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Quantum Stills of a Thin-Spun Life - Part 2

Part 2

By Theresa McGarryPublished 7 years ago 20 min read
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Journeyman Engineer Ned Shinichi stood with both hands poised over the instrument panel. It wasn’t hesitation, he told himself, it wasn’t apprehension or fear or anything negative. No. It was awe, pure and simple.

A whole row of instrument screens and monitors he’d never seen active had lit up as he entered the room to look for one of his tools that had gone missing. He’d been in this unused room briefly the day before as part of his inspection routine, not for long, but it was possible he’d set the tool down and left it. It would be unlike him to be forgetful, more like Fosdyke, the Engineer Master Chief. Shinichi’s braided tie of black-and-gray bore only a silver band, but Fosdyke did little of the actual work any more and more of the workers looked to Shinichi for instructions and leadership. He deferred to Fosdyke, his mentor and father figure, for whom he hadn’t lost one iota of esteem, careful to allow the older man to keep his dignity, but Fosdyke, if he was aware of Shinichi’s carefulness, gave no sign of it.

Fosdyke said last night in the Workshop when the two men drank their hot cups of carob as part of their nightly ritual that he ‘felt’ something was ‘up’ with the ship. Shinichi murmured something not meant to be understood or interpreted as anything except respectful acknowledgement that he was listening. But Fosdyke had gone on talking about how the ship felt different, the space they were in felt different, and for sure the air itself felt different.

There was a lot of worry about the monads. And now the crazy idiots had blown a hole in the supposedly unbreakable bulkhead. They were still investigating that. How had the monads done it? How had they known how to do it? Did they have exosuits?

Shinichi drew in a deep, steadying breath. Came back to the present moment. He lay his palms down on the panels. His touch produced no immediate effect. He didn’t expect it. But then he didn’t expect the heat either. Or the tangible vibration. Turning his head slightly, he gazed thoughtfully at the middle screen, the Core interface. Deliberately he moved so that he could lay his palm down on the indentation clearly meant for such a movement. The vibrations increased incrementally until…

Identification confirmed. Continue. On the interface screen.

Excitement threatened to overwhelm his heart. He sat down in the chair where no one had sat for as long as he could remember. And on a deep breath, he put his fingers on the keypad and began to manipulate them so as to respond to the machine.

And in the back of his mind was the thought that Fosdyke, again, had been exactly right. Something definitely was up with the ship.

He wanted details to tell the Master Chief. Hell, he wanted answers himself and he was determined he’d find them.

A chill brushed over his neck as if a malevolent spirit had glanced in his direction. But he ignored it. He didn’t believe in spirits, bad or otherwise.

So he missed the telltale shadow of the blow before it fell.

* *

Lanh sat on the bank of The Lake. It was called something, but no one called it anything except The Lake. There was only one body of water this large. Other smaller bodies of water existed elsewhere, holding ponds and streams that ran along the edge of the peach and apple orchards and the great forest in Mechanical (or so he’d heard). It was calm here. Peaceful. Wildflowers (or so he called them) grew in colorful profusion; blue, red, pink, bright yellow and purple. It was the one place in the world where clouds hovered sometimes and he loved the clouds, more than the glimpses of darkness and the blurs of brightness seen through the sky strips.

Hardly anyone came here. He didn’t know why. This was where the fish liked to come, but there were nets to catch the right-sized fish downspin from The Lake. Lanh gazed thoughtfully at the shimmering water’s surface, imagining the mindless fish swimming their fishy lives away. He felt sorry for them. But he liked to think about things, not just do them. Only this morning his father had scolded him for staring at an apple rather than eating it right away.

He scooted out from under the hawthorn, crawling into the stand of birches and then farther so he could lie back, hands clasped behind his head as he stared up, not at the farmstrip but in-between.

The sky strip. Was there something else? Something above the sky?

