New to Other-Terrestrial? Check here! Or if you need to, jump to the beginning of the episode here!

---

The P’G’Maig shuttle looked nothing like a standard shuttle.  Nothing about it was reasonable or practical.

It was triangular, with spikes that extended from each angle.  They were over ten meters long, and made the whole craft unnecessarily large.

But that was surely the point, Brooks thought.

It certainly helped that the ship was plated in gold and platinum, shined to an almost mirror-like finish.  It was over the top, and very consciously so.

“Good for reflecting lasers, I suppose,” Urle noted over the live feed back to the Craton.

“I’m sure it has other defenses as well,” Brooks commented.

“Captain, we should not be discussing such things,” Decinus chided.

Brooks nodded to the other ship – only under magnification was it visible to the naked eye.  “I guarantee you that Ks’Kull is noting our shuttle’s defenses as well.”

Decinus frowned, but said nothing else.

Their destination was visible, if just barely.  Ks’Kull would not agree to board the Craton, no matter the guarantee, and Brooks would not let himself or Decinus go onto the Hev flagship.  So they’d had to compromise.

The small floating station was as close to neutral ground as could be had.  It was little more than a boxy rectangle, shielded against radiation, that contained a single room and two airlocks.  It had the barest minimum of computers, maneuvering thrusters, and general mass, so each side could be as reasonably certain as possible that it was not a trap.

He’d brought it, but allowed Ks’Kull to send in his troops to check it under supervision.  So many layers of potential tricks and traps . . .

Ks’Kull had had a list of demands that had to be appeased prior to agreeing to a face-to-face.  Only four members to each delegation, no weapons, and N’Keeea was not to come.

Brooks had been fine with all but the last, but N’Keeea himself had shrugged it off.

“It is wise,” he had said.  “If Ks’Kull was there, I would try to kill him myself.  And if I was there he would wish for me to be killed.  Anything else would be foolish.”

He’d actually demanded an open recording made, which Brooks was happy to allow.  Let anyone see; it would help make everything as transparent as possible.  Not that anything about this would be secret; they all would be recording for posterity.  It was the only way to be sure nothing underhanded was done, and that everyone’s word was honored afterward.

The most odious part to him, though, was Ks’Kull’s final demand.

“I will not make deals with one who has not killed.  Your diplomat is nothing to me – it would insult me to speak with it.  But you, Captain Ian Brooks, your reputation is known.  You do not approach my greatness – but you have known blood.  Therefore you will speak on behalf of your people and the disgusting, reviled, traitorous, filthy T’H’Tul.”

“Very well,” he’d agreed.  It wasn’t like he had a choice.

It was not his forte, and not where he wanted to be.  But Decinus had wisely pointed out something; “I may be the diplomat, Brooks, but you seem to know the Hev far better than I.  Therefore it may be best if I simply assist you.”

For the rest of his party he’d picked Logus and Kell.  Or, at least, the latter had asked.

“Absolutely not,” Brooks had said.  “This is going to be an extremely delicate matter, Kell.  I mean no offense, but you have a tendency to be far too blunt for me to even-“

“Do you trust the Hev?” Kell asked.

Brooks paused.  “No,” he admitted.

“That is why I must go.  He will not play by the rules that have been set.  Why should you be so foolish?”

“There is,” Decinus said carefully, “The issue of your . . . presence, Ambassador Kell.  While I understand other species do not feel it as keenly as humans, it will be detrimental if Ks’Kull felt threatened by your presence.”

“Then he will not feel it,” Kell said.

And as he said the words, the unnerving pressure that they felt simply was gone.

Brooks found himself almost uncomfortable with the feeling of normality.  “Is this difficult for you?” he asked Kell.

“It is an effort,” he admitted.  “But difficult?  No.”

Brooks looked to Decinus, then back to Kell.  “So long as you swear you will not speak unless I directly speak to you and will follow all my cues, I will welcome your presence, Kell.”

“I give my word,” Kell replied.

And now Kell did not even look like himself.  He had taken the guise of a different person, one heavyset with a balding pate, and wore the uniform of a Response Officer, sans unit insignia.

Logus seemed fascinated by it.  “Did anyone see him change?” he asked the others.  “Kell, how hard is it for you to do that?”

“To change shape is the natural state of a Shoggoth,” Kell told him.  “It is holding it the same that takes effort.”

“Remarkable,” Logus muttered.

Their shuttle was now approaching the meeting room.  Brooks scanned it again, and Urle fed him the results of his own scans from the Craton.

“Still detecting nothing suspicious on their ship or in the meeting cube.  Once you dock, though, we are incommunicado.  Best of skill, Captain.”

“Thank you,” Brooks said.

He looked to the others.  “Initiating docking procedures.”

The shuttle docked without incident, and Brooks stepped into the antechamber leading to the meeting room.  His system indicated that Ks’Kull’s shuttle was still docking, but everything seemed normal.

“Ambassador Decinus, I would appreciate it if you take our gift forward,” Brooks said.

Decinus nodded, taking their diplomatic gift; a meeting with Hev demanded such an offering, and theoretically Ks’Kull would offer one in return.  Just what he would offer would indicate highly how he viewed the coming meeting.

---

< Ep 6 Part 27 | Ep 6 Part 29 >

New to Other-Terrestrial? Check here! Or if you need to, jump to the beginning of the episode here!

---

Iago looked at the return message from Kai Yong Fan.  Pirra had forwarded his message to her, though he’d requested it go to the Captain.  Apparently, Kai had not felt it was actually worthy enough to go that far.

At least, that was how it seemed to him, as he read her response.  He could hear Kai’s words in there, transposed into Pirra’s own thoughts.

Kessissiin’s idea – that he’d typed up in his own words, though of course crediting the Dessei – were, apparently, not important.

“At this time we have no reason to believe the P’G’Maig will attempt any hostile action against the Craton or its crew.  Our mission requires us to be present in the system, therefore the unlikely threat of an attempt to capture the vessel is not sufficient cause to violate our orders.”

He’s forwarded it to Kessissiin, who had accepted it with seemingly no problem.

“They did give praise for our initiative in modelling such scenarios,” he’d pointed out.

