Well, this system's almost done, the
captain thought with a sense of accomplishment, as she began reading
through the last of the team's reports. In a couple of days the
final steps would be taken and yet another solar system would
be through a preliminary surveying. What's more, this was the
last star they were scheduled this time out, and she felt a small,
contented smile
twitching on her lips as the thought of the journey home to loved
ones sparkled through her mind.
Her reverie was ended abruptly by an
intrusion from one of the crew. "Captain, sensors are picking
up an object that appears to be another starship. It's heading
on a course that will bring it quite close to us, and will be
here very soon. It's moving at an enormous velocity, yet the instruments
say it's also decelerating at an impossible rate."
Moving from her chair to the crew-member's
station, the captain stood over her, consulting the instruments
intently, quickly corroborating her findings. "Bring it up
on the viewer," she ordered, the excitement leaking out from
her voice.
"There it is there captain,"
a small marker encircling the fuzzy dot on the screen.
"There shouldn't be another one
of our
ships around here, not this far out, and we would have received
word if another ship was dispatched to
this region," watching the blob grew as it drew nearer.
As the image on the screen began to
coalesce and clarify, the ship still growing in size, cloudy realization
dawned into certainty. Watching the craft pull closer into view,
its design an oddly-shaped one, the edges of the hull flowing
in some alien aesthetics, any doubt was expunged from their minds.
Finally, with the unknown craft close
enough to see the strange markings stencilled
across it, possibly letters in some unknown script, new questions
were rapidly forming. Losing herself in the image, the alien letters
of the UES Stargazer having no meaning for her, the captain lowered
an ear, and twitching her tail in puzzlement, wondered just where
this strange craft could have possibly come from.
"Ah Daniel, you're here. Good,
we're almost at optimal range" one of the members of the
late-night crew called out as the captain entered the bridge,
the vestiges of sleep still showing on him, but quickly being
replaced by his growing excitement.
"Yes Terrie, I trust you didn't
wake me up for nothing," he replied, winking, then looking
at the image before them, his face betrayed his astonishment.
"So that's it then, it's finally happened?" letting
it out with a gasp.
"Yes, we picked it up on long-range
sensors fifteen minutes ago, but we weren't absolutely sure until
we got closer for a better look. We almost
didn't breathe for a few minutes there."
Looking in amazement at the vessel hovering
before them, floating just outside of the virtual window of the
viewscreen,
there were several moments of silence, as if not daring to question
the reality facing them.
Briefly surveying the other people on
the bridge, the captain spoke again. "I think this is something
we've all been waiting a long time for, and now we've got the
chance to finally do it..." Pausing, he added, "Mick,
have you been able to make any radio contact with them?"
"Yes, but only a few minutes ago.
On our approach we scanned all the frequencies and found a couple
of channels on
which we can talk with them.
Right now I'm working on the standard mathematical-progressions
protocol. It took them a bit of time, but they've caught on and
are working through the patterns with us. It's not much, but we
are
talking with them," the officer finished with a sparkle in
his eyes.
The next several hours passed in an
excited stream of little accomplishments, until Mick triumphantly
announced "we've got visuals!"
All eyes turning toward him, he added
a brief explanation. "They finally must have been able to
decode our signals, I've been sending out a video loop of clips
from our archives, test patterns mainly, a few of the canned greeting
files and shots of Earth. They started sending back their own
data, which took a bit of massaging, with the computer's help,
to figure out the coding and image size, but we've got something
that we can look at now..."
Keying in a short command sequence,
a smaller window appeared in a corner on the main viewer, eclipsing
part of the alien craft. The image wasn't perfect, but it still
commanded respect.
"I'm not sure if the colors are
correct or if it's supposed to be this grainy. I had to have the
computer guess the mapping from typical color distributions, but
who knows if that means anything. The first few images look okay,
though washed out a little."
His explanation was overlooked for the
moment at least, as the rest of the crew on the bridge watched
the images cycle slowly through, their gaze stuck intently on
the screen, hanging on each new scene to the vision.