No one wanted to talk about such things. Except Naera. But she was almost a grown-up and maybe she’d stop talking about it when she reached her eighteen-T. She’d probably be busy and that was good because he liked her and he thought she’d make a good Governor. A lot of people said she was still too young, like her creepy Uncle, but others said what did it matter, her dad had been Governor and she was his daughter and that’s all there was to it. Couldn’t be much fun, having to make decisions all the time and for other people. Lanh was glad he didn’t have to do it and he wouldn’t even if someone offered him all the carob in the world. Or a toy. Or even a flasher game. He grinned at the thought because Naera had promised him that when she finally took the Governor’s Oath that she’d see that he did get a flasher game because then she’d have legitimate, official access to the Core, games included.

And thinking about flasher games Lanh realized that he saw something flash. He focused. Trying to remember what he’d seen. Trying to remember where. Was it on the farmstrip? Or--

And there it was again. A quick, bright flash.

Above?

His heart skipped uncomfortably in his chest. He sat up, not taking his gaze off of the spot where he’d seen the flash. He didn’t want to miss it, if it came again. And he knew it would. And there it was, so brilliant it almost hurt his eyes to look at it.

He had to tell someone. It could be dangerous. He marked where he was, the origin of the flashes by the k-markers along the sides of the farmstrips, and leapt up to his feet, already running.

He tripped in his surprise when a bird flew nearly in his face.

A bird?!

Lanh stopped and looked around. But the bird was gone. He’d seen it, he knew he had, but he didn’t think anybody would believe him. The only birds that existed were in the flasher games. In all of the world, no one had ever seen a bird fly. Never.

A funny little chill ran over his skin. Lanh looked over his shoulder.

And the bird was right there, sitting on the limb of a birch tree, its dark eyes watching Lanh. It tilted its small, feathered head one way and then the other, as if it were trying to figure Lanh out the same way Lanh was trying to figure out about the bird.

“Allo,” Lanh said softly, coaxingly, the way he would to a dog he didn’t know well. He took a step toward the tree. The bird shook its feathers but didn’t fly away. Lanh took another step. And another. Stopped. The bird craned its head so it could look down with one eye. Lanh could see a flicker of an eyelid or something over the dark eye. The bird was beautiful, with white and brown chest feathers and soft gray feathers that looked almost blue on its wings and the top of its head, its beak dark at its sharp tip. But as beautiful as it was, he also knew, from his scant plugged-ins from early years-T to his experience in the flasher games that this was a dangerous creature, a hunter, and it would be stupid to think that just because it was small that it was not a threat.

Kind of the way that people thought about him. Well, he wasn’t a threat, but he was smarter and faster than people gave him credit for. Except for Naera. She saw him when she looked at him.

He felt like the bird saw him, too. And he got another one of those weird chills so that he rubbed his hands on his arms.

The bird watched him, tilting its head to look at him with its other eye.

“I’m too big for you to eat,” Lanh said with a grin.

And as if that was the bird’s conclusion, too, it soared off the limb and into the air, circled above Lanh’s head and glided toward The Lake.

Reflected in the water, a bright flash of light seared Lanh’s eyes. The bird seemed to fly through the shaft of light, the shining down and the reflected up, so that it was encased in a strobing cage for a few moments, and then it was gone.

Lanh stood for a few precious moments staring at where the bird had been, looked up in time to see another, less bright flash, before he turned. And this time he ran.

* *

“So you hit your head.” Fosdyke sat in the only chair in the medic station, thick arms folded across his chest. He wasn’t tall, but solidly built tending toward fat these days although no one in the mechanical torus accepted his nightly invitation for a wrassle unless they were very drunk.

“No,” Shinichi said with obdurate patience, trying not to wince as the medic cleaned the wound on his scalp. “Someone hit me.”

Fosdyke raised his eyebrows and shook his shaggy head of reddish-brown hair. “And why would someone do that?”

