“You must have been one of the first humans.”
“I think I was the 12th human on this ship and this is one of the first ships to have humans.”
“Yes, I know.”
He showed her the different systems and it looked like she was paying attention. Then he opened the hatch and they watched the dark liquid flowing.
“Wow,” she said. “So that is the life liquid?”
“Yeah. You know about it?”
“Of course, I’ve read about it, but this is the first time I have actually seen it.”
They watched in silent awe.
“So the food we eat and water we drink comes from that?” she reached out towards it.
“Don’t touch it.”
She took her hand back immediately.
“You don’t want to contaminate it.”
She nodded. “I know that.”
“Yes to your question. All our food is synthesized from that.”
“And the current is caused by the fans?”
“Yes, the fans pull the liquid through the influx filters, and that clean liquid is then filtered once more before the fans push it into the pipes that lead to the converters,” he showed her the diagram on the wall that showed the process.
“That is fantastic,” she said.
It was, he thought as he looked at the diagram.
The following day when Alec arrived to work, Jamez was milling around. Today his body didn’t look as muscular and his face was not so ‘Chris Pratt’-like. Maybe Chief had said something to him about appearing too human, or too handsome.
“Hey Alec, Chief asked me to give Cate the run down on the engines, but she is running late,” said Jamez. “I’m supposed to be checking on converter #2, it’s having a problem.”
“Yeah I heard.”
“Can you check it out for me?”
“Maybe I should give her a tour of the engines,” said Alec. He wasn’t the expert, but he knew enough to give a tour.
“No, please Alec. I think I would be better giving her the tour.”
“Okay, but you owe me.”
“Sure, any thing you like,” Jamez smiled and winked.
That was strange. Maybe Jamez didn’t understand what those signals meant. It made his sexual preference ambivalent if he was winking at him to spend time with her. He would have to explain it to him later.
“Good morning Alec,” said Chief coming out of his office.
“Morning,” he said. It was never really morning, but most agreed it was a pleasant greeting and since it signified the beginning of the work shift, all species used it. The workers on the night shift also used the same greeting at the beginning of their shift.
“What do you think of Cate?” asked Chief.
“Don’t know much. This is her second day.”
“She is not going to be here long. She is training for another ship.”
“Oh. I thought she was the help we had requested.”
“We have requested help, but it is not her.”
“So she is basically wasting our time?”
“No, this is part of her training. Be nice,” said Chief.
“I’m always nice, sir.”
Cate arrived soon after that and Jamez took her to the engine room. Alec wondered if she had figured out he wasn’t human yet.
“Too bad she is not staying with us,” said Chief. “I like her.”
Alec was surprised that Chief had an opinion about her so soon and he was further surprised when he didn’t chastise Cate for arriving late.
He didn’t think a pretty face swayed the aliens, but he couldn’t explain Chief’s reaction. He returned to the problem at hand, there was always something. The life liquid filter problem was only one of many things that needed attention.
As the ship screamed through the galaxy, many parameters needed to be monitored and tweaked, and that was if everything was working smoothly. Right now he would address the problem with converter #2.
He had seen this problem before and suspected the problem was with temperature controller. A few people had complained their ice tea was too warm and their hot tea was not hot enough. Other species had complained as well, but people’s foods had a wider range of temperatures and so he would test the converter with that.
The life liquid fed into the converter through a pipe that was separated from the rest of the system so he didn’t have to worry about touching that. He called Tech Center for help and a Lola was sent to help him disassemble the temperature controls. They soon found the problem. One of the photon emitters had burnt out. These emitters energized the atoms to heat the food or slowed the atoms down to cool it.
“All right CC, this is easy to replace,” said Alec.
All of the Lolas techs he had met went by two letters. He had started to suspect that their names had something to do with the work they did. X and Z were more senior and only had one letter in their names.
“Yes, sir,” said CC.
Alec was not going to correct her about calling him sir, it wasn’t necessary, but it sounded good. In any case all techs called everyone sir.
“Alec?” Chief came in and glanced at the parts on the table. “Looks like you found the problem?”
“The problem is fixed, sir, but the reason it happened is unknown,” said Alec. “That actuator should not have burned out this way. I would like to see what was happening when it failed.”
“Good idea. A log of all food ordered is kept on the mainframe.”
Alec left CC to finish reassembling the unit and logged into the computer. The converter had been functioning properly dispensing food for the Lolas primarily. They like their food crunchy and cool, close to -78 degrees Centigrade (the temperature of dry ice). Then it looked like someone, most likely a human, had asked for Earl Grey tea, extra hot, and it had been served at 85 degrees.
“What did you find?” asked Hazel. “Chief said you had a theory?”
Alec told her what he had found.
“A swing of 160 degrees, although large, should not have burned out the emitter,” she said.
“I agree.”
“Well it is fixed for now and I need your help. Jamez is still busy.”
“Still?” That tour was taking a long time.
