by S. J. Madill
“Empty.”
“Huh,” said Saparun, leaning to look past Cho. “The Chief owes me ten bucks.”
The Lieutenant put his hands on the edges of the doorway, slowly leaning into the small square building. He stepped inside, the floor under his feet made of the same dark metallic surface as the rest of the structure. Five paces to the far wall and just as wide, there was no furniture, no adornment, no objects of any sort inside the building.
Stopping in the centre of the small room, he looked around at the empty space. Saparun came into the room behind him, their two helmet lights playing off the surfaces around them.
Something was catching Cho’s eye. “The walls, Sap…”
The light from the Mechanic’s helmet swung around to the same point on the wall illuminated by Cho’s beam. “The walls, Lieutenant? I don’t… oh, I see.”
The wall’s polished surface appeared rough in patches, missing its shine. As Saparun stared at the wall, the patches of dull wall resolved themselves into geometric shapes. Small squares and triangles, arranged into simple pictures. Two squares, with a tall triangular spike between them; the square on the left had a small humanoid figure drawn inside it. “Wait, is this here?” he asked, stepping closer. As he moved, the image suddenly changed, with a few stylised plants sprouting from the ground around the shapes of the buildings. “Pak, it moved!” he gasped, recoiling away from the wall. As he did, the plant-like shapes disappeared.
Cho reached out a hand to steady the Dosh, not taking his eyes off the wall. “I didn’t see it.” After a moment’s hesitation, he took a step closer to the wall. “Oh, neat,” he said, “I get it. The wall’s been etched.”
“Ah,” breathed the Mechanic, taking small steps back and forth. “Different images from different angles. Distance based?” he wondered aloud, bending over to get a closer look. “No, height based.”
Cho stood up on tiptoe, then slowly began to lower himself until he was in a crouch. “Okay, looks like it’s this planet… cities and forests, lots of life, then some ships came. Levelled the cities, then the plants died, then these buildings appeared. Then someone standing in the one building — us, I guess, and the other building…” As he leaned downward, the image of the second square building erupted into hundreds of smaller squares that burst upward into the sky. A lead weight dropped into his stomach as he jabbed at the computer on his arm. “Lee!” he cried. “Stop! Do not open that building!”
Saparun lunged toward the open door, Cho following behind. As he ran out into a sand drift, he heard Lee’s calm voice come through his helmet. “We just got it open, sir. You had better come look at this.”
-----
When they got to the other building, Lee was standing outside the door waiting for them. The rest of the crewmembers were holding a wide perimeter, either standing atop dunes or walking carefully between them.
Lee jerked his thumb toward the open door. “Door’s open, sir, but nothing’s been touched and no one’s been inside. Strange looking thing in there.”
Cho peered in the door. The light from his helmet was reflected right back in his face. Turning his head slightly, he saw the room’s only content.
A massive cube of smoky glass stood in the centre of the room. As tall as Cho and as wide, it filled the building save for a narrow aisle around the outside. Light that struck the cube was fragmented and broken into smaller beams that danced on the chamber’s inside walls.
“Didn’t expect that,” said Cho.
The Dosh stood beside him, one suited hand holding up his datapad. “It’s almost a perfect cube. Not natural glass, but a synthetic crystalline material. It’s… well, how about that.”
Cho turned to face Saparun. He saw Lee look as well, a quizzical expression on his face.
“It’s not just a cube,” said the Mechanic. “It’s assembled from millions of smaller bits. Identical crystalline cubes, about ten millimetres each. The size of, what would be the human approximation?”
“Dice?” asked Lee. Cho and Saparun turned to look at him. He shrugged, “Small ones. Something like that.”
The Dosh returned his attention to his datapad, poking at it with one finger. “Each small cube contains something, but my pad’s scanners can’t make it out.”
The petty officer unslung a piece of equipment from his back, and stepped forward to offer it. “How about this, sir? The ground scanner we were using earlier.”