The first few pictures looked to be
the counterpart of the data they'd sent out to their fellow, but
unknown, travellers.
The images would have been boring, had it not been the first time
human eyes had come across them. Simple test images, various geometric
patterns, overlaid with text in an alien script, its letters scrawled
out, yet stylized in some unearthly way, commanding the attention
of those regarding them.
Flipping through the images, they became
more and more intricate and animated. Showing an alien world,
a planetary system orbiting some foreign star, then views of their
starships, and glimpses of their cities. Finally, the show ended
in the grand climax, as a visual of the beings themselves appeared
before them.
No one moved, or scarcely breathed,
as their eyes remained locked on the realization of the aliens
in front of them. Whatever they'd been expecting, whatever vision
they might have conjured up, the reality of the situation now
confronted them. There, faced with a combination of something
so familiar and ordinary, yet so fantastic, even their wildest
imaginations seemed pale in comparison. For on the screen stood
the aliens, walking upright on two legs, vaguely fitting into
the humanoid mold,
while wearing a mask of seemingly improbability. With their paws
outstretched to
the viewer, their ears at attention,
the felines stood before them, their tails twitching and the lips
of their muzzles moving, speaking in an alien tongue.
Chief medical officer, Joan Chen, was
the last of the four to assemble for the quick briefing in the
shuttle bay. Looking a bit harried from her quick preparations,
the energy of the excitement they all felt was flowing through
her as well.
"Okay Joan, with you here, that's
everyone. Is everything ready?"
"As well as we can plan on, Daniel"
she delivered with a nervous smile. "I've gone through the
info you sent me, and am up with everyone else on this."
"All right let's do it. We'll need
to proceed with some caution, but again, this is the mission we've
all been waiting for. We've done as much as we can through transmissions;
the shuttle's all prepped and it's time to meet our friends in
person."
Taking the small craft out away from
the ship, they made the approach to the other vessel carefully,
moving at a reduced speed, and with a signalling
beacon on to alert their neighbors of their approach. Moving to
rest in front of the alien craft, now looming larger than life
before them, they waited the agonizing few minutes before a slight
movement caught their attention.
Emerging from a side landing bay, a
small craft made its way to their location. When the complement
to the human vessel had made its rendezvous with its new-found
visitors, their shuttle began the slow and cautious escort, leading
the humans into what, from viewing the aliens transmissions, literally
could be the lion's den.
With bated breath the crew waited as
the shuttle was brought to a smooth landing within the foreign
landing bay. Studying an instrument panel, Mick finally broke
the silence. "The atmospheric readings are good, similar
to terran standards, and are well within safety tolerances."
Following Daniel's silent move, they exited the safety of their
craft to confront whatever might be waiting for them, hearts pounding,
both with apprehension and excitement.
Standing before them in the confined
openness of the bay were five of the aliens, even more improbable
in person, yet so tangible, watching them with unblinking feline
eyes. The two races stood like that, gazing at one another for
a small eternity, each side appraising the other with reserved
astonishment.
Now up close, the humans got a much
better look of their hosts. The felines stood upright on digitigrade
feet, the large soles of their paws supporting their weight. Besides
the obvious catlike attributes, the aliens' body structure was
similar to humans, with a slightly shorter stature. Poking up
through the flowing manes of hair framing feline faces of golden-brown
and tawny-yellow fur, the large ears of every alien were standing
at attention, their tails twitching softly behind them as they
watched the visitors.
The gulf was finally breached when a
single alien, a female and presumably the captain, stepped forward.
Holding out her arms, partially extending them in front of her,
she brought her palms facing upwards. Then cocking her head to
one side ever so slightly, she uttered the first words of theirs
ever to reach a human's ear.
"Rrimmak iggan terkarmok 'Kevar-Trennek.'
Yevvak Mkkarr Pak Sserral, petrek kos Rramatharr Terkar Ferrak.