“Yes. I need to calibrate one of the engines that is not performing optimally, follow me.”
Alec followed Hazel into the engine room. The balancing of the engine was an on-going task. It was not unusual to adjust engine parameters based on power requirements throughout the ship.
Cate and Jamez were standing in the middle of a hologram of engine schematics. She was laughing.
“You are here to rebalance?” asked Jamez noticing them. “Do you need my help?”
“No, I have Alec helping me,” said Hazel. “Are you done explaining the engines to Cate?”
“Almost,” said Jamez looking more serious. He returned to the hologram and his description.
“Okay Hazel, which engine is it?” asked Alec. In the year on board, Alec knew that rebalancing was easy to do with some someone to help and soon they had it working optimally.
Currently the ship was traveling at a medium speed. There was low, medium, high and space flight. The terminology was pretty simple so all the species could understand. Up in the command center there were tweaks made by the pilot so that the each speed could translate into gradients. This way low translated into 1, 2 and 3, medium into 4, 5 and 6 and so on.
He liked to think of it as covering distances. Jupiter was 588 million km from Earth and at low speed it took almost two days to cover that distance. On the other hand Proxima Centauri, the nearest star to the sun, was 1.3 parsecs or 40 trillion km away and the ship would use space flight speed taking it less than a day.
“Hey.”
“Hey,” said Alec. Cate was standing next to him. He realized it was almost quitting time.
“Some of us are going to the bar and I was told to ask you.”
Okay, thought
Alec. She was making it plain that it wasn’t she who was asking. “No thanks, I’m going to finish this first.”
“Hmm, they said you would say that.”
“Did they.”
“For a human you are not very friendly are you?”
“I don’t know if that is true. I’m just doing my work and I was not aware all humans are supposed to be friendly.”
“Well, you have probably heard, all work and no play makes a …”
“Dull boy,” he interrupted. “Yep and that is what I strive to be.”
“Okay then, see you tomorrow.”
He didn’t think he was dull. He went to the bar most nights, and actually had a couple of friends whom he met then, but it was much later in the evening. That way he avoided the crowds. Honestly, it wasn’t so much the crowd as some of the humans that frequented the bar earlier. Most of them were gone by the time he arrived, but unfortunately so were his coworkers. It seemed that most of the species on board and many of the humans needed more sleep than he did.
Chapter 3: A new diver
“How far away from Earth do you think we are?” asked Cate.
Alec looked at her. “Clarify.”
“Of course. Days at medium speed, from 0800.”
He smiled. Her question was good; it was precise. It had been eight days since she had come on board, but then she had not boarded on Earth. “320 hours, a little over thirteen days.”
It was her turn to smile. “Just like that. You keep that sort of information on the top of your head?”
“Yeah, I like to keep track of that, among other things.”
“I’ll have to ask you about those things later,” she said as they walked into the conference room.
Yeah, he could look forward to that, he thought.
Chief was already sitting at the table and next to him were seated several other officers, most of them were Zandu. It was their ship and they had the most experience so it made sense they were mostly in charge.
Alec noted that each Zandus was wearing a variety of attachments and that each seemed unique. Chief had changed his usual mechanical gear for something that looked more like hands, probably since he was presenting.
As they waited for the captain and others to show, Alec took a glance at Cate. He had to admit she had fit well with the group. In fact, he had started to agree with Chief that they would miss her when she left.
The meeting started and Chief recounted what was happening to the filters. He ended by mentioning that things were getting worse.
“We have to find what is causing this,” said the captain.
Everyone agreed with that.
“That is the reason I have called this meeting,” said Chief. “The first time we saw this problem was about three months ago.”
“So what changed then?” asked one of the officers.
“I think I know,” said Denabulus, the second mate. “We took on seven more humans.”
The second mate was a Shaper like Jamez, but unlike him, his view on humans was pretty negative. Like most of the shape-shifters on board, Denabulus had taken on a look that was a cross between the Lolas and the humans. He had adopted their large feet, and pointy ears, but he only had two eyes, a well-defined nose and his brownish skin was not scaly.
Alec had heard Denabulus make derogatory comments before and wondered where this comment was taking him.
Meanwhile everyone had turned to look at the Alec and Cate. There were twenty-five humans on board, but they were the only humans present at the meeting. Cate glanced at Alec briefly and looked on as if it didn’t concern her one little bit. He did the same.
“That is just one of the things that happened three months ago,” said Chief. “If it were that easy, I would have tested that theory already. In fact, we are lucky to have Alec since he can change the filter more easily than many of us could.”
That was true, he thought. Several of the species represented in the meeting would not fit in the conduits and some couldn’t even swim.
“Somehow a pollutant has been introduced into the life liquid,” said Chief.
“I thought the system is sealed, except for the hatch in engineering, of course,” said the captain.
“Yes, a hatch that is kept under tight surveillance, so this is the mystery,” said Chief. He pressed a control in front of him. “I’ve brought up a hologram of the life liquid system. Alec will walk us through it.”
