“Put me down for failed weapons experiment. I’m on my way.”
* * *
“Captain on the bridge,” Doall said just as the lazivator doors opened. One day, Jeb would figure out how she did that with her back to the doors.
“Report,” he said as he entered and made his way to the comfy seat.
His first officer took that time to finish the last of his tea, then answered. “Definitely a distress signal. Translators are finishing up now. Very idiom-rich language. It appears to be a highly religious species.”
He lifted a finger in command and Doall played the transmission. “Oh, Keptar! Save us! Whatever we did, we take it back! By your buttock, bring us aid!”
The transmission continued along those lines, with some gibbering.
“Buttock?”
“The computer insists that’s accurate.”
“Be sure to keep as many of the original idioms as possible. Loreli will want to study them when she gets back from her conference. Can we transmit?”
“They should be able to understand us now,” Doall said.
“This is Captain Jebediah Tiberius of the HuFleet HMB Impulsive. We’ve heard your distress call. Can we help?”
There was a moment of subspace crackle just to remind the audience that communications weren’t always easy or immediate, and then a voice gargled, “Our prayers are answered! Praise Keptar! Our ship has suffered a warp core breach. We must evacuate. Can you get to us in time?”
In the background, a computerized voice announced twelve minutes to get their affairs in order before meeting the Great Crack in the Sky. Doall tagged that phrase for their xenologist.
“Well?” The captain asked his helmsman.
Lieutenant Tonio Cruz’s hands flew over his console with the grace with which he flew the ship. “Lots of subspace wake, but va bene. Plotting the course now.”
“I’m sure it will be no problem. How about if we fix your ship instead?”
“Do you know Graptarian technology?”
Tiberius looked at his engineering officer. Lieutenant Morange was a Heptite, skilled, experienced and on the Impulsive for career broadening. He would make a good chief engineer someday soon, but the way he raised all three of his eyebrows clearly said, Are you out of your mind? We just met this species.
Jeb liked that his crew felt comfortable being so honest. Still, Morange had a thing or two to learn. He told the Graptarian captain, “We’ll improvise.”
“Improvise? In ten minutes?”
Maybe the Graptarian were distantly related to the Heptites. “It’s what we do.”
The translator did a good job of imitating the strain in the alien captain’s voice. “I swear by Keptar’s left buttock that my own crew has done everything possible. Please – just help us escape. Do not add your deaths to our souls’ burdens.”
“I’m sure we can multitask. Prepare to receive visitors. Impulsive out. Number One, care for an outing?”
“I could use a stretch. The usual away team?”
“Oh, let’s send them the best, and Lieutenant Morange, too. I’m sure Deary can use the assist. And it’ll be good career broadening. I’ll meet you in Teleporter Room One.”
In the bullpen that held the crew of second-string bridge officers, high fives were exchanged, and the secondary engineer took the place of her discomfited Hep-tite superior. Her heart swelled with pride and ambition. One day, she vowed, she would wear that same deer-in-the-headlights look as her commander chose her for a dangerous and most likely fatal away mission.
As he left the bridge for the head, Tiberius smiled to himself. The Graptarians seem like such a noble species. He had no doubt they’d tried everything possible to save their ship.
Just not everything humanly possible.
* * *
The away team boarded the teleporter pads, excited for First Contact and ready for the challenge of repairing the damaged ship. All except Lieutenant Morange, that is. Like the Logics, Heptites were rational, mathematical creatures, and when he’d run the odds of survival, he’s almost elected to duck into an airlock, suit up, and blast himself toward the nearest sun in hopes a friendly, familiar species would pick him up before his air ran out. The odds of survival were somewhat better.
On the way to the teleporter room, he’d mentioned this to Lieutenant LaFuentes, the security officer, who insisted they were too pretty to die but had relayed his findings to Ensign Doall for the latest ship’s pool.
His commander had told him he’d learn a lot about humans while serving on the Impulsive. Somehow, he didn’t think this is what he’d meant.
Commander Angus Deary hummed to himself as he bumped the spanner on his thigh in time to the music.
