The Afterlife of Alice Watkins 1

by Matilda Scotney

“Don’t worry about me,” she said. “I know two of the crew members on board. They suggested meeting up for dinner, but I told them we had plans but now, I’ll go. Statesman Patrick left me a message, but I didn’t call back.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Of course, don’t you want to spend a couple of hours with Mr Dreamy?”

  “It’s not like that, Amelia.”

  “And it won’t be either if I tag along.”

  Alice hesitated.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “I’m nervous.”

  “Gosh, so would I be, going out with him. But you still gotta do it. Forget the nerves, you can have those anytime, but a hunk like that and a statesman as well! What are you wearing?”

  “Grey. It’s all I have, but I have got a chain belt and a gold necklace and earrings.”

  “Good. Do you want makeup? I have some.”

  “I’ve never worn it. My mother wouldn’t let me.”

  “Your mother?” Amelia had to think about that one. “Well, she’s not here to know. I’ll be there in a sec.”

  Amelia could turn her hand to many things and one of them was applying makeup, arriving with an array of gel colours and tiny lighted tubes that changed colour when applied to the skin. When she finished, Alice stood in front of the image definer and despite reflecting an overall impression of grey just as she predicted, her pinker lips and the green shading to her eyes, brightened and lifted her complexion. She was pleased with the result.

  “I like it. I wish I’d discovered it before.”

  “It suits you and you only have a little on. It’s designed to enhance, not hide. Shows how pretty you are.”

  Alice looked back at her reflection. Pretty? Even as a young woman, Alice had been small and mousey, then when old age crept up, she’d got white hair and wrinkles. There had been chin hairs too. Yes, Toby said chin hairs. She paused, looking at her reflection and waited for the pain of remembrance to begin. This time, it didn’t come.

  Precisely at 1900 hours, the portal buzzer sounded, and Amelia released the door. Statesman Patrick, out of uniform in a blue shirt that matched his eyes and wearing casual slacks, was dressed to impress. His hair, even though he’d tied it back, was softer and less regimented than when on duty and he topped off the vision with his glorious smile, even while he made polite effort to hide his disappointment at seeing Amelia, who turned to wink at Alice before making cheeky wide eyes at her.

  “Educator Sebel.”

  “Statesman Patrick. Please forgive me, I must decline your invitation, I have a prior engagement. I’m sure you’ll take good care of Dr Langley.”

  Patrick was not in the least upset at her having a prior engagement, Educator Sebel could have whatever she wished, provided it meant having Alice all to himself. Amelia wasn’t fooled, she knew his type. Patrick turned his attention to Alice.

  “Dr Langley. You are beautiful.”

  “Thank you, Statesman.” Alice’s reply was gracious and proper, and she hid her shyness at his compliment well. As he took her hand to lead her through the portal, Alice resolved she would take Amelia’s advice and leave her anxieties in her quarters for the next few hours.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  The officer’s dining room looked like the officer’s mess on the station, only larger and busier. Patrick led Alice to a table by the viewport, away from the bustle in the centre of the room. Once seated, she had a favour to ask of Statesman Patrick.

  “Would you do something for me, Statesman?”

  “Of course, if it’s in my power. Space can be a bit limiting though.”

  Alice was unaware he was as dazzled by her as she had been by him the first time they met. Meeting her on the station, finding her lost in the corridor on her first day on board, knowing her history; everything about her intrigued him.

  “Would you call me Alice, instead of Dr Langley?”

  “Alice?” he looked baffled. “Alice? Why?”

  She told him why, at least in part.

  “For some reason, I only ever remember being called Alice. I don’t remember being Dr Langley and it feels strange when people call me by that name.”

  He thought for a moment. “I’m aware of your history Dr Langley…Alice. On this ship, other than myself, only Principal Ryan and Statesman Hennessey have been appraised of the events of the last 14 or so years. Educator Sebel knows of course. I haven’t read the reports fully but, Principal Ryan tells me you have amnesia.”

