by Joe Zieja
“Ghost sandwich,” Rogers said. He pulled his datapad from his pocket and pressed a couple of buttons. “How are things going with you two?”
The crackling voice of McSchmidt came back at him through the datapad. “Lots of cooks in the kitchen,” he said. “We think we have a good idea about how to keep them busy. We’re heading to engineering now.”
“Are you sure that’s a good idea?”
“Uf curse it is!” Tunger’s voice came through. “We’re a team!”
“Shut up!” McSchmidt barked. Rogers thought he heard the sound of someone being slapped in the face, then the howling of a monkey, the high-pitched scream of someone absolutely terrified of said monkey, and then the transmission cut out.
“I hope they know what they’re doing,” Rogers muttered. He switched communication channels, and Mailn’s voice came through.
“What do you want?” she asked. She sounded irritated.
“Just checking in,” Rogers said. “Is everything okay? You don’t sound too happy.”
“Because I’m friggin busy,” she said, “and some boob is calling me to check up on me. How would it feel if someone was breathing down your neck every ten seconds of every day?”
Rogers paused. “. . . Normal?”
“Ugh,” Mailn said, and the transmission went out.
They exited the up-line onto the communications deck, which was mostly an unnavigable maze of hallways leading to various offices, server rooms, and one Popsicle stand that had been shut down during Rogers’ leave of absence from the military. As the electronic nerve center of the Flagship and the entire 331st, the communications deck was a huge, important, incredibly complex section of the ship. Rogers had always avoided it like the plague; Communications was the red-headed stepchild of Engineering. The personnel were also notorious for being teetotalers, which was one step above politician in Rogers’ book.
He pulled up a map of the comm deck on his datapad and tried to figure out how the hell to get to the IT center that connected to the mainframe room. The whole layout of the deck literally looked like someone had crumpled up a long piece of string and thrown it on the floor. It was nearly impossible to figure out which way led to which room.
“I can’t make heads or tails of this stupid map. Deet, can I short-burst transmit this thing to you so you can use your, uh, droid powers to automatically navigate us to the IT desk?”
“What do I look like, an EXPLETIVE tour guide?”
“No,” Rogers said, “you look like a piece of machinery specifically built to help humans with tasks. And I thought your profanity generator got fixed?”
“EXPLETIVE you.”
“Right. I’m sending this to you now.”
After a couple of button presses, Deet’s eyes flashed and he beeped a couple of times, and Rogers waited impatiently for him to finish whatever processing he needed to do. For an automated life form, he certainly was slow.
Klein had finished his sandwich and was licking his fingers contentedly as they marched down the hallway in the direction that Rogers guessed was the IT desk. The hallways were almost ridiculously narrow, so much so that as a couple of pale, beady-eyed comm troops passed, everyone had to turn sideways just to avoid grinding up against each other. Even they, however, looked just a bit less uptight than Rogers was used to seeing folks on the Flagship since he’d returned. It was amazing what some real food and some fluorescent pictures of farm animals riding on the backs of rocket ships could do. Rogers wondered how Ralph was doing; if he’d gone through all the tainted coffee, he’d probably be crashing pretty hard right now.
“This way,” Deet said suddenly, turning down an unmarked corridor and running smack into a sleek gray droid that Rogers hadn’t thought he’d see again.
“What are you doing here?” the droid—the Froid—asked. It was Oh One, former second-in-command of the recently disbanded AIGCS. Rogers hadn’t seen him since he’d nearly torn the training deck apart. He was easily recognizable due to the painted badger pattern on his face.
“It’s, uh, I . . .” Rogers stammered.
Oh One looked at Deet, and his eyes flashed. For a moment, Rogers thought there would be another droid fu contest, but neither of them moved to slap each other. Rogers started to sweat; did Oh One know about Barber Bot’s attempt on Rogers’ life? Had he ordered it, perhaps? Obviously, he would know by now that Barber Bot had failed.