But he didn’t know Kai enough to understand the rudeness of her dismissal.

Sure, they couldn’t just abandon the mission, but that wasn’t his recommendation!  He’d just suggested pulling further out towards the fringe, to forestall an enemy attack.  Any one of the large Kuiper Belt objects could have provided cover.

He felt drained.

There were not many people in the canteen at this early hour, and Elliot was sitting next to him, holding a toy dinosaur that kept attacking his fries.

“Ahhhh!” he cried, as the raptor’s mechanical jaws crushed a piece. “Not the crunchy bits, they’re the best part!”

The sight of his son playing was the best thing he’d seen lately, and while normally he didn’t want Elliot to have toys at the table, he would not even consider stopping him now.

Someone else walked into the canteen, and he looked up sharply.

It was Apollonia Nor, the Cerebral Reader they’d picked up on New Vitriol.

He’d only met the woman in passing, though he had heard that she’d volunteered.  He could respect that, though he’d also heard some rumors that her performance was far below par.

The woman had looked at him, then looked around.  She started to come over.

He found his stomach falling as she came closer, and a pall of gloom seemed to close in.  She must have wanted to talk to him, and he couldn’t fathom why.

“Hey, are you Iago Caraval?” she asked.  She seemed nervous, but something about her made him think that she was trying to seem that way.  Trying to get him to let his guard down.

“Yeah,” he said shortly.  Elliot looked up at her, but then back down as his raptor took a piece of bun from his hamburger.

“Could I, uh, ask you some questions?” she said, stumbling over the words.

It seemed a calculated level of it, he thought.

“What about?” he said, feigning ignorance.

“I just thought I’d ask for any tips.  To being in Response, I mean!  I know I’m not in the big leagues, but you’ve also been leader of the field teams for a long time, right?”

“I was,” he said.  “Nowadays, I’m just a volunteer like you.”

So that was it; she was trying to learn classified secrets of his Response teams.  The only question was why and who for . . .

Part of him wanted to report her.  But, he thought bitterly, who would listen to him?  Kai had made clear already she didn’t trust his judgment anymore.

“Oh,” she said.  “Well that’s good – I mean, you don’t have to risk your life anymore, right?” She fidgeted awkwardly a second.  “I’m just doing really badly.  I want to do my part – you know, each according to their ability and stuff?”

Suddenly Iago felt uncertain.  Apollonia was . . . a kid.  Not even long out of her teens.  What if she was just honestly coming to him, an old hand – even if a washed-up one – and asking for advice?

He suddenly found that he couldn’t come up with any words.

“Listen to your non-coms, trust your team, and don’t take unnecessary risks,” Elliot chimed in.  “That’s what Dad always says to me!  Well, he tells me teachers, not non-coms, but I know that’s what he’d tell you.”

Elliot beamed at him, and Iago’s confusion shattered into a pride and joy he’d not felt in a long time.

“That’s right,” he finally said to her.  “Just like that.  Your non-commissioned officers are old hands – they know how to get things done and how to keep people safe.  And your team are your lifeline.  Each according to their ability, yes, but it is together that we accomplish great things.  And . . . yeah, don’t be a hero.  We have more than enough names in our list of dead.  The goal is to save lives, not to try for glory.”

The words came out easily, and he felt a lightening of his heart as he said them.  His eyes glazed over as, for a moment, he felt like himself.

“Excuse me!” a new, cold voice said.  It had a cheeriness in it, but devoid of life, and he knew that it was Dr. Y.

“Doctor,” he said curtly.  He’d let his guard down and the doctor had snuck up on them.

His pulse rate increased and he felt his cheeks flush.

“Oh, Y, hi!” Apollonia said, smiling brightly.

Ah, of course she was close to him, Iago thought.  The Doctor was oh-so friendly to everyone.  To the point that it had always rankled him.

“I am sorry to intrude on your conversation and meal, but I have a request from you both,” he said.  “It is not for medical reasons, merely for a personal science project.”

“What is it?” Apollonia asked.

“I require some of your blood,” Y said.

“Oh,” Apollonia replied.  “You just took some from me the other day . . .”

“Yes, well, that was for medical reasons,” he said.  “Ethically, I cannot use it for a personal project – nor can I command you.  I can only-“

“I LIKE BLOOD!” Elliot said, holding up his dinosaur, the long-extinct animal’s jaws moving precisely as if it was speaking the words.

“Oh, naturally,” Y replied.  “Zhenyuanlong suni was almost certainly a hypercarnivore and therefore would have enjoyed quite a bit of blood, I am sure!  Much more than french fries.”

“But they are sooo delicious!” Elliot added, sticking another fry in its mouth, which it obligingly chewed.

Apollonia laughed, but Iago cleared his throat loudly.

“I’m afraid not, Doctor,” he told the machine.  “And if you don’t mind, I’d like to enjoy the rest of my dinner in peace.”

Dr. Y bowed and shuffled away.  Apollonia rose to follow him.

“Sorry to have bothered you,” she muttered.  “Thank you for the advice.”

She ran off after Dr. Y, and Iago couldn’t help but wonder if they had planned together to get a blood sample from him.

He just didn’t know why.

---

< Ep 6 Part 26 | Ep 6 Part 28 >

New to Other-Terrestrial? Check here! Or if you need to, jump to the beginning of the episode here!

---

Brooks paced his study with long strides.  They took him to the side of the room in only three steps, whereupon he had to wheel and start again.

His system told him that Urle, Decinus, and N’Keeea were on their way up to his office, mere moments off.

And it was an effort to hide his anger.

The door chimed.

“Enter,” he said sharply.

The three came in; first Urle, showing no sign of being shaken up after nearly getting missiled, then Decinus – and N’Keeea last, but Brooks held up a hand.

“Ambassador N’Keeea,” he said gravely.  “I’ll have to ask you to wait outside briefly.”

The Hev seemed more responsive than Urle had initially described him, but said nothing, merely nodding.

Brooks was not concerned with him running or causing trouble – his every move was being monitored.  But he didn’t want the Hev to hear what he was about to ask.

“How is the Bright Flower?” he asked Urle.