  “So I’m told, but it doesn’t feel like it to me.”

  “Well, I’ll call you Alice when we’re alone, like this,” and on impulse, touched her hand. So surprised was she at the pressure of his fingers, she didn’t think to pull away and for a nanosecond, compared him with Ted. There’d been no-one before Ted and no-one since. In all honesty, she couldn’t have cared less if there’d not been any Ted between those two points, except for the kids, of course.

  Patrick, realising he’d breached protocol, was the first to withdraw his hand. Always drawn to beautiful women, this woman was bound up in mystery and classifications, and under both the Tabernacle’s and his protection while she was on board. That meant off limits. Not that he paid much attention to restrictions of that kind.

  The steward brought a clear, red liquid, which Alice called wine, but the steward quickly informed her, rather tartly, alcohol is never served on starships. Alice thought it a sensible rule. What if you were drunk and driving a starship? It didn’t bear thinking about. You might crash into Mars.

  Amused by the changing faces of Alice as she tasted the drink and examined the edible floral concoction the steward placed before her, Patrick was reminded of the time he first learned of her at school, he’d paid little attention back then. At university, the study of cryogenics was mandatory but the subject, lumped in with other ancient and obscure sciences, didn’t give any weight to her uniqueness and he largely forgot about her as the years passed. What was the analogy Ryan used during their debriefing? That was it, like Carter, the archaeologist, finding Tutankhamen’s sarcophagus and discovering, far from being mummified, what was inside was alive and breathing. True and living history!

  He hadn’t expected this when he met her. Hadn’t expected her to be so lovely, so sweet. As a scientist, her history and awakening fascinated him, that she survived was astonishing, that she was so beautiful, mesmerising. She looked up and smiled, clearly fascinated by the intensity of colour and variety of dishes served.

  “We have a hydroponics deck for fresh food, Alice. Fresh and preserved food is combined to offer diversity. Even though the portions appear small, they meet all our nutritional needs. They look good too!”

  “It does look good,” she looked up. “It’s not laced with firewater, is it?”

  “No, I promise,” he grinned.

  “Thank you, Statesman.”

  “Well, Alice. You can drop the Statesman part. Just Patrick.”

  “Oh, ok, if you won’t get into trouble.”

  He grinned again. “Just don’t say it in front of Ryan or Hennessey.”

  “I promise. Amelia told me your surname was Patrick, so why can’t I call you by your first name?”

  He took a second to own up. “Because it’s Carmichael.”

  “Carmichael?”

  “Yes, awful, isn’t it? No-one uses it. It’s my mother’s family name. It doesn’t work as a Christian name, but it’s a custom in her family that the women always name their firstborn son, Carmichael. My mother calls me Michael, but everyone else, when I’m not being Statesman, calls me Patrick.”

  “Michael is a lovely name,” Alice said, “and Carmichael is very solid. I think it sounds fine.”

  “Solid? That settles it. It’s official. I hate it! Just Patrick or I will call you Dr Langley for evermore. Hennessey is the same, he hates his first name, so everyone calls him Hennessey.”

  “What is it?” then she reconsidered. “Perhaps you shouldn’t tell me. It might upset him.”

&n
bsp; But Patrick was not so sensitive about revealing his colleague’s name.

  “It’s Lester, which is almost as bad as Carmichael. The only one of us three command officers with a normal name is Ryan, and he’s so used to being called Principal Ryan, or Principal, or just Ryan, he probably doesn’t remember it!”

  Alice laughed. “A normal name? I suppose you’re going to tell me?”

  “Noah.”

  “That’s appropriate. Noah in charge of a big ship.”

  “Biblical Noah—from the ancient text?”

  She nodded.

  “I never made that connection,” he said. “He doesn’t answer to Noah, anyway.”