“Thank you, Lee,” said Cho. He took the scanner, deftly opening up an access panel and powering up the device. He pointed it in through the building’s door, toward the massive cube. After a brief moment, the display began to run with lines of data, scrolling too fast to read. Cho tapped the display to stop it.
“So…” he began, reading the information on the display. Saparun leaned in, trying to see over the Lieutenant’s shoulder. “Huh,” grunted the Mechanic.
Cho lowered the scanner, looking reverently at the glassy bulk. “My god. Each crystal bit has traces of DNA in it.”
Saparun took the scanner from Cho, holding it up so he could see the readout. “Each small cube is a different species, a few cells preserved in crystal. The structure wasn’t finished, but the scanner counts…,” he read the line again, “…almost eight million pieces. Eight million different species.”
Cho shook his head, his voice barely a whisper. “It’s an ark.”
“Apparently so.”
“They knew… they knew the planet was dying, so they preserved every species—”
“Every species they could,” interrupted Saparun. “The cube isn’t complete.”
“Okay, so they must have run out of time. They saved everything they could, preserved it here, in the hopes they’d come back and re-seed the planet.”
“Or someone,” said the Mechanic. “there’s nothing written anywhere, and the only information is in pictures. They must have suspected the next people on this planet wouldn’t be them. They hoped that whoever followed them would be able to do the reseeding.”
Cho tilted his head, looking at the Dosh out of the corners of his eyes. “So, they thought they were dying out as well?”
The Mechanic offered a small shrug, one hand upturned. “It fits.”
“Huh,” said Cho. He put one hand on the edge of the door and leaned in, getting a closer look at the massive cube. The beam of light from his helmet swung back and forth as he looked around the room.
Lee shifted his feet, his hands coming to rest on his hips. “Orders, sir?”
Cho pushed against the doorframe, standing back upright, and stepped back from the building. He pointed at the scanner in Saparun’s hands. “Okay, set that up here. Scan the cube, scan all the DNA in it. A complete scan of everything in there. And we’ll scan those images in the other building as well. Record everything.”
The Mechanic looked at the device in his hands, rolling it over as he looked for a way to stand it on the ground. “Scan the entire genetic code for eight million species? That will take a little while.”
“Yeah,” said Cho absently. “It’ll fill a few datapads as well. Gather up the team’s pads that still work; we might need them all.”
-----
Master Seaman Singh was proud of her medical bay. The counters, beds and other surfaces were clean, neat and well-organised. Regular passes with the steriliser kept everything free from dirt, germs and other unwelcome micro-organisms.
She sat at the bay’s small desk: a short stretch of counter where the medical console was mounted. Dragging her finger across the display, she scrolled through the results of her most recent round of testing. The ‘doggie drool’ infection that currently inhabited the Captain had been subjected to a battery of experiments, trying to find some drug or combination of drugs that would defeat the infection without producing life-endangering side effects. His body’s normal immune response — including a very high fever — had only made the infection worse. To keep his temperature down she’d been giving him Fevazon. It wasn’
t a solution, she knew, but it addressed the symptoms.
Her latest batch of twenty different drug combinations had all come back negative, which was frustrating. She opened a new file, compiling a list of what combinations she could try next. She was running out of ideas. The Captain was taking large quantities of antibiotics, which were able to keep the infection from getting worse, but her stock was running low. The Dosh Mechanic said that the organic fabricators weren’t sophisticated enough to create pharmaceuticals, but he’d see what he could do.
The silence was shattered by the sudden snap of the door unlatching, making her jump in her seat. As the door opened, she put her hands down on the counter and took few deep breaths to calm herself.
Turning to look, she was surprised to see the Tassali enter the bay, her eyes searching for and finding the medic.
Singh came to her feet. “Good evening, ma’am.”
The Palani woman smiled. “Good evening, Master Seaman Singh. Do you have a moment?”