“This location is not in concordance with your essential duties as executive officer to Admiral Klein,” Oh One said. “It seems highly irregular that you would be present here.”
“Um,” Rogers said. His knees started to shake. A droid armed with a welding torch and a butcher knife was one thing; he knew that Oh One had a deadly disruptor rifle hidden in his chest and knew how to use it. Where was that big orange button when he needed it?
“Are you in the habit of questioning your superior officers’ motives for carrying out their duties?” Klein suddenly bellowed. His voice completely changed, taking on the character that happened whenever he gave speeches to the fleet, but now it had a force to it that sent vibrations all throughout the long hallway. “Do you know who I am?”
Oh One didn’t speak for a moment, but his gaze appeared to shift from Rogers to Klein.
“You are Admiral Klein, commander of the Flagship and of the 331st ATBU.”
“You are correct,” Klein said. “And I’ll thank you to stop impeding the progress of my official duties. What is your alphanumeric designation?”
“I am F-GC-001,” Oh One replied. “Former second-in-command of the AIGCS.”
“And now you are assigned to roaming the halls and harassing personnel?”
“I am unaware that such a position exists aboard this ship,” Oh One said. “If you wish to have me assigned to such duties, please fill out a general request form—”
“I don’t fill out forms,” Klein said, pointing to Rogers. “I have him fill out forms. And nobody messes with the guy that fills out my forms.”
“That’s right,” Rogers said, feeling bold. “Now get out of our way before I rub my feet on the carpet and touch you.”
Oh One spared him an irritated glance, that red glow flashing in his eyes for a brief moment. Rogers tried not to show the fact that he was currently considering where the nearest bathroom was if he happened to poop his pants. What would they do if Oh One decided to draw his weapon? Deet might be “a fierce and loyal warrior of an ancient order” or whatever, but he didn’t have a disruptor pistol. He barely had matching arms.
Just when Rogers thought he was going to have to do something desperate and heroic, like die in a pool of his own blood on the floor of the communication deck in complete and utter obscurity, Oh One abruptly shouldered past all of them and continued walking toward the up-line. Rogers let out a breath that kind of sounded, maybe just a little bit, like a whiny sob.
He turned to Klein, feeling a little ashamed of himself. He’d done nothing but berate this man for being a complete and utter imbecile for as long as he’d known him, and that man had likely just saved their skins.
“Sir,” Rogers said. “I didn’t know you had it in you.”
Klein looked at Rogers, his face unreadable. His lips parted as if to say something, but he closed his mouth and swallowed. Slowly, he shook his head.
“Let’s just get this over with,” he said.
“Deet,” Rogers said, “lead the way.”
Their droid companion began walking forward at a brisk pace, leading them through the twists and turns of the bowels of the Flagship. Rogers felt even more confused and disoriented than when he’d visited Ralph, who had really been in the bowels of the Flagship. It was like they had constructed this place specifically to be confusing. Maybe it was a defense mechanism in case the ship was ever boarded—though communications troops didn’t exactly have a reputation for defending things to the last man and all that.
“What is with this place?” Rogers said out loud. Despite being surrounded o
n all sides by claustrophobia-inducing metal surfaces, his voice seemed to echo as though he was in a large cavern.
They passed a room with an old-fashioned latch-and-hinge construction, composed entirely out of thick bands of riveted metal. The room was marked ROOM 01010110. Someone had scratched out two of the numbers and changed it to ROOM 01011110, and someone else below that had scribbled “That’s disgusting.” Rogers didn’t understand any of it.
Deet made a sound that only vaguely reminded Rogers of laughing.
“That’s a good one,” Deet said, pointing to the room.
“I don’t get it,” Rogers said.
“It’s a binary thing,” Deet said. “Either you get it or you don’t.”