“Her heat radiators deteriorated a little during the jump back,” Urle replied.  “Which was not unexpected.  Other than that she’s holding together fine.  It will take her a little longer than normal to charge up for a jump, but that can’t be helped.”

“No crew dead or injured?”

“Some bumps and bruises.  Captain Daa sprained two limbs holding N’Keeea in his seat, but they’ll be healed within a few hours.  She’s not complaining.”

Brooks accepted it with a thoughtful nod, looking down and away.

“Excuse me,” Decinus said.  “But I feel the largest matter here is the status of our negotiations.  With an attack by the side we came to help, it seems clear to me that our presence is no longer wanted.  We have little reason to stay in-“

“Wrong,” Brooks said.  “We did not receive any official word to such an effect from N’Keeea, their ambassador.”

“But they tried to kill him as well as us!” Decinus protested.

“An unfortunate accident,” Brooks said, clearly distasteful of the idea of playing it down.

“Captain, I do not think you are being rational here,” Decinus said, his own words turning sharp.

“I am not,” he agreed.  “However, I am right.  Can you truly walk away and leave the Tul to die because of this?  No one was killed, and the damage was minor.  In a few hours we’ll have the Bright Flower repaired to the point where it will be like it never happened.  It is a ghost in the data.  But the Hev on Poqut’k are not ghosts – not yet.”

His eyes met Decinus’s.  “Do you still disagree?”

Decinus sighed.  “Now I see the truth of the rumors about you, Captain.  No, I will not abandon those lives if I can help them.”

Brooks looked to Urle.  “What did the Bright Flower find?”

“Find?” Decinus asked, looking confused.

Urle looked to the ambassador.  “The Bright Flower has a great suite of extremely good sensors.  We were gathering information during our entire time there.”

He looked back to Brooks, opening his hands.  “What Hev are alive down there are well-hidden in deep bunkers.  Poqut’k is smaller than Earth, and older, too, so they’ve been able to dig very deep – we’re talking kilometers under the surface.  Short of a planet cracker, they’re going to be fairly safe.  It looks like the Maig have launched a lot of nukes, even a lot of asteroids, but none yet have been large enough to kill them all.”

“Yet,” Brooks replied.  “How many do you think are left?”

“That’s hard to tell, but our best estimate is around ten billion.  How they’re faring is an even bigger question, but they’re still producing weapons – the parts of the missiles we recovered from the Bright Flower’s hull seem to have been manufactured in the last few months.”

“And they’re Hev design, not sold to them by the Fesha?”

“They don’t have any hallmarks of Fesha engineering.  I already ran tests on it, and the ore likely originated from Poqut’k.  They sent a fair few after us, too, so that suggests they’re not running low.  This war could drag on for a hell of a lot longer, I think.”

Brooks began pacing again.  “I think it’s already gone longer than the Maig would have liked.  We’ve seen signs that they’re adding engines to a rock that’s fifteen kilometers wide.  It may already be in transit – and then it’s a matter of months before it hits.”

“Bigger than the one that caused the K-T Extinction,” Urle noted.  “The seismic waves alone will collapse all their underground bunkers even if it doesn’t hit them.”

“God,” Decinus said.  “Do you truly think the Maig would do that?  Will the Tul not surrender?”

“Let us ask our ambassador,” Brooks said.  His voice rose.  “Ambassador N’Keeea, please enter.”

The door opened, and N’Keeea came in.  His head was not held high, but level, a sign that while he was not evidently feeling defiant, he was not going to simply submit, either.

“Why did your people shoot at the Bright Flower when they knew you were aboard?” Brooks asked.

“They view that I have failed them,” the Hev replied simply.  “And I have.  We have no hope left.”

“Will they truly not accept the idea of withdrawal if we can arrange it?” Decinus asked.

N’Keeea hesitated.  “I . . . cannot say with honesty that none would wish to leave.  But in practicality – no.  None will.”

“Why?” Urle asked.  “Surely it is better for some to survive than all to die!”

“We are not fanatics,” N’Keeea replied sharply, then sighed.  “But during times of war, our military clans hold more sway than most.  How can they not, when Hev wars are to the bitter end?  All must be for victory.  Dissent is not tolerated.”

The room fell quiet for a moment, then Brooks asked; “So are they executing those who wish to flee?”

“Most likely,” N’Keeea said.  “The military clans are born and raised on the idea that nothing is too much to sacrifice for victory.  And if victory is not possible, deny the enemy everything.  Even our lives.”

His eyes whipped over them all.  “Before you judge – for I know your kind view the universe differently – to be captured by your enemy is not simply a dishonor.  There are no rules in a war such as this to protect those who are captured or surrender.  The Maig will have no mercy.”

Urle looked to Brooks.

Brooks was only looking at N’Keeea, though.  “As far as we are concerned, N’Keeea, you are still the Hev Ambassador.  Do you wish for us to leave?  Or continue to try?”

Confusion spread across N’Keeea’s face, followed swiftly by elation.

“I still request your aid on behalf of my people,” he said.

Brooks nodded.  “Well, then.  There we have it; a formal request.  We’re going to have to have a talk, though, Ambassador.  It’s going to be a very difficult talk that neither of us are going to enjoy.”

N’Keeea was silent a long moment.  Then; “You mean about what my people are willing to give up to survive.”

The words sounded almost painful for him to say.

“Yes,” Brooks agreed.  “This will cost you more than anyone.  We can attempt a deal, without your government’s approval.  It may be for nothing, but . . .”

“If we have something to offer, some may take it,” N’Keeea finished.  “Enough that even our military caste can’t stop them.”

“That’s right.  And once we have that hammered out, then I think that it is time we talk to Overlord Ks’Kull.”

---

< Ep 6 Part 24 | Ep 6 Part 26 >

New to Other-Terrestrial? Check here! Or if you need to, jump to the beginning of the episode here!

---

It seemed all too soon when Vakulinchuk sent out his alert for them all to return.

“Suit up!” he called.  “We’re going in hard vacuum!”

They’d already had lessons on the suits – were wearing most of the pieces, just lacking a proper helmet.

Every uniform, including hers, had a pop-up head cover that would activate in the event of pressure loss – giving even those caught unawares by a hull breach a chance to survive.  It was no substitute for a proper spacesuit helmet, though.