“Of course, ma’am,” said Singh, motioning toward one of the examination beds. The Tassali stepped further into the room, but didn’t sit down. Although she had been in the medical bay before, she looked around as if here for the first time.
Singh knew the look. She’d seen it many times before; even once today already. It was the look of someone who had an embarrassing or awkward question to ask. She leaned back, her hands holding the counter’s edge behind her, trying to adopt body language that would seem approachable. She hoped she was getting it right. “Ma’am, anything said in here, stays in here. So please don’t feel embarrassed if—”
The Palani’s brilliant blue eyes flicked up to meet hers, and looked right through her with the calm certainty of a predator. It caught the medic off guard, and she fell silent.
“Master Seaman Singh, I need you to swear to me that this discussion will be private.”
The medic nodded. “Yes, ma’am. I absolutely swear it. A medic is a physician first, and a sailor second. Unless the ship is at risk, anything we discuss will be completely confidential.”
The blue eyes didn’t move from Singh’s. “You understand I will hold you to that.”
“I understand, ma’am. “
The white face relaxed, the blue eyes starting to look around the room again. “So. I am beginning a relationship with a human.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Tassali Yenaara looked at her meaningfully. “With the Captain. A physical relationship.”
Singh didn’t blink. “Yes, ma’am.”
The Tassali made a mental note of something. “The difference in body temperature is posing a problem.”
“Yes, ma’am. Human body temperature is thirty-seven Celsius, while Palani body temperature is nine point five. It would be difficult, if not harmful, for both of you.”
“I have raised my temperature to fifteen. I can raise it further through meditation, but it will soon begin to cause problems.”
“Yes, ma’am. Unfortunately, it will mostly be up to you. The human body cannot withstand a significant change in temperature, even if we try to acclimatise. A change of two to three degrees is enough to pose a health risk. Palani can change their body temperature significantly, if given time to acclimatise. But as your temperature rises, your blood becomes less efficient at moving oxygen. You will become lethargic.”
“So,” said the Tassali, “you have been doing research.”
Singh gave a small nod. “You’re one of my patients, ma’am.”
“Is there a solution, then?”
“I can give you an armband, and load it with something that will make your blood more efficient at higher temperatures. As you raise your temperature higher, you will need more and more of it. At thirty-seven degrees, you’d be using a ton of the stuff. And there is a danger, ma'am: if your supply runs out, your body’s oxygen level will crash, causing your system to slow down. You would pass out, and probably suffer widespread cellular damage. It could easily be fatal.”
The Palani had leaned back against the examination bed, her arms crossed in front of her. She was looking down at the floor, deep in thought. She took a deep breath. A smile crossed her face, and she began to slowly shake her head. “By the Divines, Feda,” she whispered, “you task me again.”
31
A smirk crossed Chief Black’s face. Cho's team had returned from the surface, triumphant and full of data. The ship was underway once again, onward to the next planet, and the crew's spirits were high. She clasped her hands behind her back and started to walk slowly across the bridge. “Okay then. It’s twenty-three hundred, and the Captain has gone nighty-night. Time to slack off?”
The three bridge crew, without looking up from their consoles, answered in unison: “Hell no, Chief!”
Black paused, raising her eyebrows, then continued her stroll across the back of the bridge. “And why is that?”
“Because the Chief never sleeps!” cried the crew.
The corners of her eyes crinkled as her smile grew wider. “Damn right. Carry on.”
Black turned her head to see Atwell’s reaction. The officer was bent over the counter at the back of the bridge, carefully writing in the ship’s paper logbook. She was shaking her head, her lips curled up in a small grin.
Lieutenant Atwell glanced up as the Chief leaned against the counter next to her. She quickly looked back to her writing, her cheeks blushing slightly. “I… I’m not very good at this,” she said.
“What, sir?” asked the Chief. She leaned over to get a closer look.
“Handwriting. This is the only time I ever use it. I feel like a medieval monk, hand-lettering a manuscript.”