  Patrick was so easy to be with, there was no place for nerves or unease and Alice forgot her social ineptness in her other life and laughed at his silly stories, his candid observations of life in space and his extraordinary wit. But when she asked him about his home, he became reflective.

  One of the small principalities in the northern hemisphere, he told her—it was called Ireland centuries ago. He loved that name. Had she heard of it? Alice told him she had and could even picture it on a map and knowing now where he came from, she immediately placed his accent.

  Patrick was a poet. Never at a loss for words or the ability to communicate his thoughts, he built up a picture of a beautiful Earth, where animals and people and cultures lived without fear or oppression. It was clear to Alice, he loved his home. His soft, dreamy rendition of an old Irish poem, which he recited in clear and unbroken Gaelic, his expressions changing with the lilt and rise of the verse and entirely from memory, captivated and enchanted Alice.

  But in contrast, when he spoke about the engines of this great ship, he became animated, enthusiastic, his eyes bright and wide as he gesticulated about their size and speed, laughing at all the things that can go wrong during development of the components, then dropping his voice to speak with reverence and pride of their ultimate success.

  “I don’t understand anything about engines, Patrick,” Alice admitted. “I can’t imagine anything so large it would power a ship of this size.”

  “They’re not so large Alice. A’khet provided us with an organic material that powered their own ship. This material, this Substance is the power. A’khet have a sacred name for it, but when they offered it to us, they said ‘Substance’; a rather ordinary title for an extraordinary element. We don’t know where A’khet sources it.

  “Our challenge was to build a container to house Substance. Over the years, many tests were carried out but each time, it burst through the housing as we reached light speed. For reasons we don’t understand, A’khet didn’t need to contain Substance on their ship, we only know that with our technology, it becomes unstable unless it’s sheathed. A’khet tried to help but they aren’t engineers. We had no choice but to develop our own containment.”

  “What happened?”

  “Over time, we developed materials containing widely available minerals, usually noble metals which work well but unfortunately, only for limited periods of time. Eventually, A’khet identified that for us to fuse Substance with our technology, we needed to understand and harness the harmonics. They selected a few people, not at random—those who had distinguished themselves and whom A’khet trusted and gave them what we call today, Knowledge. Without it, regardless of all the components being in place and all the theories, the engines won’t work to any great effect. The coalition of the two technologies made space travel possible but initially, difficult and lengthy until the advent of Knowledge.”

  “And your family was involved in all these trials?”

  “Yes, my great-great-grandfather created a housing, a Gravidarum, able to diffuse the intensity or magnitude of Substance into three other chambers, these are the portage cylinders and though we could use it for speed, it still didn’t give us the ability to sustain essential systems such as gravity, temperature, light and so on, over a long period, even for a crew of a dozen. On this ship, those systems are maintained as a byproduct of the joining of Substance and the Gravidarum.”

  Prompted by her obvious and genuine interest, he continued.

  “My great-grandfather then took up the torch and in time, found that by manipulating the minerals in a particular way, all Substance within the portage cylinders remained stable. As the ships approached light speed, Substance lifted and floated inside the portage. It became stable, and the Gravidarum stopped the portage cylinders fracturing. It all led to the engines we use now, allowing us to travel at considerable speed over considerable distances while sustaining all the systems we need. I use the term ‘engine’ loosely, Alice, because really, it’s a complex merger of technology, organics and harmonics, and, I gave you the simple version,” he laughed. “It’s more complicated, but I don’t want to fry your brain!”

  Alice found it amazing. Complicated, mystifying, but amazing.

  “So, space travel is relatively new?”

  “Of the exploratory kind we undertake, yes, but humans have been in space for hundreds of years, tinkering around.” His gaze wandered to the darkness of space beyond the viewport and then back to her when she asked,

  “And you have no idea what this Substance is?”

  “No. It’s organic, that much we know, possibly brought with them from their planet of origin. Even those with Knowledge only know as much about its composition as our scientists do. I can tell you about the everyday minerals used in the Gravidarum, gold, rhodium, osmium, iridium, but Substance is another matter so to speak.”

