by Z D Dean
At some point during her movement to the command deck Samix had stopped walking without even realizing it. She grabbed a cup of sloop and finished her walk to the command deck. Using her command authority, granted to only the captain of a ship, she brought both Zade and Jorloss’s visual feeds up on the displays. Next to the visual feeds, Samix brought up a map which showed the real time position of the landing party. Markers showed the location of both men, but markers for the SSILF were missing. Samix attributed this to a coding error and thought nothing more of it. Finally, as she sat back in the command chair, she opened the men’s audio feeds so she could hear what was going on.
As the speakers crackled to life and the men’s voices became audible, she could hear that they were talking about her, of all things. Zade was explaining why he was interested in her. The defensive tone in his voice indicated that Jorloss had either accused him of something or threatened him before she started monitoring the audio. The men’s conversation quickly devolved into insults and talk of women. Samix intently listened, sometimes entertained and sometimes disgusted by what she heard. Her ears perked up as Zade began explaining to Jorloss the three traits the women of his species must have for him to be interested.
Zade explained that a perfect woman was athletic, intelligent and fun to be around. He continued explaining, in crude detail, why he was still single. According to him the women of his planet often embodied two of the three traits, but rarely had the full trifecta. He explained that those who were intelligent and fun were rarely in good shape. Women who were athletic and intelligent had the personality of a pissed off porcupine. And those who were athletic and fun were usually dumb as a rock. Zade concluded by conceding that he had only really interacted with women that hung around army bases, so maybe not all women were as he described. Maybe it was just the ones he had met.
With that Jorloss started talking about women on his planet. Samix snickered at the thought, knowing that Jorloss had never actually been to his home world. The chatter stopped as they came to the edge of the objective. Like their entry into the jungle, they had to cut through a dense patch of jungle to reach the objective. So far, the mission was proceeding flawlessly. Zade walked the perimeter while Jorloss began taking samples. Five minutes after the team hit the objective, the mission went sideways. The SSILF sent to protect the team began firing on them instead. Samix tried again and again to hail the team over the communications channel to no avail. Samix watched in horror as the team scrambled to regain the initiative. With the sound of heavy fire and Jorloss’s screams the comms went dead.
“Mur! Shut down the malfunctioning SSILF! They’ve turned on the crew,” Samix ordered, valiantly trying to maintain her composure.
“Negative, captain. They are not malfunctioning. I have assessed Zade to be a threat to the ship. As such, I took the proper steps to terminate him, and punish the crewman who badgered you into releasing him from captivity. Leaving him planet side will serve as his punishment,” Mur replied as the ship began its launch sequence.
Samix’s mind reeled. She tempered her immediate shock, breathing deeply, and quickly turned her thoughts to finding a solution. She knew that she would have to be the picture of control and poise, much like Zade was the picture of chaos and lethality. If at any point she lost her composure or made the wrong move, there was a good possibility that Mur would label her as a threat and try to neutralize her as well. Heart pounding, Samix pulled up the location data of the planet before the ship broke atmosphere and, using her interface, stored a photo of the data in her personal drive, thankful Jorloss had DNA coded it so Mur couldn’t access it. She knew Mur had no intention of allowing the ship back to the planet which meant that he would erase all data pertaining to it the first chance he could.
She knew the ship protocol. The ship would first break for high orbit, where it would calculate the warp data required for its first jump. For a long jump, the ship would periodically drop out of warp to recalculate data and ensure it was still on course. If her plan worked, the ship wouldn’t make it past its first navigation stop. Her plan was risky, and she would require the help of the only other crewman still aboard the ship.
The situation has CHANGED. Meet in my quarters for debrief, Samix messaged Axis through her interface.
“Mur, where are we headed now that the threat has been neutralized?” Samix asked as she headed off the command deck.
“We are returning to Unity space. With only two crewmen this ship is no longer capable of completing its original mission.”
“Very well. I am headed to my quarters for a shower,” Samix said as she exited the command deck.
One of the perks of being captain was that the captain’s quarters were designed to be private. The walls were insulated to prevent sound from escaping or entering, and most importantly they were the only quarters that Mur could not monitor remotely. The design went so far as to sever the connection between an individual’s interface and the ship as soon as they entered the room. Many captains enjoyed the privacy while still allowing data inflow from the ship in order to receive alerts and notifications while they rested. It was the only place on the ship where Samix could formulate a plan and update Axis without threat of detection. Samix hoped that by playing along and maintaining her composure, she would not raise Mur’s suspicion.
With the door to her quarters closed securely behind her, Samix opened her personal drive to ensure the photo of the location data was present and legible. She waited for Axis to join her so she could enlist his help. Minutes, which felt like days, passed before Axis pounded on her door. Before the door was completely open Axis stormed in clearly agitated from being pulled away from his work. As the door closed, he began his rant about how inconsiderate it was for Samix to pull him away from his research.
“If you’re finished, we have much bigger problems than the study of new rocks,” She said, irritated, not just with him.
