 |
| Generated by Google Gemini Advanced text-to-image AI software, powered by Imagen 3 |
Lataran doesn’t call much, but when she does, it’s usually pretty important,
albeit not typically an emergency anymore. Tinaya finishes up her scheduled
duties, and then walks down to Admiral Wing at a deliberate but unhurried
pace. She reaches up to ring the doorbell, but the door behind her opens.
“Oh, hi.” What are you doing over there? What’s in that room?”
“Your future office,” Lataran replies with a smirk.
“Huh?”
“When you’re an admiral,” Lataran says as if it’s obvious.
“I thought we would share,” Tinaya explains, gesturing towards the other
door.
“You think they would only build one office for all admirals?” Lataran
questions. “Captains are supposed to sit down young, and sit back up when
they’re still young. There should conceivably be three admirals at once. The
much smaller third one, plus an extra space, are down that hallway.”
“Oh.” Tinaya tries to step into her new work space, but remains blocked.
“Don’t just walk in. That’s so unceremonious. I’m here to give you a tour.”
Tinaya drops her face into a sinister grin.
“No, don’t.”
She deepens the grin, then makes a short-range jump to the other side of the
wall. She expects to find an office much like the one that Lataran has been
working out of, but it’s much different. For one, it’s at least three times
the area, and that’s just on the one floor. There’s also a mezzanine that
wraps around the whole perimeter. Was this really meant to be an office, or
some sort of shared recreational space? It would sure work for that. Part of
it is made out of metal and metamaterials, like one would expect out of a
transgalactic starship, but there’s also an artificial grass path that
weaves through an impressively complex flower garden. It takes her a moment
to notice the fountain, which leads to a very narrow stream before being
pumped back up through the system. There are several trees known for
thriving in indoor environments, but also a couple that are generally
limited to the outdoors. Hopefully the Japanese maple and crape myrtle were
genetically modified to stop growing before they reach the ceiling. Speaking
of the ceiling, hologram viewscreens curve up the wall to meet each other in
the center. They were surely an aftermarket add-on that was never in the
original designs. Lataran has to have put a ton of work into this project,
even if she commissioned someone else to build it all for her.
“I know what you’re thinking, but I didn’t involve anyone else. An admiral
is not allowed to give orders, so I did it all myself. It’s taken me years
to get it to this point. I gave myself a buffer year, but obviously didn’t
need it, and was too excited to wait to reveal it to you.”
“This is for me?” Tinaya questions.
“It’s for us,” Lataran clarifies. She glides over to the workstation
sector, where two desks are sitting perpendicular to each other on either
side of a corner. “Here, the next captain can see both of us at the same
time when he needs help.”
“Or she,” Tinaya reflexively corrects. “Or they, or whatever.”
“It’s gonna be a boy, I can feel it.”
Tinaya chuckles, and steps deeper into the office to admire the garden. She
takes a deep breath, accepting the sweet scent of the jasmine overpowering
all other flowers in the room. There is lavender here too, as well as... She
smiles, and gently runs her fingers along the petals. “Lilacs. Nice.”
“She’ll never see ‘em, but I figured I might as well remind you of one of
your friends since she’s one of the few people you know named after things.”
“I appreciate that. I can’t believe you did all this.” It’s a little
bittersweet, seeing the fruits of Lataran’s solo labor, knowing that in
another reality, they worked on it together. But it probably would have been
too much, and couldn’t have gotten done, due to her split focus with
Silveon, Waldemar, and the ship as a whole. This was likely the best call,
and a very lovely gesture. “I love you, Admiral Keen.”
“I love you, Captain Leithe II.” To Tinaya’s knowledge, she’s the only one
on this tin can to call her Leithe II. People don’t really talk about the
fact that she’s a legacy, and Tinaya doesn’t think too much about it
herself. Truthfully, she’s always identified more with Admiral Perran
Thatch, who wasn’t even ever a captain. What will it feel like when she
reaches his rank, and if he were here today, what would he think of her?