Jattek tuk do wekkam," the tones of her voice rumbling softly
with a the timbres of a throaty purr.
Reacting quickly, the human captain
was quick to respond, pantomiming the alien's gesture. "Hello,
my name is Daniel Simpson, captain of the United Earth Starship
'Stargazer.' Thank you for letting us aboard, and we wish to extend
our peaceful greetings to you."
Then turning to one of his crew mates,
he proceeded to offer his hand to them, the aliens watching intently
as they shook hands. Facing the alien captain once again, he slowly
stepped forward two paces and offered her his hand.
Their eyes locked as she regarded him,
the slightly-elliptical pupils of her hazel eyes silently studying
him. With the others looking on, she reached out and tentatively
took his hand. As they shook hands in an uncertain gesture, they
continued to appraise one another, gathering as much information
as possible, minds straining to keep up with the situation.
Daniel noticed several things about
the aliens then, little observations, but each important in its
own right. First of all, while their hands were similar to those
of humans, they only had four digits, three fingers and an opposable
thumb, the light fur covering their body absent on their fingertips
and palms. Their fingers were also a little shorter than a human's,
appearing slightly squat, but still looked capable of fine manipulations
of objects. Also, glancing around at the other four creatures
standing behind their captain, he noticed that while he'd come
aboard with a mixed-gender complement, all five of the aliens
who'd come to meet them were female.
Ending the handshake, still watching
the aliens watching him and his crew, Daniel spoke again, more
to his fellow humans than the felines. "Well, now what do
we do?" Seeing the alien captain's look of confusion, straining
to try and comprehend their visitors strange words, he turned
to the doctor.
"Joan, have you got the translators
ready?"
"Yes, but I don't know how useful
they'll be. They were designed for this, hoping it would happen
someday, but we've only used them on humans before. I don't know
how our friend's will react to it. It will take quite some time
to get anything useful out of them anyway, you can't just learn
alien brain structure and language components at the flip of a
switch."
"I know, but it's the best thing
we've got, and now is as good a time for a field test as ever."
Taking the two headbands and putting
one on himself, he returned his attention to the alien captain.
"I know you can't understand me, but this is something that
with a little time can help us talk to one another." Doing
his best at pantomime, he managed to get the basic idea across
and was able to convince the dubious feline to don the second
headband.
With five sets of alien eyes boring
down on them, he gestured over to the doctor. "Okay, bring
it on line, but take it slowly. We don't know what kind of an
effect it could have on them."
Standing over the unit, a moderately-bulky,
yet portable device she'd set up on one of the storage containers
lying near her, Joan keyed in a short sequence of commands. Intently
watching its screen flicker to life, she brought up several waveforms;
at the same time, small indicator lights on both headbands blinked
on as the circuitry woven into them was engaged.
With an almost perceptible ripple, the
alien captain's body gave a small shiver. Her crew tensed at this,
but the effect was short-lived and the feline recovered, her pupils
just slightly dilated and her ears flickering near attention.
Daniel's reaction was similar, but not
as pronounced. When both parties had adjusted to the new sensations
buzzing lightly through their minds, he turned to gesture towards
the view of his ship seen through the invisible force field covering
the mouth of the landing bay. "Once again, that is our ship,
the 'Stargazer,' we hail from Earth, approximately sixty-eight
light years from here."
The alien's reply was just as incomprehensible
as before, coming out in its soft rumblings.
"Okay, I guess we need to start
with something simple." Pointing to himself, then to the
members of his crew, he added "we're called humans,"
pausing he repeated "humans."
"Rrakith," was the feline's
reply, gesturing in a similar fashion to her own kind.
Pointing back to the Stargazer, he followed
"starship."
Flicking her ear, then briefly tilting
her head to the side and back up again, the captain mimicked him
in her tongue, "terkarmok."
"Turkahmock," he tried to
repeat it, his tongue fumbling on the alien phonemes. The feline's
ears flicked again, more so than before, and he thought he saw
a slight twitch of her lips, perhaps stifling an almost imperceptible
smirk.