The insulting disregard for his work silenced, Axis who stood sulkily waiting for an explanation. Samix quickly explained how Mur had turned and tried to kill both Jorloss and Zade while they were on the planet. Now the ship was headed back to Unity space leaving the two, if they were still alive, stranded. Axis’s mouth fell open in disbelief.
“But, why?” he asked, finally able to speak.
“Mur classified Zade as a non-crew threat and is punishing Jorloss for allowing him out of containment.”
“That’s absurd! Zade has saved all of our lives at least once,” Axis protested.
“Which is exactly why I need to stop Mur and get them back,” Samix retorted quickly. “I could really use your help.”
“Zade saved my life same as you, I owe him,” Axis said, a look of grim determination settling on his face. “What do you need to me to do?”
“We need to reset the AI, but we can’t do that while we are in warp space, which means that we have to wait until we drop out for a nav stop. According to the computer, we have 12 hours.”
Axis sat down on the couch in the quarters and began to brainstorm different ways that they could accomplish their goals. Next to Jorloss, Axis knew the most about the ships systems and how they functioned. The two were deep in thought when Samix spoke up.
“Can you cause the material recycler to malfunction without raising suspicion?” She asked.
“Sure, but how does that help us?”
“If it goes down, I will have an excuse to go down to the subdeck where I can access the AI core and manually reset it.”
Samix went into detail about her plan. Just before the ship dropped out of warp, Axis would cause the recycler to malfunction. Samix would move to the subdeck, appearing to be down there to fix it. While down there, Samix would position herself directly outside the AI core where she would wait until the ship dropped out of warp. The instant the ship was in real space, Samix would reset the AI. While the AI was resetting Axis would use the computer systems in the medical bay, which Jorloss had reprogrammed to be completely separate
from the AI, to add Zade to the crew roster. The AI would reset, pull the new crew manifest and recognize Zade as a member of the crew. After agreeing with the plan, Axis brought up one minor problem with it. The AI would take a couple of hours to reset, time when ship power and life support would be shut down. The oxygen levels would drop to dangerously low levels before the AI completely reset and turned them back on.
“I know that’s a risk, but we are the two hardiest crewmembers on the ship. Both of us can withstand the cold, and I can stand the oxygen deprivation. After you change the crew roster, grab whatever you need to survive from the medical bay, and seal yourself in your quarters. I will put myself into stasis and wait it out,” Samix said.
“That sounds great for me, but even in stasis, two hours without oxygen could kill you.”
“It’s a risk I have to take.”
After agreeing on the plan, the crewmembers continued their routine so they did not raise suspicion. Samix stretched out on her couch, thinking over the plan, while Axis headed back to his lab to feign work while the ship neared its nav stop. As she thought about the current situation, Samix became more and more irritated. Not only at the fact that two of her crewmen were in danger, but more at the fact that she couldn’t even get the male AI of her ship to respect her. This train of thought led to her thinking about Zade, the only man, next to Jorloss, who valued her abilities and respected her both as a captain and a person.
Thinking about Zade and Jorloss made her replay the last sounds and images from the mission. To her distaste she found herself more worried about Zade than Jorloss. She felt terrible about this because Jorloss was her best friend, while she had only known Zade for a short while. She knew that she heard Jorloss screaming on the audio, which meant that, either injured or terrified, he was alive. She couldn’t even hear Zade moving over the gunfire or any indicator that he was incapacitated by the initial volley. She spent the entire 12-hour trip lost in her morbid thoughts. The notification that the ship would drop out of warp in 10 minutes snapped her back to reality.
While in his lab, Axis thought of the best way to disable the recycler. As the smallest member of the crew, he was often tasked with fixing it when it broke. Axis knew that the recycler had three openings; the one in the robotics lab and one in the terraforming lab were large, and meant to handle large objects. The one in the galley was only meant to handle small waste items from the food processor. Knowing these key facts about the recycler, he stuffed the largest wrench he could find into his back pocket and headed to the galley for a meal. After grabbing a tray from the processor, he sat down directly on the uncomfortable wrench in his pocket. The mild discomfort, he hoped, would ensure his actions didn’t look malicious. After removing the wrench from his pocket and setting it on the edge of his tray Axis pushed his food around aimlessly, too worried to eat anything. When the countdown timer for the nav stop hit 30 minutes, Axis grabbed his tray, still holding the wrench, and tossed it down the recycler chute. The wrench hit the small grinding wheels at the bottom of the chute and firmly wedged in between them, stopping the machine cold. Muttering some nonsense to strengthen the illusion of an accident, Axis pulled off the top of the chute and pretended to examine the damage, waiting for Samix to arrive. Samix walked into the galley as the countdown timer hit 10 minutes.
“What the hell did you do to my ship this time?” she asked.
“Sorry captain. I think I got a wrench stuck in the chute. Shut the whole damn thing down.”
“Why did you even have a wrench? You know what, never mind. Get back to work, while I go down and take a look at the damage.”