“There’s one more thing that I need to show you,” Lataran says after giving
her friend some time to soak in the beauty. She deliberately closes and
locks the door to the hallway, even though not many people are authorized to
be down here, and even fewer ever actually exercise that authority. She
leads Tinaya up to the mezzanine level, and over to what appears to be a
random spot along the catwalk, though it does seem to be intentionally
behind the canopy of the maple. Lataran carefully looks around, apparently
paranoid about looky-loos. No one could be here right now, though. There’s a
self-contained teleportation controller on all high executive areas, like
this and the captain’s stateroom. You can’t just show up unannounced.
“What are we—”
“Shh!” Lataran scolds in a loud whisper before transitioning into a regular
whisper. “This is illegal. Very illegal.” She looks around once more, then
kneels down to tap on the wall where it meets the floor. Glyphs glow faintly
upon contact, but disappear quickly. After she’s finished inputting the
secret access code, a square on the pathway disappears, revealing a hole
leading to a very small room below. It’s more like a pod, but maybe for a
few people. Minimal lighting flickers on automatically.
Tinaya looks over the edge of the catwalk. She recalls seeing the space
under this from below. There’s no room here; it’s just more flowers and fake
grass. The pod room must be in a pocket dimension of some kind.
“Trickle charged power reservoir, sourced gradually from the grid,” Lataran
still whispers as she’s climbing down the ladder. “Undetectable as long as
you don’t operate this too frequently, or for too long.”
“Operate what?” Tinaya asks, respecting the whisper.
“Come down here. And push that green button to close the door.”
Once Tinaya’s at the bottom, she looks down at the floor, and realizes that
they’re standing in an undecagon, which is the same shape as the Nexus
chamber, though that one is much larger. It’s an atypical number of sides to
use for a room, so it’s either only an homage to that, or something more.
“What the hell is this?” she questions, hoping that it’s the former.
“Backdoor Nexus access. From here, you can go back and forth to Verdemus
without anyone else knowing. I know you left some people there.”
“This is illegal.”
“D’uh, I said that earlier.”
“I thought you just had alcohol down here, or something?”
“What? Gross! No. Omega built this here in case the main Nexus building were
ever compromised by a corrupt government, or just some asshole.”
“How is this even possible? I thought that these machines had to be built to
exact specifications.”
“They do,” Lataran agrees, “but once you do that, you can add satellite
locations. Omega says that one of the floors above the control room serves
the same purpose, but you can’t get there unless the gods let you in, or
some shit. They have to like you, unless you wanna build your own backdoor,
which is what he did here.”
“This isn’t okay, Lataran.”
“Okay, have me arrested,” she goads in a mocking voice.
Tinaya sighs. “You know I can’t do that. But I can’t use this either.”
“You don’t have to, but it’s here, and you had a right to know, and now that
you do, you can decide whether anyone else does, like your husband,
or your successor.”
“Okay, I’m leaving.” Tinaya reaches back up for the ladder. “Thanks for
telling me. Let’s never talk about it ever again.”
“Very well.”
They start to climb back up until Tinaya finds herself face to face with
Spirit Bridger. “Oh, crap.”
“Oh, crap, to you too,” Spirit jokes.
“Sorry, I just didn’t expect to find you here,” Tinaya says as she’s pushing
herself back onto solid ground, and helping Lataran up behind her. “You were
on Verdemus.”
“I was,” Spirit confirms, “but as you know, we have this little thing called
a Nexus, which lets us travel back and forth.”
“That’s only become more regulated, and more difficult to pull off over the
last few years,” Tinaya contends.
“Until now.” She jerks her chin toward the baby Nexus below them, the
entrance of which waits a few more seconds before sealing itself off with
its metamorphic nanites.
“You came through here?” Lataran searches through her armband. “I should
have received an alert if anyone had done that, and there are a number of
redundancies.”
Spirit smiles and slides a finger along the wall next to her. “There’s a
direct power connection between the main Nexus and the satellite. We can
appear anywhere along that pathway. The fact that you ran it along the scope
of almost the whole ship means that’s just about anywhere. Can’t go back
from anywhere, though...hence, I’m here.”