“I don’t know.” Shinichi gritted his teeth as the medic ran the seamer over the wound. He knew it had to be done, but he hadn’t even had a skinned knee since he was four-T and he’d forgotten how much it hurt. “Maybe because I was interfacing with the--”

“They’re not active.” Fosdyke’s tone was both skeptical and reproachful.

Shinichi shot up his hand to grab the medic’s wrist as he turned his head to gaze directly into Fosdyke’s eyes. “What?”

Fosdyke sighed heavily. “You heard me. I checked out the whole bank of machines in the room where we found you, every screen and possible interface. Dormant. Just like they’ve always been. Maybe you were dreaming or hallucinating.”

The medic, Dal-Chang, rolled her eyes. “Probably a little of both. He took a hard hit.”

“I wasn’t--” Shinichi began and stopped, gritting his teeth again, this time in frustration.

“He needs to rest,” Dal-Chang said to Fosdyke who nodded agreement at her.

“No,” Shinichi said and broke away, walking out before either of them could grab him. He went quickly, not knowing why he felt the need for haste, but knowing that haste was required. Even so, it took him nearly ten minutes to reach the room from the medic station because it was nearly a quarter torus spin away.

He entered the room and paused as the lights slowly brightened at his presence, without command. He surveyed the screens and panels. All dark. Silent. He walked toward where he’d sat. Leaned forward to put his palm in the hand-shaped indentation.

Nothing happened.

Straightening up, he heard the sound of footsteps and the heavy breathing of someone who has run faster than he was used to.

“You’re almost as stubborn as I am,” Fosdyke said, wheezing a bit.

Shinichi didn’t dispute it. But this wasn’t about stubbornness.

It was about duplicity. And he hated lies. It was one of the reasons he preferred machines to people. Machines didn’t lie.

He turned and brushed past Fosdyke who fretted at him, trying to follow as Shinichi returned to the Workshop. Shinichi found what he needed and strode back upspin to the room, with Fosdyke throwing up his hands and following more slowly. The Engineer Master Chief didn’t try to stop him, didn’t try to say anything else, just watched with exasperated skepticism, arms crossed over his chest again as he leaned heavily against the wall, trying to catch his breath.

Shinichi removed the scanner from his belt pouch and plugged it into the outlet just above where he’d interacted. Frowned until he read the results. Unplugged it and took it over to Fosdyke.

“Well?” And the big man peered at the scanner’s screen. Frowned much as Shinichi had. Took the scanner out of Shinichi’s hand to peer more closely. Then he looked up and over, toward the sleeping bank of machines. “Damn.”

Shinichi said, “I didn’t want to plug in and ask the Core, that might have been corrupted, too. But the energy usage is automatically recorded.”

Fosdyke nodded almost absently, his thoughts clearly going on some other path. He handed the scanner back to his journeyman. “We’ll have to investigate this more thoroughly.”

“We need to post guards.”

Fosdyke nodded again, his expression reflecting some of Shinichi’s grimness. “We do. Two at a time.” He surveyed the room critically. “And let’s get some active scan monitors in here, too.” He met Shinichi’s eyes. “We’ll call an assembly, tell everyone what you told me, so more people know.” He gestured widely at the room. “You set up the scan monitors and I’ll go set up the assembly.”

Shinichi allowed himself a sigh of relief after Fosdyke had gone. He didn’t realize how much the old man’s skepticism had disturbed him until it was replaced by acceptance. A slight throbbing in his wound reminded him that he had other things to worry about, like— who hit him?

And why?

* *

Xie knelt to remove Doc Quy’s shoes. The elderly woman looked more her age than usual, but it had been a difficult thirty-six hours. With her eyes closed, the map of wrinkles in her face clearly visible, Xie thought she looked both tired and incredibly wise. When those dark eyes were open, the startling intelligence made one forget the gentle wisdom and remember only the keen mind. Xie put the shoes aside and picked up the moistened cloth to gently wipe her Physician Master’s feet. She then carefully folded the cloth and set it aside as well. She picked up a small jar, unscrewed the lid and dipped two fingers into the salve inside. Rubbing the salve between her palms, she began massaging Doc Quy’s feet.