As they buddied up, she got Knowles, who seemed more nervous now, though she smiled.

“First time in a vacsuit?” Apollonia asked.

“Ah . . . no.  I’ve done hull welding in a shipyard.  Supervising drones, mostly, but when there’s nothing to do but watch, you go out and do it yourself a few times, right?  Helps pass the time and gets extra work done.”

“Oh, yeah.  Naturally.”  Apollonia had never done that.  Hell, she’d never been outside a station in a suit before.

Her throat felt dry.

She pulled on her helmet and clamped it, hearing the click of a good seal.  The faceplate was a screen, and she got to see a nice proper HUD for once.

Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad!  There were some errors due to her lacking the subdermals for the suit to interface with, but she closed those warnings.  They weren’t a huge deal, the suit was telling her.

“Check your partner’s seals.  You don’t want to be out there and then find out you’re leaking air,” Vakulinchuk said through their radios.

Knowles checked her, and then gave her a thumbs-up.  Apollonia went to check hers, and immediately forgot everything she’d been told.

No, she knew this, she thought.  She just had to focus.  But it felt so stuffy in this helmet.  Air was circulating, and it was cool, but she still was feeling hot.

Everyone else was done with their checks.  She fumbled through the rest of her check on Knowles as best she could, then patted her to tell her she was good.  She honestly wasn’t sure.

“All right, everyone,” Vakulinchuk said.  “Activate magnetic boots and stiffeners.”

She clicked that on.  Her feet stuck to the floor, but almost more importantly, the suit went partially rigid.  If not for that, then walking in zero-g even with magboots was a nightmare; you could put a leg forward, but your torso would want to stay behind, and you’d just end up bending backwards as your feet moved on without you.  Unless you were quite strong, it was extremely difficult.  With the suit stiffening at strategic times and places, it was manageable.

“Connect your umbilicals and activate your beacons.”

She turned on the latter first – never, never wanted to be without that!  If you drifted off without a beacon, no one would ever be able to find you.  The nightmare, just drifting off into the Dark, with the demons and ghosts and spirits . . .

She swallowed through a dry throat as she connected her umbilical to the ship.

They went into an airlock.  It was a small, claustrophobic room, and she could hear the sound of air hissing out – fading into silence as it thinned too much to even carry noise.

The doors opened, and she saw endless stars.

“March!” she heard.  Knowles started, and she began after her, but her throat felt like it was closing up.

“Nor, are you all right?” she heard.

She tried to speak, but she couldn’t.  Her stomach was rebelling, her throat was spasming – and then she threw up.

Some part of her suit broke, flopping down into her face, and she flailed, reaching for her helmet even as she began to choke.  Without gravity, it was impossible to even get the vomit out of her throat, and she began to gag, threatening to get even sicker.

“Help!” she cried – or at least tried to cry, but she couldn’t talk.

Excited voices were saying something, and Vakulinchuk was there, calling for the air to be brought back.

“And gravity, for star’s sake!” he cried.

It was back in a moment, and suddenly Apollonia was able to spit, though she was still choking.  The air was coming back, and it took an awful long time before Vakulinchuk was able to take off her helmet.

He put something on her face.  “Just let it work,” he said, though through instinct all she could do was fight and flail.

The device sucked the vomit out of her, and then gave her a gulp of air, and she gasped loudly.

She was on the floor now, stars swimming in front of her eyes, the whole rest of the team clustered around, looking at her.

“Spread out, spread out,” Vakulinchuk said.  “You’re all sitting ducks just standing here like this!”

She appreciated it, but it seemed like her humiliation was already complete.

“I think,” she said, then coughed.  “I don’t like vacsuits.”

“That seems obvious,” Vakulinchuk replied dryly.  “Let’s get you back up.  We have some meds that might help with that.  Just let me get a pharmacy drone over . . .”

He stepped away, but she didn’t want to wait.  She struggled to her feet, feeling bitterly annoyed that now when she actually needed help to stand, no one was offering a hand.

She wasn’t sure she could have made herself take one right now, anyway.

The airlock was opened back into the main room, and she went through.  Before Vakulinchuk returned, she moved towards the door.

She’d had enough training for today.

“Nor!” she heard Vakulinchuk call as he noticed her.  She waved him away and went out, tearing off the vacsuit as she went.

She wanted to curse, scream, or cry.  God this was pathetic.

She couldn’t do this.  Why did she ever think she could?

As she stalked down the hall, she expected to get a message from Vakulinchuk, throwing her out of the Volunteers, or threatening her with dire consequences if she didn’t come back.  But that message didn’t come; she only got one saying that she could take the rest of the day off, but to report again tomorrow morning.

Fuck!  Couldn’t they at least be properly mad?

She turned a corner, holding one of her gloves, wanting to hurl it down the hall, when she walked into Squats on Sand.

“Oh!” she cried, her leg hitting his shin and bouncing off.

She stumbled back, but one of the weird tentacles around the top of his head shot out and grabbed her shoulder.

“Oh, Apollonia!  It’s good to see you.  I was not lurking in the area – just . . . I was working,” he said.

That was a very odd thing for him to say.  And as he stumped around, she realized he could hardly lurk even if he tried.  She was shocked she hadn’t even registered that low-tide smell that seemed to follow him around – he practically reeked, though for her at least it still brought to mind positive memories of Earth.

“Okay,” she said.  “I . . .  I was just leaving training.  I failed.  Miserably.”

“Really?” Squats on Sand asked.  “That’s terribly distressing – what’s wrong?  Are they being . . . unjust?  I’ve heard sometimes humans are that way to other humans!  Abmon do not have that issue, there’s so few of us we all know each other.”

“I didn’t know that,” she replied dully.

“Well . . . it was a joke.  There are tens of billions of us, despite our populations being relatively small.”

“All right,” she replied.  “Look, I’m sorry, I’m just . . . I threw up in my vacsuit, and here I’m from a colony!  Everyone expects us to take to space like it’s second nature, but I never went outside to play with the micrometeors.  I just . . . stayed in my corner.”

Squats on Sand went silent, his body sections rotating so three of his eyes could view her at once.

“You’re quite upset,” he said, as if just realizing it.  “I am sorry.”