“What song is that?” the captain asked.
“Voltaire, sir,” Commander Deary replied. “The man understood man’s role in the universe, he did.”
From the teleporter console, Chief Dour cleared his throat. “Subspace is highly polarized due to the Grap-tarian’s malfunction. My mistress leads you on a difficult and perilous path. Perhaps it would be easier if you were silent for the preparations?”
A Heptite subordinate would have spent a day in isolation, meditating on his rudeness while suspended over a vat of man-eating larva for such a comment, but the Captain merely rolled his eyes at his chief engineer. Before Morange could experiment with a rude comment of his own, they dematerialized.
They rematerialized to the controlled chaos of a ship in its death throes. The crew, who looked human enough except for wrinkled foreheads and an affinity for shiny jumpsuits, were rushing to and fro, some carrying what looked like tools while others had luggage. The translators worked overtime to record commands, pleas, and prayers as a ship’s computer informed everyone that they had eight minutes to live.
Jeb Tiberius clapped his hands together. “Good! We’re early. Where do you think the captain is?”
Almost is if scripted, a Graptarian in a slightly more decorated jumpsuit approached them. “I told you not to come!”
Captain Tiberius smiled. “Such nobility. Please. I’m Captain Tiberius. Captain…Ke?”
“Yes. Please. My people are evacuating by escape pods and shuttles. Can you?’
“Oh, absolutely! We’re already prepped to pick them up, get them lunch and a tour of our ship and bring them back when my engineers here have taken care of your little problem.”
“Our little…?” The captain nodded and threw up his hands, which also had five fingers and looked human except the nails were a thick brown. “Perhaps it is your way to die in the service of others. Come.”
They started down a corridor. Lights strobed between yellow and green. LaFuentes asked, “So is that normal, or is that your alert?”
“It is our highest alert – a call to fleeing and prayer.”
“Fantastico. See, in human culture, green means ‘Go’ and yellow means ‘Go faster.’ Of course, it also means it’s safe, so you know, kinda opposite.”
The alien captain led them to a door just as it opened to a swarm of Graptarians. They froze at the sight of their captain.
‘There’s nothing else we can do!” The one holding the door panel open said.
Deary raised his box of spanners. “No worries. We brought fresh ideas.”
“Meh, I want your best five engineers to stay. The rest, flee!” the Graptarian captain ordered.
Apparently the best five were in the back of the group. They swallowed hard, their coincidentally humanish Adam’s apples bobbing in their necks, and made their way to their consoles.
* * *
Inside the engine room of the Graptarian ship, the alarm lights had steadied to a soothing bright yellow. While the computer still counted down to their inevitable demise, the lack of panicky crewmen – save the five silently weeping at their consoles – had made things more relaxed. Jeb felt this was the right time to introduce his away team.
“Captain Ke, Meh, let me introduce my team. Commander Deary,
our chief of engineering and his first assistant, Lieutenant Morange. First Officer Benedict Smythe, who is here in place of our xenologist. She’ll be so sorry to have missed this opportunity. My Chief of Security Lieutenant Enigo Guiermo Ricardo Montoya Guiterrez LaFuentes. Doctor Guy Pasteur.”
The doctor gave a small, nondescript nod and pointed his scanner in the direction of the one crewman who had gotten a hold of his emotions, as well as his own buttocks. “Don’t mind me. I’ll be over there taking readings and basically being irrelevant to the current situation. Holler if Angus shocks himself on the alien equipment.”
Ke looked at each member of the Impulsive away team, befuddlement growing on his face. “Is this your senior staff? Who’s running the ship?”
“Ensign Doall, thanks for asking. Real up-and-comer. I felt the taste of command might do her good, motivate her to stay in HuFleet. Don’t worry. She’ll make sure your crew’s all picked up and fed, and I told her to warp out of here if we didn’t have this fixed in…”
“Warning: Warp core breach in four minutes.”
“…three minutes. No doubt she’ll dally an extra minute or two. You know how junior officers can prevaricate.”