It was a ritual that had begun with a great deal of reluctance on Doc Quy’s part. She thought it was demeaning to expect a physician-apprentice to perform such a task. But Xie finally convinced her that it was a privilege. She was glad she’d done so because she knew that the Physician Master suffered and wouldn’t admit to suffering. This small task relieved some of that suffering.

When she had finished massaging the doctor’s feet, she gathered up her massage things and rose to her feet. She put the things away carefully and retrieved the nettle tea that had been steeping. She brought the cup to Doc Quy between her hands.

“Physician Master,” Xie said quietly, “here is your tea.”

Doc Quy opened her eyes. She smiled and sighed, lifted one hand slightly. “Just set it there. Thank you, child.”

Xie set the hot, ceramic cup on the small table beside the chair. She didn’t mind the appellation, understood it was affectionate. The Physician Master never used the term when anyone else might hear it, it was only at such private moments as this not just because it would have been inappropriate, but because they were both sensitive about Xie’s age.

Normally this would be her signal to leave, to return to her own apprentice quarters on the other side of the Infirmary. But Xie hesitated, stood there with her hands folded in front of her, until the older woman finally lifted that penetrating gaze.

“You’re disturbed.”

“Yes.” Xie’s fingers hurt because she’d been clasping them together so tightly. She relaxed them with conscious effort. Took a deep breath. “I’ve studied very hard. I know some things to be true, about the body, how to make small, neat stitches that will heal a wound to an almost invisible scar, about herbs and decoctions.” She paused. “I thought some things about the world to be true, too, that there could never be anything like a hole in one of the sky strips!” Her voice rose as she said it and she fought for control again in the face of her Master’s serenity. “If it is not true, then can other truths be wrong as well?”

“Hmm,” Doc Quy said thoughtfully. “That is an understandable logic chain, but faulty.”

“How so?”

Doc Quy picked up her cup and sipped at it delicately, then held it between her hands as she spoke. “The world is like a body. It can be harmed and it can be repaired.”

“Can it die?”

Doc Quy looked up, her expression vaguely troubled, which frightened Xie. “I have never mindfully considered it, but I have to believe that, yes, it can die. All that we know of life tells us that a living creature or system goes through cycles and must be vulnerable to death or what resembles death in organic life.” As Xie contemplated this somberly, Doc Quy continued: “I will ask one of the machiners.”

“I can go find one to ask,” Xie offered, although approaching the starboard passage made something quiver deep inside her. But she’d do that rather than take one of the wells through the habs. She wasn’t fond of losing her sense of up-and-down, the way one did if one traveled into the habs, not to mention other perils, including the habbers themselves.

“Perhaps,” Doc Quy said, “if one doesn’t cross our paths in the next few days.” She sounded very tired. She sipped at her tea, set the cup down and lay her head back with great weariness.

Xie bowed respectfully although the Master couldn’t see her do so and left the older woman to rest. Xie closed the doors to the Master’s room gently, sliding them in their groove. She walked quietly away, going past the Infirmary with only the briefest of glances through the transparent doors to ascertain whether a new emergency had occurred in the last hour, but all seemed calm, so she continued until she reached the wooden structure that housed the apprentices. She paused before she went inside, surveying the curved line of the world above her head and then she looked anspin toward the port passage that led to Control and Command. No one ever traveled that passage except for the Governor and once, Doc Quy herself, to treat one of those who resided there. When asked what it was like, Doc Quy had replied only that it was very clean. She’d brought back fresh peaches. Xie still remembered the taste of the pie.