Turning to one of his crew, who'd been
capturing the whole proceedings with an imager-recorder, he remarked
"well it looks like this might take a bit of time,"
a small sparkle in his eyes tempering the excitement and slight
frustration in his voice.
"So Joan, it looks like our work
these past several days has paid off," the captain addressed
the doctor as they sat in his office, glancing out the window,
watching the alien ship hovering near them. "The translators
appear to be quite functional. I've been able to have a couple
of good conversations with their captain because of them."
"Yes, it's remarkable at just how
well they've worked, adapting so quickly. I was worried that the
learning curve would be much steeper, though having multiple pairs
running in parallel, and off-loading the data to the main computer
for training was a phenomenal improvement." Pausing she added,
so how are things going with the Rrakith?"
"Very good, very good indeed. From
what we've been able learn their technology level isn't as advanced
as ours. For one thing they haven't developed hyperspace travel
yet, and can only travel at near-light speeds."
"This was a bit of a sticky subject,"
he continued" as they appear to be very prideful and there
was a little bit of a misunderstanding when one of our engineers
lightly put down one of their technological developments. It wasn't
intentional, it's just that when they were giving us a tour, one
of them showed us a piece of their equipment. Someone made a comment
about it being like something they hadn't seen since the academy.
When their engineer realized he was referring to it as something
quaint, she was a bit put out by it."
"I trust things have been smoothed
over?"
"Yes, they're not arrogant, just
very proud of their accomplishments, so it was a little tweak
of their noses to find out we're a few jumps ahead of them. They
are eager to learn from us though, especially when they found
out we can travel faster than light, and I think there's a good
amount they could show us themselves."
Seeing her nod in agreement, he continued.
"Which is why I've thought about their request to help them
get home through hyperspace, and have decided to go forward on
it."
"In all due respect Daniel, is
that something we should do?"
"I've thought about it and I think
it is. We already know that ships can be towed through hyperspace
safely, and that way we can use our own engines and will not have
to give up any trade secrets. All that is necessary is to install
several stabilizing-field generators on their ship to keep things
okay during transit. I already have Nile and a team working on
it."
"This will also be a show of good
faith, especially when they arrive home in a little over a day,
as opposed to several months, and will make a very good impression
on their leaders, which will make any talks with them start a
lot easier."
"Their captain also alluded
to them having medical technologies which are more advanced than
in their other areas." Seeing Joan's reaction, he continued.
"I knew you'd be interested in that. Now that the work with
the translators is done, I'd like you to meet with their senior
doctor and do some work with her."
"Definitely. I've been looking
forward to talking with their medical staff, and finding out as
much about them as possible," she replied with an energetic
smile.
As she was getting up to exit the room,
he added "just one more thing Joan, something that I've noticed
about them."
"Yes?"
"With the rrakith you've seen,
you haven't seen any males have you?"
"No, I'd noticed that their entire
crew seems to be female. I figured it was a little strange, but
maybe they have segregated work environments or something."
"That could be, but have you noticed
that they seem to be a bit uncomfortable around men? I've caught
more than a couple of them giving me and a few other crew members
odd glances."
"Hmmm, that does seem a little
odd, but it could be the effect of the segregation. Perhaps their
sexual politics are vastly different from ours and they usually
don't have interaction between the sexes, unless for mating...
Under those circumstances, I could see why they'd find it strange
for us to have both men and women on our ship, and they just might
not be that used to males."
"I guess. That would make sense.
Maybe after working with their doctor for awhile you can broach
the subject with her."
"We'll see."
Having arrived on the other ship, a
rrakith met Joan and escorted her to their sick bay and medical
offices. The trip, while short, was still a little unnerving.