“You don’t have to apologize.  I’m just being a whiner,” she said.  An attempt at a smile tried to come to her face.  “Do Abmon ever do that?”

“Hah, never!  Well, sometimes.  If one of us eats all the grack!”

She had no idea what that was, but forced a smile.  It was easier with Squats on Sand than most people.

Dark, how strange was it she got along so much better with aliens than other humans?

“Is there anything Abmon don’t do better than us?” she asked, getting that this was some sort of joke of his.

“Ducking,” he said without hesitation.  “I’m afraid we’re in full squat all the time, and- Dr. Y, hello!  I was not lurking here, I am in this area in an official capacity!”

Hearing Y’s name got her attention.  She turned and saw the AI – or his tall, mechanical body, at least – standing behind them.

“By all means,” he said genially.  “Do not let me interrupt your important work of conversing.”

“Y!  What are you doing here?”

“Conveniently,” he said, “I was coming to see you, Nor.”

“Why me?” she asked.  Not that she minded, but it seemed . . . well, convenient, as he had said.

“Trainer Vakulinchuk informed me you were having an issue with nausea, and I thought it would be a nice break from my own work to come myself.  I could have sent a drone, but they are very impersonal.  Along that topic, Armorer He That Squats on Yellow Sand – haven’t you left a drone in charge of the armory for a period of time greater than is allowed in protocol?”

The Abmon did an odd sort of hop in place that achieved no air.  It seemed impossible to think they could jump at all.

“Ah, well,” he said.  “That is a valid point.  I should perhaps be on my way.  I am sure that all is well there, but I should check.”

“Farewell,” Y said happily, as Squats on Sand ambled away.

“I think he was actually lurking here,” she said to Y.

“Yes, that is an appropriate word,” Y replied, his voice brimming with amusement.  “Though he is actually quite dedicated to his work when he is actually doing it.”

He turned to her.  “Now, this is a good chance to give you a medical check-up.  If you will come with me, Nor, there is a medical suite not far from here!”  He began to walk away.

“Wait,” she said, not following him.  “Didn’t I just get a checkup recently?”

“Yes,” Y said, turning back to her.  “But it is always good to get another.  The march of entropy is inevitable, after all!”

Apollonia took a deep breath.  At least she could be around the one being who she didn’t actually fear would judge her as useless.

“Okay,” she said.  “Lead the way.”

---

< Ep 6 Part 23 | Ep 6 Part 25 >

New to Other-Terrestrial? Check here! Or if you need to, jump to the beginning of the episode here!

---

Apollonia breathed hard, straining to bring more air to her burning lungs.

“Heave!” Vakulinchuk ordered.

Apollonia had thought she was already heaving – she felt ready to heave in another way – but she tried to exert herself even more.

“Go on, you almost have it!”

With a cry, Apollonia and those at her sides succeeded in lifting the plate of metal.  It was, theoretically, a piece of hull that had had punched into the ship in a mock-attack simulation.  Now, as the ship was ostensibly still under attack, she and the others were attempting to clear it from a hall.

Normally, she knew, they’d have some kind of lifting equipment.

But when they’d come in for their volunteer training today, Vakulinchuk, their trainer, had told them that they would have none of it.

“Power is not always available,” he said.  “Robotic arms malfunction.  Sometimes we must make do with the muscles of our back and with sweat on our brow.”

She’d felt so stirred by the idea.  At first.

But now, she was just exhausted.

It didn’t help that they’d been at this for days.  Sure, at first the training hadn’t been this difficult.  A lot of trust tests, which admittedly she had sucked at.  She’d dropped one man, who at least had laughed it off.

Vakulinchuk had taken her aside and talked to her.  She’d expected to be chewed out, but his words were reinforcement instead.

“We are all in this together, Ms. Nor,” he had told her.  “We must work together – and that means to trust each other, even with our very lives.”

And everyone had done that, it seemed.  Only she’d had more trouble trusting than anyone else.

No one had let her fall.

And the more they went through it, the worse she felt.  Because she didn’t always catch them, and she knew she was supposed to.

“All right, we have to flip it just one more time to get it into the cart!” Vakulinchuk exhorted.

She really wondered what kind of situation would have them lacking power arms and exo-suits but still have gravity – but she wasn’t going to question the man who’d been in Response probably longer than she’d been alive.  He had that ageless look about him.

She had fallen on her rear, and struggled to her feet.

God this sheet was heavy.  Bracing herself behind it with the others, they lifted and flipped it onto the wheeled cart.

The others cheered at their success, but she was too tired to do that.

“Fifteen minutes,” Vakulinchuk said.  “Then we’re going to practice operating in vacuum.”

Oh, that just sounded awful.

The others in her group didn’t seem nearly as exhausted as she felt.

She’d never had a full-time job before.  She’d done odd jobs, stolen, or begged all her life.  The former had never lasted long, the second was always risky, and the latter was, well . . .

People who didn’t have a lot still often gave.  But not when things got too tough.  And it was demeaning.

It was the only good thing she could say about prison; that they gave you food.

On the Craton it was different, of course, and no one had ever even bothered her about paying for stuff.  On some level she knew it wasn’t exactly free, but she also kind of thought she was just in a new, slightly more dignified level of begging.

As the others spread out, talking and looking generally so pleased, she found herself loathing her own self-pity.

Vakulinchuk was off to the side, gazing off, clearly busy at work in his own personal system.

She moved towards him, into his line of sight, but waiting.

He didn’t keep her looking wrong.  The man had a large mustache and a broad face, but his eyes were kindly.

“What do you need?” he asked.

“Ah, sorry to bother you . . .”

“It’s not a bother,” he said.

“I’m . . . well, are there any kind of . . . strength-enhancing things I can use?  I mean, even just a lever, like a crowbar.”  She smiled nervously.  “We’ll still have those if the power goes out, right?”

“Yes,” he said, looking amused.  “But it was more about getting everyone to lift together, than just solving it the best way.  We’ll get to that sort of thing.  Right now, we need you all to work together under stress.”

“That makes sense.  But I feel like I’m a lot weaker than everyone else.  And a chain is only as strong as its weakest link, right?”

