Chapter 02 - REGARDING NIV
21 January 2173 – Friday
IWG-SS JOHN A.WHEELER
XIU-LI
They were en route to Cape Of Velvet, 21 light years “south” of Earth. After Velvet, they would next visit system HD-19373, just over fifty three light years from Velvet, for a re-survey mission. Hyperflight took subjective ship time, and these were the stars farthest from Earth; at a ratio of one subjective week for every four light years of distance, it was a five week long trip to Velvet from Earth.
It was Xiu-Li’s longest trip in hyperflight so far. She had studied past naval history, and had decided WHEELER was closest in function to an “aircraft carrier-sized submarine,” with the vacuum of space on the other side of the hull, not crushing watery blackness. Just as on a long underwater submarine cruise, they spent many weeks to months cut off from the outside, and then re-emerging to a busy universe.
Five weeks – thirty five days, just over a month – was a long time.
Toward the end, it took a toll.
Chief Engineer Aria Threnody went crazy for a night, after drinking. It was at a private officer-level anniversary party.
Xiu-Li’s watch time the past days was spent trying to fine-tune the vast net of sensors while they were in use – not easy – and the runs had task points that required her availability for as much as 30 hours straight through, although she did get two thirty minute naps. But her trips for coffee and the endless prowls of corridors and Jiffi tubes meant she saw the Tactical Quick Response Team responding to round up an intoxicated Niv female who was just headed toward her quarters to sleep it off, and Xiu-Li could hear what happened next.
It sounded as if Threnody had subsided in her singing of (in a very beautiful but very loud voice) a truly obscene song – after the Tac Q.R.T. lieutenant asked her to. Then as she walked toward her quarters area, someone on the Tac Q.R.T. may have pushed her.
The supremely cool and analytical Niv officer was drunk, but she now said quite clearly, “You do not need to push me, Lieutenant, I am responding as you have requested.”
There was a male response – “Fekking Niv (muffled)” – then a pair of tapping thumps. Male response: “Grr! Get her!”
There was a whole series of thumps and grunts, and Xiu-Li leaned out of the Jiffi tube opening to peek into the corridor.
The team had been thrown around like cheap ‘bots. Threnody dodged the last one – the Lieutenant, who was now trying to call for help.
She slapped his comm away. He kicked her shin – no response on the face of the engineering chief, who looked so terribly sad and tired...
– then the lieutenant launched a series of fairly good looking attacks.
He was a powerful young man capable of very punishing blows, and his attempts at kicks and punches might have hurt any other person on board except perhaps Commander Takaguchi or Xiu-Li – and also, as it became apparent, the Niv Chief Engineer, who was from a culture most usually self-described as “neutral, peace loving, and non-judgemental,” (to be fair, the code of conduct and state of existence most often observed).
To Xiu-Li, it looked like Threnody merely slapped the incoming fists, elbows, knees, kicks and lock-up attempts away, one after the other, now matter how many or how fast, until the snarling Lieutenant (who was long since frustrated enough to kill) just grabbed her neck in his hands and tried to choke her.
Threnody swept her arm up to break his grip and gather both of his arms in the crook of her right arm as she stepped a half step closer in toward him and thrust her fingers against the surprised man’s neck, blocking both carotid arteries. He looked shocked, then his eyes fluttered as he passed out.
Threnody sighed. “You fekkin’ idiot,” she said, and lowered him to the deck, careful he didn’t strike his head as she did. “I’m not that drunk!” Then she walked the short distance to the aft bulkhead door, then through it to her quarters beyond.
Xiu-Li sighed and stepped forward.
MATISOU
Captain Matisou looked cool despite being woken from sleep. He arrived as the Lieutenant was settled into the carry-cradle on top of the response cart, his protests stopping the moment he saw the Captain was present.
Matisou saw four other carts with conscious, groaning Tac Q.R.T. members wearing imobilfoam on various limbs, and three Tac Q.R.T. members conscious but a bit dazed, seated on the deck while the Doctor, an ensign, and two other crew – one was that new female, Crewper Chen – attended to them. The Tac Q.R.T.-B squad was arriving, taking reponse carts, and heading toward the Medical Section, while the Tac Q.R.T.-B medics started helping with the last three Q.R.T.-A crew on the deck (one of whom seemed to be in shock).