Not having unpacked the translator, the two of them could not
communicate, and even if they could, what sort of small talk would
they make? While she'd seen enough of the aliens over the past
several days to no longer be shocked by them, she was still far
from being used to them. Just watching her escort walk, with the
subtle fluidity of a cat added to an almost-human gait, was enough
of a reminder to not get too complacent. From her companion's
nervous twitching of her tail and ears pulled back ever so-slightly,
Joan figured the feelings were probably mutual.
Still, even with the uncomfortable situation,
her heart still beat a little faster and her mind tingled with
anticipation. How long had mankind
dreamed of finding someone else out here amongst the stars? Now
she was one of the few fortunate enough to experience such a meeting
for the first time, in its most primal form, unfiltered by any
previous contacts, with new discoveries awaiting at every step.
Reaching the medical suite, Joan was
greeted by another rrakith, again a female, whom she took for
their chief physician. The escort leaving the two of them alone,
Joan smiled slightly at this new rrakith. She was very careful
not to show any teeth; another little faux pas which had caused
a bit of friction when one of them had mistaken a human's toothy
grin for aggression, and while not going on the offensive, had
ridden up on their hackles a bit. The situation had been diffused
quickly though, as luck would have it the translators were highly
functional then, and some hasty explanations prevented things
from escalating.
The rrakith doctor's lips twitched in
a small smirk and she held out her hands to Joan, who mirrored
their welcoming gesture. Then setting up the translator, this
one a smaller and more-manageable unit than the original device
required for the initial training, Joan put on one of the headbands
and handed the other to her alien counterpart.
As the unit hummed into life and they
both felt the now-familiar subtle tingling of the headbands, Joan
held out her hand. "Hello, I'm Joan Chen, the chief medical
officer from the 'Stargazer.' I assume you were expecting me?"
Taking her hand, the rrakith replied
"Yes Joan," the sounds of her words transforming in
the human's mind, yet still with their apparent, alien accent,
her name slightly twisted by lips not used to human language.
"My name is Ssarrabi Pak Trekkar, the head doctor for the
'Star-Runner.' It's good to finally get a chance to meet with
someone from medical personnel,
now that things have calmed down a bit."
Maybe it was just the fact that they
were able to communicate, but Joan felt more at ease. Also if
first impressions held even a grain of truth, she thought she
liked the rrakith doctor and what came off as a warm demeanor,
at least in a formal setting.
"Well Joan, I guess we should start
with a tour of our medical facilities."
Following her through the medical suite,
Joan watched on with rapt attention as Ssarrabi eagerly showed
her the main components
of their equipment. While their technology in other areas might
be lacking, their captain had been right when she'd said their
medical sciences were more advanced. As Joan looked on, she was
drawn more into the tour, which quickly became animated and interactive,
both her and Ssarrabi finding common ground in their interest
in
the marvels of rrakith medical engineering. Not only were the
principles of many devices familiar to her, Joan found that their
life sciences were not only on par with humans, but in a few areas
they seemed to have surged ahead.
In the middle of the tour, Ssarrabi
interrupted the proceedings to look at Joan quizzically and ask
"Joan, what are your perceptions of us? I know you're still
a little uncomfortable around us, which is understandable, as
we're not anywhere near being used to each other yet, but I'm
just curious what your first impressions were?" Her question
came out easily given the shortness of their acquaintance, perhaps
spurred on by the comfortable rapport they'd found while discussing
shop talk.
A little stunned by her openness, Joan
hesitated a moment before responding. "Well Ssarrabi,"
now it was her turn to stumble over the other's name, "of
course it was somewhat of a shock to us. We didn't know what to
expect, and when we first saw you, it came as a bit of surprise."
"I can understand that, we didn't
know what to expect of you either."
"Well it was a little more than
that for us, what with your body proportions and design being
similar to ours, at least enough for comparisons, but what was
the biggest surprise is how much you look like cats."
"Cats?" Ssarrabi replied,
her voice and expression showing confusion.
Almost as soon as she'd said it, Joan
had realized it wasn't the best time to bring the subject up,
but the damage had been done. Fumbling for a response, she replied
"cats or felines are a genus of fauna on our homeworld, and
your race has surprisingly many characteristics of their appearances."