  “Do you, have it? This Knowledge?”

  “Yes, I do, and my father and grandmother and great-grandfather and his father before him. Way back, an ancestor had a form of Knowledge that didn’t relate to engineering but none of us knows anything about it. Few are granted Knowledge, possibly half a dozen or so. Two of us are military, but all are engineers.”

  “Sounds like a big responsibility.”

  “It is. But I’m sure I’m giving you more information than you need!”

  “I’m afraid I found even your easy version of your engines a little too involved for me. How long can you be away from Earth for, with these engines?”

  “We were away a year each on our last two missions and now we’ll have a few months back at space dock to upgrade the Gravidarum. I’ve designed several modifications to increase longevity, in theory, the engines would keep going forever because Substance appears to be indestructible and has never shown signs of decay. At one time, because of its durability, it was thought A’khet Substance might have been used in the manufacture of your sarcophagus, but it was just a theory and never proven. So even though we have this wonderful gift where we can move amongst the stars, our technology limits us, that and perhaps, our courage.”

  “Courage?”

  “Yes, to simply point to the first star and fly on until morning. Long-range communication is an issue, so we’re caught up with having to come back to Earth, file our reports, catch up with family. Principal Ryan would stay out in space forever, on his own, cataloguing planets and star systems, investigating nebulae and discovering black holes. I see the appeal of longer missions, but I do not share Ryan’s disposition. He tends towards the solitary. Hennessey has a baby now, so his career as an explorer is pretty much over.”

  “He’s excited about the baby. I met him on the observation deck.”

  Patrick couldn’t fathom such a thing as being excited about a baby. He would take Alice’s word for it and change the subject back to technology.

  “I’d like to show you the engines, I’m proud of them. Would you think me self-indulgent?”

  “Not at all, but I’m hopeless with mechanical things. I don’t even own a computer. I can’t work out how to use them.”

  “A computer?” he stood and held her chair for her. “Why would you own a computer?”

  “Perhaps that explanation may have to wait for another time. Let’s go look at your engines.”

  The engine room was in the cen
tremost part of the forward disc and they passed through dozens of portals to get to their destination. A few crewmen glanced up with curiosity at the sight of their senior officer escorting a civilian in a restricted area, but their interest was fleeting and after taking in the unexpected sight, went back to their tasks. Patrick made no attempt to introduce her to the crew, just led her to a single, narrow portal, and invited her to step through with him.

  The structures Patrick referred to as engines, were little more than three long cylinders, stretching into the distance, two below and one sitting above. If she were to stand in one cylinder, the uppermost part would touch the top of her head. If she raised her arms, she would reach the sides. There were no visible signs of technology within the tube and the shining interior reflected the only source of illumination in the room, a row of soft lights across the floor in front of the cylinders. The cylinders were contained within a large ring, set within a series of smaller rings around the outer cylinders. Narrow bars entered and exited almost like a latticework binding the rings together. It was huge. This was the Gravidarum. Alice knew that without Patrick having to tell her.

  Near the mouth of each cylinder, a much smaller tube, not suspended by wires or any structure visible to Alice, silently rotated, bathed in a barely perceptible light, a light not reflected from the floor. From where she stood, the smaller cylinder looked to Alice like the middle of a toilet roll wrapped in sandpaper, a simple structure, devoid of beauty or elegance but it emitted a soothing radiance that held her spellbound, purple to blue and back to purple. And the song, the chiming? Soft on the ear. D major perhaps? As the chiming changed to a rhythmic chanting, she felt as if her ribs had opened like fingers to receive the music into her heart, her head tilted back as she closed her eyes, the colours and sounds perfusing through her mind and body, bringing eternity within her reach.

  Patrick walked on ahead, chattering on about angstroms and parsecs before noticing she wasn’t following him, he stopped his bright chatter and turned to see her face inclined upwards towards the Gravidarum.