“Or a psalter,” offered the Chief. “No idea what it is,” she said to herself, “...but I know monks used to make psalters. Is the ‘p’ silent, or is it more like ‘pih-salter’?” Black thought about this for a moment. “Probably silent. And your writing is fine. The paper log is important, tradition and all that. Like the watch bells, or ‘Roll to Quarters’, or saluting the stern when we come aboard. Plus,” her fingers drew small circles in the air, “all these computers can crap out, but a paper log doesn’t.”
“‘Rum, sodomy and the lash’,” mumbled Atwell, still writing.
The Chief kept watching the bridge crew, but her eyebrows jumped up her forehead. “Yes, please sir,” she said enthusiastically. “Best offer I’ve had all day.”
The officer stopped writing, her face turning bright red. “No, no, no… that was a quote from Churchill, ages ago. He was being dismissive of naval traditions.” She put her hand to her face, pinching the bridge of her nose. “Sorry Chief, I guess I can’t write and think at the same time.”
Black curled her face in an exaggerated frown. “Shame. Went and got my hopes up.”
“And it’s a book of psalms, by the way.”
“Sir?”
“A psalter is a book of psalms.”
The Chief momentarily glanced at her. “You’re kidding, sir. A pih-salter is full of pih-salms? Who comes up with this stuff?”
“It’s from the Greek, I think.”
Black grunted. “Only Greek I know is to yell ‘Opa!’ when they set your dinner on fire.”
“Which means…?”
She shrugged. “No idea, sir. Probably something like ‘Help, my dinner’s on fire’.”
With a quiet chuckle, Atwell finished her writing and carefully put the pen back in its holder. She turned herself around and leaned on the counter next to Black. “When do you sleep, Chief?”
Black shook her head. “Chiefs don’t sleep when they’re at sea, sir. We wait until we get back to port.”
“Is that so?”
“Aye, sir. Then we go out, get drunk, and go to bed. Maybe more than once.”
Atwell rolled her head to look at the Chief. She let her eyes flit up and down the woman’s length. “More than once, Chief?”
“Aye, sir,” said the Chief. Her face was unreadable, as she watched the crewmember a
t the helm. “When we get back, I’m going to hit Dief.”
“Diefenbaker Station? That place is a hole.”
Black nodded knowingly. “Aye, sir. I’m going to get drunk out of my mind, and go to bed, repeatedly, until I fall asleep.” Her eyes narrowed in thought as she talked to herself. “Maybe a guy this time. Or one of each. Twins? If we’re getting danger pay, I could do that.” She nodded approvingly. “Nice.”
“You don’t really—”
“As far as everyone knows, I do, sir. And that’s good enough for me.” She smiled at the officer. “You should come along, sir. Dief is outside the fraternisation rules. It’d be good for you.”
“Outside the fraternisation rules? I’ve never heard—”
“That’s what my Chief told me,” said Black. She shrugged, “And you never question your Chief. Besides, it’s not like we’re following the rules now.” She leaned a little closer to Atwell, lowering her voice to a conspiratorial mutter. “There are eleven relationships on the go among the crew, plus two more on-again-off-again soap operas. Frankly, I’m fine with it. We’re a long way from home, and not a hundred percent sure that we’ll ever make it back. We’re not going to prevent it, so I’ll stay on top of it.” She paused. “Figure of speech, sir,” she said, grinning to herself. “So when we do get back, come with me to Dief Station, and discover the secret port life of Chiefs.”
“Eleven? But…” the Lieutenant trailed off. “I couldn’t possibly. I need to...,” she looked away from the Chief, focusing her eyes elsewhere, “...I need to find a good man, settle down, that sort of thing. You know, family and all.”
When she turned her eyes back, Black was looking at her. “You don’t sound convinced,” said the Chief.
The Lieutenant pushed herself upright, stepping away from the counter. She put her hands in her pockets and turned to face Black, mustering a calm face. “Chief, we should probably…”