Alec got up and actually started to walk through the hologram indicating the process.
“I understand you have been through much of the system?” asked the captain.
“Yes,” said Alec. “I have swum through most of it to verify that the diagrams we have match exactly what is out there. The areas I verified are shown in green.”
“When you swam, did you take enough care to not introduce foreign objects? What about the suit?” asked Denabulus.
His number one fan, thought Alec and for a moment he wanted to ignore the question, but then he took a breath and explained the decontamination procedure.
“I notice some areas are not green?” asked the captain.
“Some areas are too small for me.”
“Right, we need to survey those areas immediately,” said the captain looking around the room. It looked like he was looking for small volunteers.
“Sir, I might be able to fit better than he,” Cate had raised her hand.
“Are you sure? You are the trainee, aren’t you?” asked the captain.
She nodded and then remembered to say yes. Many species did not understand ‘the nod.’
“Good,” said the captain. “You should start mapping those areas right away.”
Chief agreed and the meeting came to a conclusion.
“I hope you like tight, dark spaces,” said Alec as they returned to Engineering.
“Not really, but I thought I should volunteer to help boost the image the others have about us.”
“You noticed. Humans are the low man on the totem pole. We are the newly discovered species, kind of interesting, but definitely not in the same league as the rest of them.”
“Hmmm, is it that bad?’
“No. Not all of them feel that way.”
“That is what Jamez told me.”
“Did you know… ” Alec started. He was thinking of telling her about Jamez, but then stopped. “Do you know how to swim?”
She laughed. “That would be crazy to volunteer for this job without knowing that.”
He nodded.
Chief wanted Cate to swim right away. “It is going to take several trips to plot all those areas and you should start now,” he said.
Cate agreed.
Alec started to brief her on what she would find. “If you follow the current, it will take you to the fans. After about ten minutes, the current will subside, and you might get disoriented so look at the walls. Some have arrows painted on them and they point towards the hatch. You should be able to see clearly with the light on your head,” he said as Z brought out the suit.
She could use the same suit he had since it molded itself to the wearer. Even X and Z had worn the same suit. She started to undress and Alec paused. She got down to her underwear and Z helped her into the suit.
“Alec?” asked Chief. “You were saying?”
“Uh… yes,” said Alec. He had lost track of what he was saying. “There is more. The life liquid is heavier than water, so the going will be slow. In some places there is handrail you can use to pull yourself along, but some areas will not have anything. That is not shown in the diagram.”
Chief brought out a physical diagram. “You should start in this area and move along here. We have attached a recorder to your light so we can follow your progress. It will also help us review whatever you find later. This area should take you about twenty minutes and that is plenty for your first time down there.”
“In fact, if you want to come back before that, you should,” said Z.
“Z is rig
ht about that,” said Alec. “Sometimes the darkness and the heavy liquid pressing against you can be uncomfortable.”
“Right, I think I should go, before I hear anymore of this pep talk,” said Cate.
X opened the hatch and Hazel turned the fans off. Cate waited. She would be swimming in the opposite direction from the fans and there was no point fighting against the current.
“We will be right here for you,” said Jamez. “Give us regular updates.”
Alec noticed his coworkers were more concerned about her than they had ever been about him. Maybe it was because she shared drinks with them.
She stepped into the hatch and disappeared in the goo.
“You probably feel relieved you are not going,” said Z.
“I’m not relieved, I just couldn’t fit,” said Alec. It wasn’t that he was trying to get out of doing his job. He switched the comm on. “Cate, how is it going?”
“Good, I think. It is hard to tell how far I’ve gone.”
“There should be numbers next to the arrows. Those represent meters from the hatch.”
“Meters? Why would they use a human measurement?”
“I drew those to keep track of where I was.”
“I did not know about those,” said Chief.
Alec shrugged. Chief would never be one to go down there.
“Okay, I’m coming up to an arrow,” said Cate. “It is number 1.”
“That means you are 100 meters from the hatch.”
“She is going much slower than you,” said Z off the comm.
Alec nodded. “It is her first time.”
After a few minutes, Cate was on the line again. “I see what you mean about this area. It is a tight squeeze.”
“Be careful,” said Jamez and Alec together.
“Let’s see,” said Cate talking to herself. “Maybe if I turn in this way I can make it.”
There was nothing for a moment and then they heard her again. “I am moving along the smaller tube now.”
“What do you see?” asked Alec.
“The walls are shinny and smooth, nothing unusual.”
“Twelve minutes,” said Z.
“You should start back,” said Alec.
“I am pretty close to making it through this area,” said Cate. “I see an opening at the far end, maybe thirty meters.”
Alec looked at the diagram. “It is further than you think, you should come back.”
“But I haven’t finished,” she said. From the recording they could tell that she had increased her speed.
The Anzu: Alec Page 2