“We’re not going to be in combat, Ms. Nor, so you don’t need to worry so much.  Focus largely on working with the others.  They’re counting on you, as you are counting on them.”

More like getting carried by them, she thought.

A frown crossed his face.  “Though now that I’m checking your records, have you ever had muscle treatments?  I’m not seeing them listed.”

“No,” she replied.  “I can’t get anything like that.  My body rejects them – when I got one for my bones as a kid it made me sick for months.  Still never fully took.”

“Oh!” the man said, shocked.  “Well that explains a lot.  The artificial fibers meld with your muscles and make them quite a bit stronger, you know.”

“Yeah,” she replied.  “But I’m just working with what nature gave me.  And I guess generations of genetic tinkering and rad damage.”

Vakulinchuk looked thoughtful.  “This would explain your difficulties, Ms. Nor.”

“So . . . does this mean I can use an exosuit?” she asked hopefully.

He chuckled.  “It takes years of training to use them.  And sub-dermal implants, to be honest . . .”

“I don’t have those, either,” she said, deflating.

“Don’t worry.  You volunteered, and we appreciate the help.  Each according to their ability, right?”

“Right,” she echoed, not buying it.

The man clapped her on the shoulder and went away, and she checked her tablet.  Still five more minutes of their break.

As she moved back towards the others, she heard them talking.

“. . . ship was fired upon – by the Tul Hev.”

“But we’re here to help them,” a woman said.  Apollonia thought her name might have been Knowles.

“They did it anyway.  It seems they got out, but only just.  I don’t know what we’re even doing here if the people we’re trying to help are shooting at us.”

“It seems like a big warning sign,” Knowles agreed.  “And this Maig clan – have you heard much about them?”

“I’ve heard enough to know I don’t want to have to fight them.  They say they torture prisoners . . .”

“Hell, I’ve heard they eat them.  I never really believed that one sapient being would eat another, but . . . there are a lot of stories.”

Apollonia was not enjoying eavesdropping on that conversation, and she moved away.

---

< Ep 6 Part 22 | Ep 6 Part 24 >

New to Other-Terrestrial? Check here! Or if you need to, jump to the beginning of the episode here!

---

Urle’s internal clock noted that it was only twenty-two minutes later when they received a signal back.

“We have received a one-word reply,” the comm officer said.  “‘Yes’.”

Urle sat up.  “Ambassador, are you ready to speak to your people?”

The Hev nodded, holding himself a little taller.

“Receiving live signal.”

This time, the signal was video as well as audio.

The Hev that appeared before them was tall, with broad shoulders and a face that seemed like it had been mangled at some time in the not-too-distant past and healed only crudely.  Yet it fit with the flinty eyes.

“Ambassador.  Who are our new allies?” the Hev demanded curtly.

N’Keeea said nothing, but gestured to Urle, who stood.

“Greetings, in the name of Union Humanity.  I am Commander Zachariah Urle-“

“Human ship with Sepht crew?” the Hev demanded.

“Right now I speak to you from a Sepht ship that accompanied us, but these are the only Sepht in the system.  But I am afraid we have not been introduced-“

“How many ships have you brought?” the Hev demanded.

“We are two, counting this one,” Urle said.  “May I know your name?”

“Two ships?!  Are you an advance force?  How did you get past the P’G’Maig?  Are there more than this engaged with them already?”  The Hev sounded alarmed, angry, and confused all at once.

“Sir,” Urle said.  “I can explain – we have achieved permission to pass through the lines.  We are not here to fight for you – we are here to negotiate with the P’G’Maig for your survival.”  He gestured to N’Keeea.  “Our Ambassador, Decinus, will tell you more.”

The Hev would have none of it.  He let out a strangled sound of rage, reaching forward for the camera, so quickly and furiously that Urle wanted to recoil.

The signal cut off.

N’Keeea was cringing.

“Th-that was Grand General G’Kaackt . . .” he said softly.  “But he . . . I am afraid he does not place much belief in negotiations . . .”

Decinus looked quite worried.  “Let us try again in a moment.  Perhaps after the General takes a little time he will be willing to speak to us again.”

“Captain!” a sensor officer cried.  “We are being painted with targeting lasers!”

Urle bit back a curse.  “Maneuvering thrusters, pull us back-“

“Missiles have been launched,” the sensor officer continued.

Urle’s threat board was already lighting up.  Stars, that was a lot of missiles.

“Why are they firing on us?!” Daa said, glaring at N’Keeea – who, for his part, had nothing to say, simply folding his head over and putting both hands over his snout.

“Ambassador – is this a warning, or a real attack?” Urle asked N’Keeea sharply, watching the distance tick down.  The nearest missile would reach them in thirty seconds.

N’Keeea said nothing.

“They would not dare to attack us!” Decinus said.  “We’re here on their behalf!”

Urle watched the missiles come closer.  “It seems they do not agree, Ambassador,” he said.  He waited a few more seconds, until he felt sure that this was not merely a warning.  “Arm all PDCs, engage countermeasures – break their damn locks!  And pull us back, we can drag those missiles through some dense debris fields if we move . . .” he sent the signal to the engines, getting them to move already.  “This way.”

Daa was up in N’Keeea’s face.  “Ambassador, we have to know if this is a false attack or not!” she was saying sharply.

“Leave him be, Captain,” Urle ordered.  “I need you to take command – helm, give me control access.  Defense grid, let me interface with the PDCs.”

The ship was smart, like all ships, but he could add his own intellect and reaction speeds to both endeavors.  Sitting back in his chair, he lost visual with the rest of the command center, leaving only audio on, and began to see through the eyes of the sensors.

A handful of missiles had struck debris as the ship had put it between them.  Not too smart, then.

The Bright Flower had very little in the way of armaments, not when so much of her space was taken up by her specialist equipment.  But at least that equipment told him a lot about the missiles.  He scanned them all, noting any that seemed jittery, like they had a bad thruster.  A lot of them did, and he devised a counter-fire pattern that could exploit that, predicting their likely maneuvers, and aiming to put flak into those paths.

They had only two missile tubes and a dozen missiles of their own, but several were designed for destroying enemy missiles, so he loaded them and with the ship’s help gave them headings.