Matisou took a deep breath, looked at the engine section hatch just down the corridor... then down at Crewperson Chen, who was busy with imobilfoaming an ankle on one tac crewwoman while two Q.R.T.-B medics did a tricky thigh/hip on the shocky-looking Tac-A crewper. He tapped his comm. “Bridge, Captain Matisou. Please stand down, Commander Takaguchi. More to follow.”
“Aye, Captain,” replied his first officer.
The doctor stood up. “Let’s not chance it – put them all on response carts once we’ve cleared some, which won’t take long, and then bring them in.” He looked at Matisou. “Captain – no critical injuries, at least, but this will be a busy night for us.” He scowled. “It is apparent that –” His voice trailed off.
Matisou’s open, pleasant face was drained of blood, giving him a cold and deadly look, the effect much heightened by the dead calm in his eyes and face. His blood flow was the only thing beyond Captain Matisou’s control, and he was not going to use the Doctor or anyone else as a lightning rod.
Lieutenant Commander Doctor Kevin Truhart, doctor and medical officer on board WHEELER, took a moment to consider the events through his captain’s – and old friend’s – eyes: His chief engineer drank too much (at the captain’s anniversary party), sang a nasty song in the corridor during the long walk to her quarters aft in the drive section, had a “disorderly crew, identity unknown” called in on her; in the resulting response, an eight member Tac team is taken out of action, and although there were no witnesses, there had to be something to account for this.
Explanations would be required – the call-in was on the record... as the medical records would also be.
Truhart looked down. “It’s apparent I’m needed in the Medical Section immediately, Captain. I’ll bank an update.” He looked up.
“Thank you, Doctor Truhart.” Matisou’s voice was pleasantly modulated, but Truhart knew it was too even not to be affected by rage. Yet the captain’s eyes were now warmer. “I will keep you fully advised as well, as I am able. My congratulations on your Med Q.R.T.”
Truhart shook his head. “It’s nothing so formal, sir. Commander Takaguchi has maintained that we can operate with Tac Q.R.T. medic team members as first responders, and that’s mostly who was here tonight, as he would observe, were I to make any comment at all.” He turned and started to follow the three response carts now carrying the remaining Tac Q.R.T.-A members to the Medical Section. “I alerted my informal network after that crewgirl there called it in. She did all of the triage.” He disappeared through the hatch and into the corridor to Medical.
Xiu-Li flushed. Had he really just called her a “crewgirl”? And was it as insulting as it sounded, or just one of those terms related to her rookie status? It might even be a sign of respect that he was using slang at all.
She was now in the corridor alone with Captain Matisou. He peered at her. “Fine-tuning the new sensor package?”
“Yes, sir.”
He checked a chrono. “Hmm. I know we’re on a run – but do you have time for some coffee?”
“I-I’d love to, sir. I-I-I was on my way to get some when I just dropped into the corridor from a jiffi and found everybody laid out.”
He nodded but didn’t answer, just motioned toward the mess section. The Continuous Overwatch coffee s
tation had no customers; the ensign on duty squeaked and vanished into the kitchens when he saw them, but Matisou entered his code and they went into the mess.
Being Captain meant Chef always had fresh coffee available at any time, in this case almost in the time it took to enter and proceed to the Captain’s Booth – in a far corner alcove, with a large crysglas window for a view during travel in normal space, and a door that could be closed for private meetings.
The chef/quartermaster’s officer on WHEELER was an intense lieutenant named Lucas Kimonetti, with cross-training and compuSys scores full of glowing references from the Tactical Division. He wanted to cook slightly more than he wanted to fight, and his rank and skills mix made him perfect for WHEELER’s survey mission.
The Konawian was superb (there was even fullcaff for her and decaff for the Captain) served in big plas vacmugs by an alert, dapper Kimonetti – even in the wee hours – who made sure they were not also hungry, and that the coffee was good, then vanished back into his kitchen, there to resume his wait for the Captain’s call.
They sat down at the table looking at the wall sized high def holo-screen over the window – the best one could manage during hyperflight transit, where there was no light to see. The screen was set to the starfields of the next port of call’s space, to allow study and give a chance to become familiar with them (and to distract the crew from the actual limbo of hyperflight – it was anyone’s guess what was actually on the other side of a starship’s hull during hyperflight, but humans went with optimism and showed the next starfields they would be seeing upon arrival).