Behind him, Smythe muttered, “Doall, prevaricate?”
“We’re so screwed, man,” Lieutenant LaFuentes agreed.
The captain ignored them both. Commander Deary had wandered over to the main engineering console, which he recognized because it was where Chief Engineer Meh kept glancing with that pensive look, which coincidentally looked just like the pensive look he often saw on human engineers’ faces when facing a similar situation. (In simulation, of course, although there was that one time…but we must never speak of it.)
Meh said, “We’ve tried everything possible already.”
“Sure, just not everything humanly possible.”
“Why should that matter? Do you know how Graptarian warp drives work?”
“Ach. The physics is all the same. Your engines make the same warble that rises in tone – woo wee-eeeee. And your consoles are similar. Flat, like ours. So this squiggly line is the reaction mix interface.”
“Yes…”
“So if we just…”
“Don’t touch that!”
“Morange, go crack open that console. The one by the guy who’s got his hands on his arse. No – the console next to the glowy one. Didn’t you learn anything during your safety course? ‘If the panel’s burning bright, open the one on the right.’”
“What are you doing?” Meh asked. The quality of his voice said that the answer probably didn’t matter as it could only add to the insanity, but morbid curiosity compelled him to ask. Graptarians had very expressive tones, not unlike humans.
Like often happens with humans, the tone was lost on Deary, as he studied the console intently. “Well, I think we should reverse the polarity.”
“The what?”
“Polarity. Of the magnetic containment field.”
“There is no magnetic containment field!”
“No? Well, let’s try it anyway. Morange, are there red wires and white wires?”
“Um…yellow and blue?”
“Close enough. Rip them out and get ready to switch them. I want to make a few adjustments here.” His fingers flew over the console at a mad pace. Either he’d become an instant expert in Graptarian systems, or he had no idea what he was doing.
* * *
In the debate of whether Angus Deary was an idiot savant or just an idiot, Meh chose idiot. He reached for the Impulsive’s engineer’s hands, somehow managing to miss. “Stop it! You can’t do that. It doesn’t even make sense.”
Deary paused long enough to bat his hands away. “It’s called improvising. I got this, just hold my beer.”
“Hold your…what?”
“It means step back and relax. I got this. Morange, ready?”
“Warning: Warp core breach in three minutes, fif-teen seconds. Please hang onto your butts and prepare to approach the Great Crack in the Sky.”
The alien captain sighed. “Meh, just leave him. It no longer matters. Capt. Tiberius, it grieves me that you would sacrifice your ship and all your crew to save us. Maybe if you beamed here, you could beam us all back now?”
“Sure, we’ve got some time. Away team to Impulsive teleporter room. Get a lock on all the life forms in this room and be ready to zap us out on my command.”
“No.”
“No?”
“My mistress does not know you.”
“Well, get on it! Captain out. I’m sorry, Ke. That’s my teleporter chief’s fancy way of saying he can’t get a lock. But I’m sure Commander Deary will have this done in a jiff.”
Sparks flew from the console, and Morange was tossed back. With a yelp of surprise (and perhaps a bit of joy about being useful in this final scene), the doctor rushed to his side. He ran the scanner over him and said grimly, “He’s dead, Jeb. Fortunately, his species can handle death temporarily. I can stabilize his molecular makeup with 65cc’s imposazine, but we have to get him to a resuscitation chamber in the next four minutes or he’s unrevivably dead for sure.”
“Anytime, Mr. Dour,” the captain said over the communicator.
Smythe took Morange’s place while Lieutenant
LaFuentes helped the doctor drag the body of Morange out of the way.
“Warning: Warp core breach in two minutes. Please join me in prayer: O Great Keptar…”
Jeb grinned and shook his head. “I knew y’all were a spiritual peo—whoa! Hey, that’s my butt you’re grabbing!”
The Graptarian captain said, “It’s our way. Keptar, seat of all that comes and goes…”
“Smythe, connect the yellow one. Good. I think I’ve almost got it. What’s this button do?”