“Two away,” he declared.

The missiles were twelve seconds out.  The Maig had, at least, detonated theirs by now.  And these were far more threatening – not just because the Bright Flower had far fewer defenses, but the missiles themselves were larger, with heavier payloads.

Several were intercepted and destroyed by the counter-missiles, others by their PDC fire in short, controlled bursts.  But they didn’t get them all.

“Rotating the ship – all crew, brace!”

Most were already in their seats, but Daa and N’Keeea weren’t, the ship told him.  Through the eyes of the ship’s internal cameras, he saw as the Sepht Captain grabbed N’Keeea, throwing him into his seat and herself over him, gripping on with every limb.

Urle tried to slow the turn as much as he could so as not to hurt her; but it would be close.

He couldn’t dodge the last two missiles.  But if he angled the ship just right . . .

He felt the g-forces pulling at his body, saw Captain Daa holding on for dear life.  Just a few more seconds of these Gs . . .

The ship rotated on another axis, and he hoped his calculations were right . . .

“Brace for impact!” he cried.  A klaxon was going off, a deep, throbbing sound for Sepht ears.

The ship shuddered as it was hit.

But the alarm sirens were not declaring catastrophe; he fired the counter-thrusters, finding they all worked, while damage reports poured in.

“Impacts,” an officer called.  “On radiators 7 and 31.”

Urle turned his vision back on, decoupling from the system.  He saw the eyes of the crew looking at him, almost in awe.

“You moved the ship so they’d hit the radiators instead of the main body?” one asked.

He saw that two crew members were helping Captain Daa, who looked nearly unconscious.  He moved over and helped bring the Captain to her seat.  She had risked her life to save N’Keeea, who was still just sitting there, saying nothing.

“Yeah,” he finally answered the crewmate.  “Too much risk of loss of life if they hit the hull.  Or a reactor breach.  Are there any other launches?”

“Negative, Acting-Captain.  We’re pulling back, and they’ve stopped target-painting us.”

“Continue to pull back,” Urle ordered, feeling suddenly exhausted himself.  Daa was rapdily coming to, and he was grateful for that.

“Damage report,” Daa said, shaking her head, rubbing a tentacle across her brow.

“The two radiators are at 32 and 17 percent efficiency – all others fully intact.  Debris from the hits caused minor damage to seven sensor nodes, and pierced three spots on the hull – decks 7, 8, and 12 have depressurized hallways, but not in occupied areas.  A minor leak from water tank 3.”

“Casualties?” Urle asked.

“None that we know of, Acting-Captain,” the officer said, his relief palpable.

Oh thank the Stars . . .

Urle’s legs trembled, and if they’d been in gravity he might have had to lock his knees to keep upright.

“Captain Daa – how are you?”

“I’m fine,” she said shortly, glaring at N’Keeea.  “What are your orders?”

“Given that she’s your ship, I’d like to know your recommendation,” he said.

“We get the flaff out of here,” she grumbled.  “And put Ambassador N’Keeea in the brig.”

Urle looked at the Hev, who was now shivering as well as unresponsive.  “I agree with the former.  As to the latter . . .”

Decinus stepped over, putting his hands on N’Keeea’s shoulders.  “Please,” he said.  “Allow me to speak with him.  He was just fired upon by his own people.  I don’t think it takes an expert to understand that he is having some difficulties.”

Urle took a deep breath.  “I agree, Ambassador.  Take him somewhere, see if you can get him calm enough to talk to us again.  But as soon as the zerodrive is charged, we are heading back to the edge of the system.”

---

< Ep 6 Part 21 | Ep 6 Part 23 >

New to Other-Terrestrial? Check here! Or if you need to, jump to the beginning of the episode here!

---

The code flashed by on the screen in great chunks, as Urle uploaded the data from his internal server to the ship.

“I am surprised you still remember all the code,” Decinus said, looking rather awed.

“It’s easy when you have a disk drive in your head,” he told the man with a chuckle.  “I wouldn’t say I remember it the way we remember names or paths we commonly walk.  It’s just . . . stored up there.”

He saw the look Decinus gave him, studying his head, wondering just what it might look like inside Urle’s mind.  Not everyone was prepared to accept giving up parts of their own bodies for self-improvement.

Urle had never really felt that attached to his meat.

“You are certain that this will not interfere with our proper emergence from zerospace?” Guona Daa asked, hovering around like a concerned mother.

Which, she might be a mother, Urle thought, having to force himself to look past the fact that she was around the same height as Hannah, with a smooth enough face to look young.  All Sepht had a youthfulness about them, especially Vem Em, even when they were well over a hundred.  And they had children almost as soon as they reached adulthood, their eggs only needing fertilization every three or four generations.

“It has no appreciable effect on any craft,” Urle assured her.  “I was deeply involved in this project, and it was only scrapped because the use-case is so uncommon.”  Well, and people tended to get a little concerned about messing with their zerodrive, much like Daa was right now.

“Now,” he continued, “I’m going to need a few minutes to adapt this to your system, Captain.  Shouldn’t be too hard.”

He plunged into the ship’s library code that dealt with heavy power switching and zero-drive core control loops.  The Sapient Union’s Information Security and Standardization Committee required all naval system code to be written in the Iota language and be available to all engineers onboard with proper clearance.  Urle knew Iota, but digging into Sepht code wasn’t easy – while they technically obeyed the requirements, their code was a mess of higher-level Iota mixed with chunks of opcodes specific to their processor cores that were yet to get included in the official compiler specifications.  All in the name of efficiency.  It seemed like squeezing just a couple more cycles from their CPUs was a kind of sport for them.

“What the . . . ?” Urle barely bit that one back.

Of course they invented a fancy macro name to replace all literals of the number three in the code – it was considered a very unlucky number, and four was considered even worse, making its references even more difficult.

Vem em programmers always took their work too seriously in his opinion.  This was just some virtual text that would get gobbled up by the compiler after all, but they still put just a little bit of their tradition into it anyway.

Urle fired the compiler up, observed the lack of any warnings or errors from the integration system, ran it five more times just to be safe, then took a deep breath and exhaled.  It was ready.

“All right,” he said, turning to N’Keeea.  “Whenever you are ready, Ambassador.”