Captain Matisou gave her a glance. “What happened, Xiu-Li? I need to know.”
Xiu-Li told him what she had heard. “Then the thumps stopped, and when I stepped into the corridor, the Tac Q.R.T. was on the deck and the corridor was otherwise empty of life. I alerted the Doctor and requested a Med Q.R.T. Then I sorted the injuries out and just kept working until we finished.” She sipped her coffee.
“Congratulations, Crewperson Chen.” Captain Matisou lifted his mug. “You’re now our Med Q.R.T.”
“Sir? I –”
Matisou looked at her.
It was his “Duty Look:” if she felt she was truly unqualified or unfit for this duty, now was her chance to speak – then “bear all the consequences of such an utterance,” as the Space Consortium Ship Practices Manual put it.
“I want to thank you for this opportunity,” she finished. Great! Now I’ll spend all my ship service time doing zero G rescue training!
Her captain smiled, nodded, and sipped his coffee.
Oh, well... better get a haircut. Xiu-Li took a sip of hers.
Matisou looked at the table in front of them. “I’ve never seen so messy a team exercise. Or so many crew members misjudging their moves by so large a margin that they cause each other serious falls and other injuries. It’s simply awful.”
So that’s the play. Xiu-Li looked at him. “And the anti-Niv slurs?”
He looked at her. Her tone was light, her face was neutral, and yet there was no weakness in her delivery of speech or its content. It was the crux of their problem – a possible racial slur.
“An imitation of a recently newsworthy situation, used in a training exercise. A poorly made, highly incorrect choice, because of possible situations like this one.” Matisou sighed. “Unless I hear from an eye witness who can tell me some specifics, I’ll be speaking to the lieutenant soon to let him know how detrimental just one more such incident would probably be to his so far previously successful career.”
“Captain, his sentiment has support in Space Fleet.”
Matisou looked cold. “He will have no support left anywhere if he makes another outright slur. Period. I am not going to tolerate it against a fellow crewper, and certainly not against one with her record in the service of Space Fleet.” He looked at Xiu-Li. “Sufficient?”
She was uncomfortable. “I am... uncertain.”
Matisou looked troubled. “If the party in question does not want to push this, will you? You can, of course. You were there.” He nodded. “I support you in advance if you were to say that you feel a full inquiry is needed.”
Xiu-Li looked at the window. The stars seemed to twinkle, but they were just images at the moment. She looked back at Matisou. “Captain, this solution seems to work, but it doesn’t feel right; it feels – false. Not strong.”
Matisou straightened in his seat, nodding. “Crewperson Chen, you are quite correct again,” he said gravely. He shook his head. “Make this a new exercise in your command studies – Keep in mind there is no one as ‘aggrieved party.’ What solutions can you come up with, Crewper?”
Xiu-Li flushed. “I heard him!”
“‘Fekking’ is a common ter –”
“Captain Matisou,” she broke in, “terms involving expletives and race are highly likely to be a racially motivated slurs, especially when modified by whatever word or words I did not hear.”
“Crewperson Chen,” he said quietly. “No one on this ship is more aware of and sensitive to the human costs of bias than I am.”
Xiu-Li found herself sitting at attention, looking down at her hands folded neatly on the table. “I apologize, sir. I never expected to hear a crewmate say anything like that, and it really shook me up.”
“Shook up? Doctor Truhart said that you expertly triaged eight injured people.”
She looked at him. “Well, I wasn’t shook up that way.”
“That’s why you’re the new Medical Q.R.T.” Matisou chuckled.
Xiu-Li tilted her head. “With all respect sir – and again, I’m sorry about just now – I can be a first responder, but I can’t be the ‘solo’ responder.” She straightened. “Unless I have to be, sir.”
Matisou smiled slightly. “I know you’ve been without much sleep, Xiu-Li, and your heart is for the service. As for your Q.R.T., no worries – you won’t be alone.” He stood up. “I have to check in with the good Doctor. Be certain you take your nap breaks – your best questions come when you’re less fatigued.”
Xiu-Li blinked and grinned. “Aye, sir.”
MATISOU
Captain “Bert” Matisou went down the corridor to the Medical Section.