They turned a corner, and all of a sudden, the whole area opened up. What was formerly a narrow corridor that seemed more at home in a submarine than a space cruiser was suddenly a grandiose hallway, almost bulbous. The ceiling must have extended some twenty or thirty feet above them, tattooed with elaborate drawings and frescoes of things that Rogers didn’t really understand. There were ones and zeroes, of course, but there were also other drawings that seemed both archaic and modern at the same time, perhaps paying tribute to an era long gone. Something that appeared to be a partially eaten pie was chasing around blue dots. Rogers wondered if zip jack was really that rare on this ship after all.
“This place is weird,” Rogers said.
“I concur with your assessment,” Deet said.
The strangeness didn’t end at the ceiling, however. The door to the IT center wasn’t just your average hydraulic-powered sliding door with a keypad and that really comforting hissing noise that told you that you were home. It was a giant set of double doors made entirely out of iron that ran nearly all the way to the ceiling. Swirls of intricately patterned dark wood had been embossed on the door, though there wasn’t any clear meaning behind it.
And, for some reason, Rogers heard organ music.
“Really weird,” Rogers said.
They approached the door, and without any door control to use, Rogers rapped on it using the thick knocker hanging from a well-oiled, fist-thick hinge.
A small window opened with a resounding clack, revealing a set of charcoal eyes set in a face as pale as sheep’s wool.
“Yes?”
Rogers hesitated. “Um, we need to come inside and see the mainframe room,” he said. “I have the admiral here with me. We’re conducting a random inspection.”
The eyes darted between Rogers, Klein, and Deet, and then vanished for a moment. When they returned, Rogers was almost certain they were the same eyes, but the voice was entirely different.
“Yes?”
“I just told the other pair of eyes that we need to come in and get to the mainframe room,” Rogers said, trying to remain patient. “I have the admiral here and we’re conducting a random inspection.”
The window slammed shut, and for a moment, Rogers thought they’d been ignored. He probably would have done the same thing had someone come by and told him he’d be having a random inspection. In fact, he’d tried to do just that several times. Rogers wished his old room on the quarterdeck had been equipped with a window like this he could slam on people whenever he wanted.
Rogers pulled out his datapad and paged the Viking while he was waiting for another set of eyes to appear and say, “Yes?”
“How are things going down there? We’re almost at the mainframe.”
“Move, you fat-bellied sons of whores!” the Viking barked.
“That well, huh?” Rogers asked.
“Rogers,” the Viking said, her voice sounding much closer to the microphone now. “You’re all set for the moment. Good luck.”
“What did you do?” Rogers asked slowly.
The microphone clicked off. Rogers was about to slip it back into his holster when a light came on, indicating he had a message from Tunger.
“Sir,” Tunger said. “We’re still working on a way to, uh, employ all of the chefs, but we just heard that all the kitchens are on fire!”
Rogers thought for a moment. “Is that a metaphor?”
“No,” McSchmidt called back at him. “No, it’s not.”
“I love that woman,” Rogers muttered.
“What was that?”
“Nothing. Just hurry up, alright? We’re going to hopefully plug in here in a few minutes and we don’t need any unnecessary meetings with cooks. I’m pretty sure we just met the head chef in the hallway here and I’d rather not do that again.”
“Roger, Rogers,” McSchmidt said, then tittered like a schoolboy.
“Never say that again.” Rogers clicked the microphone off.
Just as Rogers was about to knock on the door again, the door creaked. Well, something creaked. The door slid open like every other door on the ship, and Rogers realized that the gothic design had merely been really, really elaborate paint.
The door opened to reveal what appeared to be a very simple cubicle setup. In fact, it seemed almost dated. Pale lights washed over the labyrinthine half-height walls that separated faux-pine desks, and the whole office had a sort of subdued, uncomfortable quiet about it. The person who had opened the door, a starman first class, greeted them with a smile and a salute for the admiral, who returned it.
“Welcome to Communications!” she said.
Rogers took a deep breath. He really hoped this was going to work.