---

< Ep 6 Part 19 | Ep 6 Part 21 >

New to Other-Terrestrial? Check here! Or if you need to, jump to the beginning of the episode here!

---

Leaving the command center, Urle moved down a dark, cramped hall, using handholds to grip and pull himself along.  The Bright Flower had no artificial gravity, and not even a single spin-section to simulate it; being semi-aquatic, Sepht could live a lifetime in microgravity with no ill effects.

Pulling himself to a wall, he let a group of officers pass him, all of them pointing their head tentacles as they passed.  It was their form of salute, and he returned it in the human fashion – they would understand that.

Two of them were Vem em and one a Nolem.  So far he’d not seen any of the ghostly and blind Pelan, but they were rather uncommon in the Voidfleet.  And he’d seen almost no males, who made up only a fraction of the population of all three species –  only around five percent of Sepht were born male.

The ship would have been horribly cramped without being in microgravity, he thought.  It helped if someone could pass over your head, though the halls were so short that the Nolem often had to stoop through doorways.

This was a ship grounded in classical physics – every gram of weight mattered.  Every gram of mass they could exclude was one less bit they had to expend energy and reaction mass pushing.  Even the moisture in the air was not mostly water vapor, but a chemical compound that fit the biological needs of Sepht, yet shaved off around 2% of the potential mass.  When you were talking tons of water vapor, it added up.

He caught some curious stares, but they mostly looked under the hood he wore over his head, trying to catch a glimpse of his hair.

Sepht quite liked the look of human hair; many he saw had styled their tentacles in imitation of it, pulled back into ponytails or swept to one side – an odd habit, in his opinion, as their head tentacles were quite practical.  He’d have loved to have that, and had even considered getting some mechanical tendrils for his head in the past.

He considered pulling off the hood for the crew’s benefit, but right now it was serving to wick a lot of the humidity away from the port-interfaces in his skull.  It was easier than switching out every one with a water-proof model.  Even the basic kind were rated for underwater use, but it was something that made him paranoid; he knew a man who had a short next to his brain, and they were still trying to piece his personality back together.

Best to keep the hood on.

Entering the office where N’Keeea and Decinus had been working, he was glad to find that it was far less humid.  Despite that, Decinus wore a mask to reduce his breathed humidity.

The two were sitting at a large plastic desk, several tablets on it with information that his system was not allowed to view, their images blurred for all but approved personnel.

“Ah, Urle, I am pleased you could join us again,” Decinus said.  “Ambassador N’Keeea and I have developed a communications plan to get through the jamming around Poqut’k.  The Bright Flower detected heavy interference while they were on the borders of the system.”

“And I suspect the P’G’Maig will not stop such interference for our benefit,” N’Keeea said stiffly.

Urle’s systems were noting the Hev ambassador’s stress levels as through the roof, and he was clearly rattled by it.  Urle could sympathize, but hoped he could hold himself together through this.  They needed him to talk to his people.

“I’m more concerned about the Musk Field around the planet,” Urle told them.  “The amount of junk in orbit-“

“They were once habitat stations that held billions of my people,” N’Keeea said, his words now as sharp as his teeth.  “It is not junk.  It is a graveyard.”

“My deepest apologies,” Urle said earnestly.

“To use the word junk in this context is normal for our people, Ambassador,” Decinus said.  “Commander Urle meant no insult by it.”

N’Keeea seemed to dismiss it with a thrash of his tail.  “The debris may be a problem if it prevents our communications lasers from reaching a base.  We must be very cautious – I know of the locations of many hidden communications relays that will reach our high command, but I do not know which, if any, are still functional.”

“And if we get too close without them knowing we are friendlies, they may open fire,” Decinus continued.

“Surely they’ll recognize that we’re a Sepht ship and not a Hev,” Urle said.

N’Keeea snorted.  “They will think it a ruse.  It is not uncommon for the P’G’Maig to acquire ships from other species and press them into use.”

He got up and paced, agitated.  “But worse – by communicating with the secret relays, we may expose them to our enemies.  If only we could send a signal they could not miss, but that the P’G’Maig could not replicate or use against us.”

Urle sat down across from Decinus at the desk.  “I have a thought about that.  Do you know what Bower Radiation is?”

“I am afraid I do not,” Decinus replied.

“Light,” N’Keeea said.  “The scale of the P’G’Maig invasion made it an issue; so many of their ships would appear at once that it would light up the skies of our worlds.  We called it Deathglow.”

Urle was stunned into silence for a moment.  The strange nature of zerospace meant that emissions from it were often called pseudo-particles; every photon, every graviton that came from it rapidly decayed, sinking back into zerospace – in theory, at least.  In practice, all of it disappeared within about half an astronomical unit.

For a fleet to be so large it lit up the sky of a world implied so many ships appearing at once, and so close to the world, that it was terrifying.

“Ah, I . . . didn’t realize it was a sensitive issue,” Urle said.  “I hope I didn’t say anything offensive again.”

“You could not know,” N’Keeea said.  “What was your idea?”

“Well – the Bright Flower’s zerodrive is incredibly precise.  Moreso than almost any other ship in the dark, and so we could – I believe – make it so that when we surface we send a coded message in the flash.  Think of it like manually opening a panel on a light source to create a binary signal.  The only question is what the code will be.  If your people are watching – and I suspect they will be – then they’ll see it.  And since the pseudo-photons will decay before going that far, the P’G’Maig are unlikely to see it.”

Decinus looked skeptical; he was no neo-physicist and it likely sounded like technobabble to him.

But Urle knew the science was sound.  It was an idea he’d worked on in R&D at the Praxis Shipyards around Mars, years ago.  The application was limited, but they’d made it work.

N’Keeea seemed intrigued.  “Do you honestly believe you can do that?”

“Yes,” Urle said.  “I have experience with it.”

“I have a code you can use . . . how complex can the signal be?”

“We can encode in up to six or so kilobytes of information.  Will that be sufficient?”

N’Keeea’s eyes widened.  “Oh, yes,” he said, his tail lashing, but this time in excitement.  “That will be sufficient.”

---

< Ep 6 Part 18 | Ep 6 Part 20 >