He thought he’d struck the right tone with Chen, who needed to be fair but never righteous if she was to be the officer they needed. A Quick Response Team duty was what he had ensigns for, and he’d add ensigns to her Q.R.T. until she was promoted herself – on the June cycle, most likely – and was officially able to lead the team. Putting her on now as a nucleus gave him a chance to see how she trained and handled a small group command, and the way her fellow crew responded to it.
He knew some of his officers were going to be unhappy with his pick of a Crew rating for such a critical job – even though they had not been keeping up with their medical cross-training certificates, as his medical officer tartly reported to him when he inquired about “Chen as new Medical Q.R.T.,” and qualifications versus rank.
Truhart had decided to stagger the surgical repairs and wait for swelling to undergo initial resolution in the fractured joints. He was checking the imaging on Kiernan’s ankle before removing the imobilfoam to treat it when Matisou entered the treatment area from the rear entry. His question wasn’t unreasonable (they were a small bubble village in space, so managing personalities was a prime task of the senior officers). Truhart had been impressed by Chen’s work triaging eight injured crew; he was quite unimpressed with officers who envied competence but weren’t up to date, and he said so. Bluntly.
Matisou winced. He looked at Kiernan’s closed eyes and shot Truhart a look.
Truhart waved his hand. “She’s under fieldsleep – I’m going to stabilize her ankle now and call it an overnight crisis until the coolers bring down the swelling and I can fix the rest tomorrow morning.” He yawned. “Sorry, sir.”
Matisou sighed. “You don’t mean every one of my officers has lapsed their medical certs, do you?”
r /> The doctor studied the screen and activated the holo unit. The broken ankle bones appeared inside the projection cylinder. “No...” He started to walk around the cylinder, studying the holo. “No, but it’s a half of your ensigns and a third of your lieutenants.”
Matisou frowned. “Kevin, did you already tell me this?”
“Yes, Bert, I did. And I told Jason. And I told Aria. I have never felt this was so critical I had to involve anyone else.” He looked over at Matisou. “Jason made a reasonable observation about our record: where an emergency response was needed, our emergency medical response inside the ship has been 100 percent. There are a number of first responders who report as needed.”
“I know, Kevin.” Matisou sighed. “Look, it’s late, I’m tired, so’re you. If you’re finished lambasting me for missing that ‘critical signal,’ I want Chen to be lead Medical Q.R.T. responder, and I’m seeking your approval.” The holo distorted Truhart’s face as he went behind it.
“You must be tired, Captain!” Truhart chuckled. “Of course!”
Matisou nodded, smiled – then frowned. “Please expand.”
Truhart looked up from the holo. “She’s the daughter of the woman who was first commander of S.A.R. Wing Zero.”
Matisou frowned. “But her name is –” He arched an eyebrow.
Truhart nodded. “Yes. That’s Xiu-Li Chen’s mother, though. Our Crewper Chen was going out on Search-And-Rescue runs between Earth, Moon and L points when she was fourteen.” He looked back at the ankle. “I think we can trust those trips have given her a level head.”
“I hope so. She’s only twenty two.” He stretched. “Ahh, space, twenty two and out of the University – we were that, how long ago, it was what, two weeks before the Chicxulub meteor fell? Killed the other dinosaurs?” He looked at Truhart. “The injuries are consistent with a training exercise miscue?”
Truhart looked up. “If that exercise includes ‘no release joint lock’ and full contact techniques resulting in breaks from the blow or secondary contact from deck or wall – I suppose so.”
Matisou saw a conscious Tac team crew member in one of the bays nearby, his arm neatly imobilfoamed. His face was blank but his eyes were on the captain now; he had heard the last two sentences quite clearly, as Matisou had intended (he knew racism made Truhart furious, and knew his technically clean opinion would be delivered in a louder tone because of it).
“Given the absence of witness to another cause then, Doctor, at this time the inquiry suggests ‘training accident of the contact scenario type.’”
“Mpf.” Truhart was either lost in his holoankle or disgusted and unable to really agree.
“Who was that?” Matisou frowned, then looked at Truhart.
Truhart ignored the murmurs from the triage area outside. “I am uninterested in checking, but would imagine it is our lieutenant, who is better ‘connected’ than he is either trained in holo medicine or in any way politically astute.” He folded his arms and rubbed his chin, intent on the holo.
Matisou nodded. “Thanks, Kev. I’ll have a look in at our team leader outside, and check for your report in the morning before 0800 Divisions Meeting.” Truhart nodded, but was no longer paying heed.