“We need to get to the mainframe room,” Rogers said. “My droid here is going to perform a critical system update after we’re done inspecting.”
“That sounds perfectly reasonable,” the starman—whose nametag said Plinkett—said.
“Great,” Rogers said, sighing in relief.
“But I’m afraid I can’t let you do that.”
“What?” Rogers said. “Why? You just said it was perfectly reasonable. I have the admiral of the fleet standing right next to me.”
“If you needed assistance,” Plinkett said, “you should have called the helpline. We would have logged your problem, issued you a ticket, asked you to reboot your computer, and then filed it away in a long line of support tickets that haven’t been serviced.”
Rogers looked at the admiral for support, but he still seemed a little addled from the encounter in the hallway. What was his problem? One moment, he was saving their skins; the next, he was useless without a podium and note cards.
“That’s absurd,” Rogers said. “Why would I file a support ticket for physically coming down here and inspecting the mainframe?”
“I didn’t write the rules,” Plinkett said. She paused and cocked her head. “In fact, I’m not sure anyone wrote the rules.”
Rogers was not a violent man. Fighting, among other things, scared him. But right now, if he had had access to a weapon, he might have chosen to use it. Or at least hand it to someone else and ask them to please use it for him once he stepped out of the room.
Just as he was about to continue considering being violent, Deet started talking.
“Incoming message!” Deet said, loud enough for everyone in the cavernous IT center to hear. Heads started popping up from cubicles like groundhogs whose tunnels had been flooded. “Incoming message!”
“From who?” Rogers asked in a hushed whisper. “What are you doing?”
“Incoming message from all connected computer terminals! This is a Status One Alert!” Deet went on, his eyes flashing. “Information-processing terminals connected to the main network will not reboot.”
“What?” Plinkett said, her eyes wide. “That’s impossible.”
“More incoming messages!” Deet said, his voice now getting louder, approaching the volume of his noise jamming. “Multiple hardware failures are being experienced along multiple terminal streams throughout all decks aboard the Flagship!”
“I’m not getting any of this,” said a tech, who was looking down at his monitors. “Nobody put in a ticket for hardware failures.”
“More incoming messages!” Deet
shouted. “The ticket system has been taken offline by worms!”
“Bugs,” Rogers whispered.
“Bugs!” Deet corrected.
“Has anyone tried rebooting?” someone cried helplessly from the back corner of the room.
“He says they won’t reboot!”
“I have the ticket system up right here,” the skeptical tech said. “Guys, everything looks fine.”
The admiral, somehow catching on, pointed at the tech who had spoken. “Arrest that man!”
“What?” The tech’s eyes snapped up. “Why? What did I do?”
“He’s in leagues with the worms!” the admiral yelled.
“Bugs,” Rogers whispered.
A pair of MPs burst through the door and dragged the poor man out. In the chaos, Rogers noticed Deet scooting his way slowly toward an open power terminal, into which he plugged his extension. Suddenly, people around the room began shouting.
“He’s right! The ticket system is down.”
“Did you try rebooting?”
“I can’t! The reboot button is gone!”
“Oh god. Oh god.”
Everyone began moving at once. Stacks of papers appeared without explanation, thrown into the air as people ran for the door. All semblance of military bearing and discipline was abandoned as the entire IT department scrambled over each other to try to get to the door of what they thought must surely be a ship about to explode. Even Plinkett prepared to bolt, but Rogers grabbed her by the arm.
“Stop,” he said, “we need your help.”
“There is no god!” she shouted.
“Take it easy. We can fix this for you. We just need to get to the mainframe room.”
Plinkett was lost in a mix between hysterical laughter and uncontrolled sobbing. “How can you possibly do that? The ticket system is down.”
Deet walked forward, his eyes shining, the fleeing IT personnel parting around him as though he was a tall boulder in the middle of a raging river. He looked down at Plinkett and spoke in a firm, commanding voice.
“Starman First Class Plinkett,” he said. “Do you know my designation?”