“That’s a security flaw,” Lataran points out.
“Indeed,” Spirit agrees.
Lataran looks back down at the floor. “I need to speak with Omega about
that.”
“You’re too busy,” Tinaya reminds her. We’re approaching the transitional
period, where we’ll end up with a new captain. Spirit can go coordinate with
the Strongs to patch the vulnerability. Right, Spirit? You were going back
there anyway.”
“Precisely,” Spirit replies.
“Then it’s settled.” Tinaya faces Spirit. “Play it close to the vest,
please. We’ll keep the circle tight on our end too. Now, I gotta go. Silvy
is getting out of school soon.”
“How’s the little bug?” Spirit asks.
“Precocious,” Tinaya replies, being honest, but still protecting yet another
secret.
They say their goodbyes, and then Tinaya does head off to greet her son in
the stateroom after school. But then she hands him off to Zefbiri shortly
thereafter. It’s date night tonight. A normal couple with a five-year-old
child would have to take breaks like this to make sure they don’t get burnt
out on parenting, but while they don’t live with the same worries, they do
have others. As Silveon grows, he becomes more and more capable of caring
for himself, and inches closer and closer to whatever age he truly was when
this started, but for now, he needs breaks too. He can be more himself with
his parents, but he also has to be a certain way around them. It’s just
different when it comes to his aunts. Zef was made aware of the situation a
couple years ago. It didn’t make much sense for them to rely on her for
guardianship responsibilities when she didn’t even understand who she might
one day have to raise. Tinaya and Arqut are also aging, and could honestly
be gone someday soon. The whole point is to be prepared.
The two of them are smiling at each other from opposite sides of the table,
taking small bites here and there. A white tablecloth is covered in small
plates which once held a dozen courses, each one a fairly small portion. A
thistle bot has been serving them, and all the other guests are NPCs, which
he programmed to ignore the humans. Thistle is still in the closet as a
true, independent intelligence, and has been doing well. He can keep a
secret, so they sometimes come to this simulation room for private
conversations which can look like anywhere. This particular conversation has
been pleasant, noncontroversial, and currently in a lull. Tinaya can tell
that he wants to say something. “Go on, love. What is it? I know there’s
something on your mind.”
He nods, and averts his gaze a small degree to the side. “Do you remember
when I disappeared, and had that adventure on Earth in the future?”
“Yes, I remember. I’m constantly worried that that lemonhead will decide to
steal you away from us again.”
“I took precautions,” Arqut insists. “It’s not about that. It’s about what
happened to me while I was there.” He prepares himself. “I absorbed a ton of
temporal energy, which I believed would harmlessly evaporate from me over
time. We believe that that’s exactly how it would have worked had I stayed
on Earth, but this...ship is a capsule, built with an incidental barrier of
temporal energy of its own, zipping through space at hyper-relativistic
speeds. There was nowhere for it to evaporate. Don’t worry, it doesn’t hurt,
but I’ve been in contact with Dr. Cernak and Sabine Lebeau. It seems that my
body has been metabolizing it, and altering me on a genetic level. They’re
calling me a chosen one, though I may be something entirely different
since the energy I took came from an eclectic group of time travelers, so we
just don’t really know.”
“What does this mean? Can you...do something?”
“Don’t freak out.” Arqut sits very still. As his wife is watching him, the
wrinkles in his face flatten out. His skin gets its glow back, and his hair
turns dark once more. In seconds, he looks as young as he was when they
first met.
You’re a retroverter,” Tinaya determines.
“Hopefully,” he says. “Obviously, I can do it to myself, and Sabine and
Radomil are working on making it transferable. They’ll figure it out, and
when they do, it means that we could start over. We could raise our son as
twentysomethings; healthy and lively again. We may even be able to live
forever. I know, I should have told you sooner, but this could be so good
for us. What do you think? Are you interested?”
Tinaya daintily taps the cloth napkin against her lips before calmly laying
it across her most recent plate. Still, she waits to respond, first staring
him in the face for an uncomfortably long time. Finally, she quite
confidently says, “no.”