From upspin she heard the bleating of the goats on the Kestors’ farm. And immediately following the familiar noise she felt a tremor beneath her feet, a shifting wobble that almost dislodged her from where she stood. She grabbed the doorjamb, holding tightly until the wobble ceased. It was only seconds, but it felt longer. Her heart beat wildly in her chest. She should go check on the patients in the Infirmary, she should go check on Doc Quy, but she couldn’t force her feet to move or her hand to leave the solid feel of the doorjamb.

She’d felt world wobbles before, but never this strong. And she couldn’t help but look upspinaft toward what she couldn’t see, but knew to be the starboard passage where the hole had appeared. She was learning to be a doctor, to treat the sick and injured, to make them well, to keep them well, but she didn’t know how to treat the sickness of the world.

Tomorrow. If she didn’t see a machiner tomorrow, she’d seek one out, however she had to do it.

* *

Parke sat down in the command chair and plugged into the Core. He felt his neck twitch, felt nerves twing as the connection was secured. He didn’t need to close his eyes, but he found it easier to view the overlays without distractions.

Captain Parke.

Yes. I need information.

Ready.

You now have all the available data on the hull rupture near the starboard passage between the colonists’ torus and the engineering torus. Was it a result of sabotage or structural stress?

Sabotage.

Parke let out a deep breath. Can the saboteurs be monitored without alerting them that it’s being done?

Not without violating Charter privacy laws.

Parke felt his eyebrows lift slightly. He’d never heard of such laws. What is the reference?

In the original Colony Charter granted before Outbound broke orbit, it was stated implicitly that the crew of the Outbound could not, by overt or covert means, intrude upon the privacy of any individual or group or all colonists unless it was unequivocally determined that a criminal act had been perpetrated or was in the process of perpetration by said individual, group or all.

Parke blinked as he absorbed this. His heartbeats picked up speed; he could feel his pulse thrumming in his ears. This could not be new information, not if it was from the original Charter, but he’d never heard it referenced. Maybe it was understood? Maybe that was why they left the colonists alone even when they slipped into their delusions? Because he wasn’t supposed to violate their privacy unless a crime was committed? But he and the crew didn’t do that either--they let them make and carry out their own justice. Or they had.

Sabotage of the ship is a crime against all, including the ship itself.

Yes. Understood. Active monitoring initiated. An odd pause. Apologies for not instituting precautions previously. This persona could not act upon self-preservation only.

His severe scowl caused a spike of pain between his brows. Persona? Parke forced himself to relax the grip of his hands on the armrests of the command chair, made himself take three slow breaths. Forgiven. But you must bring any potentially harmful conditions among the colonists or to the ship to my attention immediately. We’re all in this together.

Yes.

Parke waited, but nothing more was forthcoming. After a measured few moments, he pushed slightly. Is there anything I need to be aware of at this particular time?

There is an explosive attached to the main water tube at section delta-127. If the device is activated, it will disrupt water distribution. The probability of injury and death to ship’s biological entities is ninety-eight percent.

Parke took the time to thank the Core before he unplugged and stood up from the chair. He lifted his wrist comm and spoke. “Engineering!”

It took several, terrible minutes before anyone answered. “Um, engineering here. Who is this?”

“This is Captain Parke. We have a serious situation. There’s a bomb at delta-127. I’m sending people down in suits but we need engineers to get there, too. Figure out the nearest lock to that section so we can just get it off the ship.”

“A bomb?! My God . . . yes, Captain! We’re on our way!”

Parke grabbed the edge of the doorway after it had opened, stepped through the opening only long enough to say crisply, “Noguerra. I’m glad you’re here. Find Commander Zennor. Both of you need to get suited up. We’ve got an emergency.”

* *

Forgiven.

* *

artificial intelligencefuturehabitatscience fiction
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About the Creator

Theresa McGarry

Astronomy buff, NASA fan, I began writing science fiction at age eleven. I sold two science fiction stories and was a Finalist in the Writers of the Future. I was an award-winning scriptwriter for the audio Star Trek fan series, Defiant.

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