The air circulation system suddenly reversed. People’s hair pulled toward the ceiling and folks staggered as they fought to keep their hands tightly clamped to their cheeks.
“Ooops. Maybe this…”
The aliens chorused,”…and guide us past the bladder of purification and on to…”
The computer started to announce imminent breach.
Deary shouted, “Got it! Plug in the blue one!”
Smythe did so with only a minimal amount of sparking. It was if his British heritage had affected the very wires, preventing them from any garish displays of pyrotechnics.
The engines ceased making a whine like a distressed TARDIS with the emergency brake on. The lights went from warm yellow to a bright florescent white. The computer said, “Warp core has been stabilized. Keptar has heard your pleas. Praise Keptar, whose mercy is sweet but whose wrath is silent but deadly.”
“Praise Keptar!”
Meh unclenched and looked over the console. “I… I don’t understand… What have you done?”
“Like I said. I reversed the polarity of the magnetic containment field.”
“But we don’t have a magnetic containment field.”
Deary smirked. “You do now. Do you want me to get rid of it?
“No!” every alien and even the computer shouted.
“Didn’t think so.”
The communicators chirped. Doall’s voice spoke cheerily, “Captain, subspace has stabilized. Is everyone all right?”
“Ensign, I told you to get that ship out of here.”
Although he spoke sternly, Captain Tiberius grinned and winked at Ke.
“Oh, I know. I was going to, but the bridge crew refused to go until the one minute mark and by then Cruz was telling a story, and you know how he talks with his hands.”
“Ah, we have to do something about that. At any rate, it’s a good thing you stayed. All’s well that ends well. Have we got teleporter lock? Good. First, beam the doctor and Morange straight to sickbay. Don’t worry; he’s just mostly dead. Then teleport over an engineering team – and make sure they bring some magnets with them. We’ve got a lot we can teach our new friends and a lot we can learn from them, too.”
To Ke
, he said, “So, tell me more about this Keptar.”
As the small engineering crew started to clean up the mess, Captain Tiberius put a friendly arm around the Graptarian captain’s shoulders and like two friends who’d known each other forever, they walked out of the engine room. The door closed as Ke was saying how Jeb had the right tush for worship – firm, yet squeezable.
Captain’s Personal Log, Intergalactic Date 676789.07
After two days of working with and learning from our new alien friends, we are leaving them and continuing on our mission. It’s been a wonderful experience. Deary got to teach a new crew a thing or two about warp engine technology. Doall has taken her inability to get Cruz to stop waving his arms and steer the ship as a sign that she’s not ready for the Diplomatic Corps. Morange recovered and feeling he’s learned everything he needs to know about humanity, has requested to return to the Heptite Corps ASAP. The doctor came to the bridge to share a cameo and a joke, but we were all pretty busy.
For me, however, this mission has been a life changer. Never have I felt so close to the divine. I don’t think it was the near brush with death. Not like I haven’t been there before! But the spirituality of the Graptarian people, even in the crisis, moved me. In the past two days, I’ve seen it expressed in their routine activities, too. Never have I been goosed so often or with such love. I think…I think I may have found a religion I can embrace.
The captain ended his log. He looked around his quarters, dimmed for the night. The Graptarian ship hung outside his window. As he watched, the drives cycled in the saucer-like vessel and it disappeared. He raised a beer to it and wished them farewell.
Then he set down his glass, grabbed his behind with both hands and said, “Great Keptar…”
Foot in the Door
Loreli stood in the center of the clearing, her face toward the suns, her skin drinking deeply of the unique rays produced by the simultaneous sunset and sunrise even as her eyes feasted upon the spectacle of colors. The fronds that served as her hair splayed around her, and she held out her arms, fingers spread the better to enjoy the warmth. She’d shed her fabric clothing for the walk, choosing to style her foliage as a short but modest dress, in order to make the most of the unique opportunity for photosynthesis. A small breeze played with the hem of her skirt, and she felt the changes in barometric pressure and humidity that signaled an incoming storm.
Hold My Beer Page 6