Matisou went to the open hatch between the triage area and the treatment bays and stood just inside it, out of sight, listening to the Lieutenant: “When will I be scanned?” He sounded irate.
“You’ll be up soon, sir.” That was Lieutenant Day, the senior nurse on board. Matisou grinned.
“I’ve already been waiting for thirty minutes. I might be hurt badly or something.”
“No, sir. You were triaged and evaluated thoroughly by Doctor Truhart, who feels that –”
“Look, nurse, I just want something for –”
“ – Who feels that –”
“ – a headache, can I just get me –”
“ – you are in need of an imaging study to assist in –”
“ – something for a headache?”
“ – evaluating your headache, Lieutenant.”
“Look, look, forget the headache, I just want to know when I can stand down and get a drink? I keep seeing that fekn’ Nvnmm –”
Matisou stepped through the door into the triage room.
The lieutenant took one look at him and lay back without a peep, but about five seconds too late to salvage any future career on WHEELER.
Matisou gave everyone else a pleasant smile and thanked them all for doing so well under unusual circumstances, then left Medical, thinking about a resource line and how a Med Q.R.T. now changed his tactics menu... and while there might be some officers who were annoyed with him, he’d just ask whether they were up to date with their medical certifications themselves, and if they really wanted the new ship’s duties tasks that went with this position –
Space it! She’s really supposed to be an Ensign, anyway...
XIU-LI
Xiu-Li assisted the bridge fiber optics team working on the tactical and science stations and saw Engineer Threnody frequently after she returned to duty on her very next watch.
The Captain had visited her in the engine section but their conversation was unheard, unrecorded, and unreferenced (except for Matisou’s comment in his personal log that he “advised Chief Engineer Aria Threnody to avoid Deep Blue Belter outside of appropriate public ceremonials of group survival,” with her agreement and appreciation of the advice noted).
Xiu-Li had long researched all the standard “reports on the Niv culture” and concluded the Niv were adept at avoiding the release of information on their culture.
Everyone knew the bare bones – how the human “slowship” colony that arrived at Tau Ceti in 2101 had found a star prone to flares. When the Tgen Probe arrived in 2103, the colony was at last able to use the comm link on it to report planetary ecofailures, death, disease, and human adaptation failures – then reports of new solar flares, and the Tgen wave signal had gone out completely.
There was now no way to communicate with them.
In fact, there was no longer a way to reach Tau Ceti. The new “point Nav” ships could travel faster than light – but only where guided by tachyon generators acting as beacons. The two waves of Tgen Probes had been launched in 2076 and 2077 using mirror-matter drives to reach speeds of 2/3 light – Alpha Centauri (The Triplet) was reached in 2091, Epsilon Eridani (Darkworld) in 2099, then the wild profusion of tumbling rocks at Procyon A/B in 2100 that became The Gem Isles.
The Tau Ceti “SlowShip” HELIX EXPRESS was the harebrained, hopeful trip that launched in 2075, two years before the Tgen Probe. They were going on hope alone, resolved to living on a ship until the hyperflight drive they weren’t sure they would have for thirty or forty years would be ready to visit or rescue them – hoping to get started on planet building.
The Tgen Probe arrived at Tau Ceti right on schedule in 2103. Three systems in a row had proven worth colonizing, so the updates from the colony at Tau Ceti were eagerly awaited.
The distressing reports were quite a shock.
The failure was quickly described as “we could not have hoped for 100% success in a Universe as complicated as this one” but it was a very serious setback. For most of 2103 it was also a riveting media drama, full of reconnections (often tragic) after the 26 year passage of time.
Then came the reports of a huge new flare – then Tgen failure.
The Tau Ceti Tgen was an ongoing enigma, functionally “dead” except for a ghostly flicker of life every now and then (suggestive of a tumbling vehicle, which was consistent with damage a big solar flare could cause to the manuvering systems, especially ones that had just moved through true interstellar space at two thirds the speed of light for twenty six years). It was a mystery the engineers loved, and most everyone else could not understand, but could easily ignore.
And did.
With reports of solar flares, planetary eco-system and human adaptation failures, and no Tgen wave signal, the planet and colo
ny at Tau Ceti were given up as “lost” (with no way to help that the laws of physics would permit, there was no choice!) – pending any future re-contact.
