for the best. You know. Just in case there's a problem on this side an' all." Somehow the big Engineer made his bright white, all-over skinsuit look apologetic.

  "You're worried I might blow the airlock by accident."

  Janson paused for just a little too long. "Nooo."

  "Fine, I'll go first. But what if there's a problem on the other side? Like a breach, or a fire, or some sort of toxic gas that-" Jamet cut herself off. This was unhelpful. "Right."