With that fallacious reprimand, Axis went into his quarters where he anxiously waited for the emergency lighting to kick on, signaling that Samix had started the AI reset. Samix headed down the nearest stairwell to the subdeck. Unlike the upper decks, the subdeck was cramped with different machinery. To allow for the maximum amount of equipment to be stored, the walkway was nothing more than a crawlspace. Samix meandered down the crawlspace pretending to be lost. She was moving slow enough to ensure that she would be just outside the AI core when she felt the ship drop out of warp.
With the sharp jolt that accompanied the ships reappearance into real space, she hit the access button to the core. The AI core was housed in a hexagonal space which had different colored quantum connections leading out from the center where the AI was housed. Before she could fully clear the access way, the door slammed shut on her left foot trapping her just out of reach of the manual reset handle.
“You are in an area you are not authorized to be in. You are threatening the survival of this ship,” Mur’s voice informed her over the intercom, its menace echoing through the small space.
The crushing pain in her trapped foot grew to unbearable levels as she stretched for the handle. At that moment she regretted not getting a pain block like Zade’s. Despite herself, she smiled remembering the day he told her about it. Stretching made the pain worse, but the handle remained out of reach. With the pain growing to maddening levels, Samix collapsed into a hopeless pile. As she did, she felt a hard metal item in her pocket. It was a knife Zade had made for her after explaining how he never went anywhere without one. Flipping it open, Samix leaned down towards her trapped foot and sliced down the side of her boot. The now open top of her boot gave her just enough room to slide her foot free from the door and start the manual reset. The newly freed foot hurt more than when it was trapped. Samix had just enough time to drop into stasis before she passed out from the unbearable pain.
The ship went silent and emergency lighting came on: Axis’s signal to move. He jumped out of his chair and headed to the medical bay. The computers in the medical bay housed all crew records and could be run on emergency power. This allowed the crew to continue providing medical care even if the ship was damaged and lost power. Axis headed to the nearest computer and pulled up Zade’s personnel file, which contained all of the information required to be added to the crew roster. Axis pulled up the crew roster, and by using an administrative bypass, began altering the underlying code of the file. Quickly, Axis created a new entry and began inputting all pertinent information from the personnel file. Satisfied that his work would go unquestioned, he backed out of the files and began scavenging for supplies to outlast the life support shutdown.
He knew that he could survive the shutdown without any equipment, but there was no reason to be uncomfortable. The first thing he grabbed was a six-hour oxygen bottle with attached breathing mask. He had been to planets with low oxygen levels, and although he could survive, Axis hated the constant feeling of suffocation that limited oxygen situations produced. Next, he grabbed two emergency heated blankets. While he waited for Samix to make her move, he had done some mental math. If the ship was in deep space, in two hours the interior temperature would drop to nearly -150 degrees. Again, he could survive the low temperatures, but why not do it in comfort? With everything he would need for the shutdown, Axis headed back to his quarters to play on his interface and wait.
Exactly two hours after power loss, the emergency lighting was replaced with the ships standard lighting. The AI core had completed its manual reboot. Axis ventured out of his room just as the Mur’s voice came across the intercom.
“Welcome to the XES01, Unity exploration vessel.”
As the only conscious crewmember aboard, Mur continued to Axis’s interface, I require that you validate important information.
Only one conscious? What is the status of the captain? Axis asked, hesitant and confused.
Captain Samix is on the subdeck incapacitated from injury. Are you prepared to validate information?
Yes…whatever, just make this fast. Axis said as he headed to the subdeck to find out what had happened to Samix.
This is an experimental exploration vessel tasked to explore the galaxy we are currently located in. Mission duration undetermined.
Correct.
This vessel is crewed by five personnel: Samix, ca
ptain, subdeck. Axis, geological scientist, subdeck. Farn, anthropologist, deceased. Alex Zade, security officer, location unknown. Jorloss, medical officer, location unknown.
Correct. The last two wouldn’t be lost if you hadn’t gone crazy earlier.
Axis, please explain. Mur requested.
“No. Just get in your frame and assist me in helping the captain. When she comes to, she can tell you what she thinks you need to know,” Axis snapped aloud rather than through his interface.
The thought of the captain being injured and hearing how two of his fellow crewmembers were lost had irritated him. During the computer’s questioning, he had made it down to the subdeck and was standing outside of the AI core. Using his highly sophisticated sensory organs, he could see that there was something jamming the door. Upon further inspection he identified it as Samix’s boot. It had been so badly damaged by the door that he couldn’t even tell if her foot was still in it. What he did know, which made the situation even more urgent, was the smell of fresh blood was emanating from under the jammed door.
Lacking both Samix’s composure and Zade’s determination, Axis was quickly becoming more panicked with every unsuccessful attempt at opening the jammed door. He first attempted was to use the door controls, which he quickly learned were unresponsive. His second attempt was to use strength to force the door open. Even when using all the strength his high gravity modified body could muster, the door didn’t budge. As a last resort Axis returned to the door controls. He knew he had the strength to tear the cover plate off the controls and he did just that. Thinking that the control panel may have been damaged, he set to using the exposed wires to force the door open. With the appropriate circuitry connected, Axis touched the wire bundle to an exposed power wire. He was rewarded with the sound of the door motor laboring; the door moved a fraction of an inch but no more.