The Tgen at Tau Ceti was “out,” declared an “unreliable” Tgen source. The “slowship” colonists had spent so long in stasis (en-route for twenty six years) that their families had mourned them, briefly met them (via Tgen-link comm) as ghosts from their pasts, and then soon gotten over the loss once those unreal voices were gone again.
Eventually, the actual Tau Ceti Planetary Project itself was shut down. And ignored – almost forgotten.
Forgotten – as truly Earth-like worlds were found by the robot Tgen probes, their tachyon systems sending a signal that the newly developed hyperflight drive, faster-than-light ships could go to.
Forgotten – as the other two “slowships” had fared better (all of them were absolute looney leaps of faith), and now two “new frontier” towns were out there to provision, visit, and spread out from, as well as the five other systems reached – all of them growing quickly.
Forgotten – for fifty five years, while the seven star systems with operating Tgens were visited by humans in hyperflight ships flying “point-to-point” using the tachyon generator beacons to navigate.
Forgotten – as navigational and drive systems improved, until hardy individuals who tolerated risk well could actually “free navigate” without relying on beacons, and human ships could move faster than light without needing tachyon generators to guide them.
Forgotten – until the Economic Returns Committee Projects Follow-Up Group of The Planetary Projects Division, S.C. (Space Consortium) asked whether there was any point in even visiting the Tau Ceti system again.
It was a G8 star, slightly cooler and darker than Earth’s Sol, known for solar flares, but it was (once more) found to be “a star close to Earth” – so the Space Consortium Yards built a new “freeNavFTL” Tgen probe package and sent it off from SoClip Station, the platform six light hours from the Sun’s south pole – below all the traffic and debris of an ecliptic plane full of planets, asteroids, dust, rocks, and junk.
The probe found a pleasant looking planet with no sign of any current or past inhabitation, and no Tgen unit to be found on radar or with any other sensor package.
Given the history of solar flares and human adaptation failure, the planet was a hard prospect; there were easier ones being found and developed every year. There were no specific planetary resources of great economic or materials interest.
The Projects Follow-Up Group accepted the findings that there was no reason to revisit the planet at the moment, but the Tau Ceti Belt was still a possible future consideration, and the Space Consortium moved the probe on.
That was in the fall of 2158.
The next organized attempt was during a bioscience survey tour by IWG-SS JAMES WATSON, a ship that was designed to explore alien biospheres and adaptation medicine, and IWG-SS CALIPER, a ship designed for mapping/science survey, on missions of system exploration and catagorization. Their survey would start at Tau Ceti, where only long range remote surveys were planned, before a resupply at Cape Of Velvet and then a survey of northern stars in Bootes and Canes Venatici.
It was a puzzle when the survey ships emerged into local space near Tau Ceti in 2162 and found all their active and remote sensors blocked and unable to sense the planet or Belt – not even the radars, which meant they had no way to see major physical hazards except to look out the ports (all of the protective shields were working, so the only practical risks were large meteors, each other, or “other” ships).
With the telescopes available, they could see activity on the planet surface and in orbit.
The Captain of the leading ship – CALIPER – comm-lasered a message: “We are here to help any survivors of the colony. How are you?”
“Thank you for your concern,” came the reply. “No assistance is required. Have a nice journey. Please pet a cat today.” They would not respond to questions and the ships were forced to bear away as they were unable to proceed.
So began the long process of re-contact.
It took two months for phase two to start, and in April of 2162 the IWG-SS JUPITER arrived at Tau Ceti. JUPITER was designed for gas giant exploration but the heavier hull construction provided war-like shielding capacity, across several spectrums (there were electromagnetic field dissipator and manipulator systems for Jovian cloud thunderbolts, for example). JUPITER also had corresponding armor on its remote probes, ‘bots and databalls. Although not technically a ship of war, JUPITER could withstand a lot of punishment from natural (or other) causes.
No one thought anything hostile would be happening, of course; this was all a fluke of ships, missions, and availability – JUPITER was idle, so... right? Right. And much was read into the instruction about cats, but in the end it was really too bizarre to make sense.
The negotiating mission ship JUPITER was also held in a total sensor dead zone and had the humiliation of having every one of its remote probes either destroyed or (perhaps worse) re-deployed in some really annoying way – one was left with only a camera working, looking at a pretty vista of the local Belt from an asteroid, another unit was pointed at a waterfall somewhere below (a ribbon of water falling into a sunny blue lake, rainbow included). But no one would talk with them, and the new ship optics bay full of telescopes could not see any further than an enormous plastic scrim screen that blocked their line of sight as it hung there just a kilometer away – a mere thousand meters! The Captain and the Ambassador resisted plans to go out in vac-suits, travel over, and cut the thing; “negotiations” plodded on.
The Captain decided to bluff a medical problem that would get a response of some kind, rather than the current indifferent stalemate they were in. He called it “a real Paramont’s move,” and the senior ambassador was also convinced. The”problem” would reach some deadly crescendo before a trip back to Earth (in SubjectiveShipTime) could be completed, so they would have to be helped!
The male who responded was the Captain’s age, wore a jump suit field uniform every bit as current as the Captain’s, and had every square inch examined (passively, from a distance) before checking out as human. He had looked at the doctor’s report and then at the Captain and said flatly, “This is a real Paramont’s move you’re pulling here, Captain,” he said, then grinned for a second.
It looked as if they were not going to respond – but they did.
The response was a trip to Earth in a ship that seemed capable of faster passage on hyperflight trips – because of highly advanced navigational equipment and practice.
The ship arrived at SoClip with the puzzled “bedridden” ensign, the survey ship’s first officer (in case there was anything to observe, besides the four room “box” they lived inside during the shorter trip – no luck), and the JUPITER’s doctor, whose efforts at interacting with the crew had been to little avail, but who had used the time of the passage to research his collected data streams and even use his portable lab to run a full DNA genome on a crewper’s blood collected on a piece of paper after a small accidental cut.
When the doctor finished, he was scared to death, and unable to tell anyone – they might hear. His first report to his Captain had been correct: they were human…
But not exactly Homo sapiens...
This was one of Xiu-Li’s favorite moments: What was it like to be flying through space with the knowledge your hosts weren’t what they seemed? That an infection, an alien disease, might have made them mutants?
They had acted like superior geeks, which neatly fit the profiles and cultural extrapolations being constructed – the “slowship” was all scientists, even the cops and other critical personnel (who were all Survivalists, and some had been soldiers as well). All contacts were in the main consistent: they were now a culture of “tough geeks,” said all the Earth Command people. “More geek than tough, too.” That bit about the cats – how tough could they be? They were cat-lovers!
/>
Everyone had been so low-key and matter of fact, and the ship designs and uniforms so similar, that over the weeks of waiting and negotiating, Tau Ceti now seemed more like any of other colony station instead of being a colony that had been out of contact for five and a half decades.
But it wasn’t, of course, as the doctor had found out.
And the people on the Earth were watching by now.
When the ship arrived, even with plenty of advanced warning, it was a great shock. It was bigger, sleeker, rakish yet more robust than any ship out of any Yard of the Space Consortium or anyone building ships anywhere else in SolSys. It looked like a ship from the future, thrown back, with uncertain offerings of both promise – and threat.
It caused consternation.
Their ship was a better designed Space Consortium MAGELLAN Class Survey Ship, essentially. Anyone with brains and the least eye for ship design could see it; it was bigger, and it was believed to have several weapons points beneath some oddly shaped hull panels, but it was – call it “Cousin MAGELLAN Class, the really big and clever one.”
It caused consternation. How did these – people – get access to our plans?
It was upsetting to discover Space Consortium tools and parts could even be used on the ship, and certain hull structures and other frame mechanical structures could be swapped out (learned after a blundering manned JournoRunner on the Runner’s last ever “we’ll-take-it-just-a-bit-closer” image run had collided, and creased its hull).
The SC doctor literally managed not to go insane before telling his chief about his findings. He wrote his primary report, and then began writing appendices which he hid – again and again, more and more, a traumatic stress injury caused by hiding the secret during the trip.
The findings were self explanatory to the Space Consortium’s Chief Medical Officer, who had spent decades worrying about deadly intermixes of exotic natural biomaterials between planets.
It was decided to leave the DNA findings out of the mix for the moment as too explosive. The Chief Medical Officer and three others were the only humans at that time who knew about them – the doctor was in isolation for psych treatment by then, writing thirty or forty new appendices a day, and hiding them in his room.
Space Fleet Tactical organized immediate DNApass retesting screens, while the politicians and diplomats were reassured there were no “unworldly advancements or enhancements detected” in the studies of the ship technology observed to date. “There are obviously a number of advancements in sensors and navigation, as well as a greater compactness in engine design, and these are the results of many patient years of human dedication and development – as we have done in our Yards as well.”
To the engineers and crews making up what was called Space Fleet, it was a future extrapolation design flying in real space, but it wasn’t terribly exotic or alien – it was a souped up MAGELLAN Class ship (they were all dying to get inside and take a look, though!)
To the public, however, it was the unknown personified. It was a source of endless speculation... What happened? asked the public. Why? It was incessant. Why? Why? Why?
The public. So many voices. So many questions. So much fear and uncertainty... and that was before it was learned what the poor doctor had discovered.
Afterward – people in every system were still trying to figure out what it all meant, even now, years later. It was an issue for everyone who was politically inclined... and anyone who was human.
Tau Ceti’s “slowship” had travelled in sheer hope that the planet in their future was livable, and found a series of crises instead: the star was not quite Earth yellow, the planet could be lived on, but wasn’t a safe match for humans over the generations – there were insects and diseases and solar radiation and other problems that could never be fully “solved” without terraforming the whole planet.
That would be unfair to the planet, but there was no doubt it would be the Space Consortium response.
And then the solar flares began, putting the small colony into more immediate risk.
The council of senior thinkers met. It distilled down to:
PROBLEM: Planet ecology and humans not well adapted.
SOLUTIONS: Leave (i.e. die). Change Planet. Change Humans.
Faced with death, they executed a radical human solution (they were a colony of scientists, and all crazy enough to ride in slowsleep 26 years at 2/3c, just in case the planet was really there).
Chosen solution: change the humans – all of them.
Completely – and forever.
They used advanced nanotech to manipulate their DNA. The humans at Tau Ceti then literally reprogrammed their genes to adapt their bodies to their planet: “just a few adaptations and minor changes to make living there more efficient.”
Every single one of them.
They now bred as a distinctly new species of Homo sapiens – they were Homo neosapiens.
They called their planet and themselves Niv, but had yet to say why.
They were at least twenty five to thirty years ahead of current Earth technology in many areas, especially in navigation and engine designs – the Niv had no intentions of being cut off on Tau Ceti, and never had. They were just extremely choosy about what they did, including their level of contact with others.
They were unrepentent about surviving their trial using a plan and techniques that nearly every human in Sol System remained very uncertain of (it was still being called “master race manipulation” and had been an area of intense scrutiny and concern ever since the first DNA and gene therapy studies began).
The changes made the Niv generally stronger across all body systems, while their eclectic culture diverged more from Earth/Belt than any other colony planet – and all of it by choice, which was what shook up humanity the most. Because it became clear that although the Niv had not been trying to contact Earth, they had been “listening in” (the Tgen flickers) and keeping up to date with what the rest of humanity was doing.
Barely a decade ago, humanity was presented with a new planetfull of smarter cousins who had left the family and returned very different. They had much to offer, but the differences were profound, unsettling for many – the Niv generated envy, suspicion, and fear. The inevitable racism followed, and there had been incidents.
And Aria Threnody was one of them.
To Xiu-Li, Aria looked sad and vaguely wounded for a few days.
Xiu-Li dared not comment (she had studied Niv culture enough to know how intensely private they were – any dumb comment that was inappropriate could chill relations forever).
Aria was certainly as physically strong as ever. She resumed her workout regimen (more so than usual, adding a run through her engineering spaces in addition to weights) and it was always nice to work out together (their dutywatches coincided for thirty to thirty five percent of the time when Aria took the overnight watch as the senior officer, so workouts were also very frequently on or around the same times as well) –
Yet... there was just more to it, Xiu-Li was certain. But all was well in the end –
Aria quickly resumed her usual aloof nature.
It didn’t bother Xiu-Li (she had family members her mother used to berate: “Who do you think you are? Chinese Princesses? Come on down back to Earth, sister!”) and she actually enjoyed the mental disciplines of the Court of the Emotionally Repressed (her mother’s words about home).
It didn’t matter. They were going to stop for planetfall on Cape Of Velvet, which Enronn Debitts seemed very keen about; and planetfall meant everybody got just a little looser (even if they weren’t lucky enough to actually get leave).
This should be fun.