"You mean there's another sentient
race besides humans on your world, why don't you have any cats
serving on board your vessel?"
Fearing the worst, Joan was forced to
follow through. "No Ssarrabi, cats are a group of
several species of animals on our world..." her voice trailing
off, looking sheepishly at the rrakith before her.
Taken aback with wounded pride, Ssarrabi
just stared at her for several moments before replying "you
mean to say we remind you of animals?" her voice tensing
and her ears turning back.
"No, it's not what I meant... it
was just that we weren't expecting you to be so familiar yet so
different... I didn't mean that at all Ssarrabi, I'm sorry."
Waiting, watching the rrakith look at
her with emotions both human and alien, Joan finally reached out
to grasp Ssarrabi's hand in hers, holding, looking into her eye's,
trying to diffuse the situation. After several more moments passed,
she softly uttered "I'm sorry, I didn't mean it that way."
Her expression softening, Ssarrabi regained
her composure and finally replied "all right Joan, I think
I can understand... your race looks so different to us too, since
you don't have any fur, and we can't read your emotions as easily
without you having a tail and with those small ears of yours..."
Half forcing a tiny smirk, she finishes "we're both not used
to this and we need to keep these misunderstandings from ruining
our potential relationship."
The atmosphere between them was still
uncomfortable, but they were able to return to the tour. As the
minutes passed they got lost in the technical discussion once
again, their dialogue warming once again, the recent mishap just
a tiny thought, barely nagging in the corner of their minds.
As they finished up, Joan commented to
her new-found colleague "thank you Ssarrabi, your medical
suite is quite impressive and it was an interesting tour."
Seeing the rrakith's expression register her praise, she continued.
"I'd like to go over some of your databases with you and
look at your medical data. I'm very interested in your physical
makeup and would like to see some anatomy studies."
"Of course Joan," her pleasant
demeanor returned once again. "We're just as curious about
you. If you don't mind, would it be possible for me to take a
scan of you first, to get some data on humans?"
"Certainly," Joan replied,
caught up in the excitement of the sharing of information and
the promise of all they could learn from one another.
Ssarrabi showed her to an examination
table which she lay down upon with little ceremony, accustomed
to the situation, having performed similar tests with her patients
countless times before. "How long will a complete scan take?"
she asked, looking up at the vaguely familiar-looking apparatus
overhead.
"About fifteen seconds to image
over your whole body with the different wavelengths" Ssarrabi
replied, her fingers gliding over the control panel.
With the scan complete, while Ssarrabi
was intently studying the displays showing various aspects of
the human's biological makeup, Joan got up from the table to stand
beside her. Turning her head slightly to glance at Joan over her
shoulder, Ssarrabi offered "a lot of your systems are quite
similar to ours. There's differences of course, and it looks like
you have at least a couple of organs that don't correspond to
anything we have, but overall the similarities are striking,"
her voice showing her excited interest.
Then as she returned to consult the
images, she stopped abruptly and turned to Joan with a look of
concern on her face. "Joan, where is your penis?" was
all she asked.
Now it was the Joan's turn to be taken
aback, floored by Ssarrabi's question, which in all its absurdity
had come from her with great earnestness. "What, my penis...
what are you talking about?" she managed to fumble out.
"Your reproductive anatomy is all
wrong Joan, you're missing your male organs. Are you okay... did
something happen to you?" Ssarrabi's voice hushed at this.
"What do you mean 'male anatomy?'
What are you talking about Ssarrabi? Everything is just the way
it should be for me down there," her confusion mixed with
discomfort at the rrakith's statements.
"You must know what I mean Joan,
your reproductive system is only half complete. How can things
be normal if you're missing the male components?"
The realization washing over her in
a flash of brilliant understanding, Joan blurted out her response
before fully grasping the ramifications of it. "You mean
that you're hermaphrodites, both sexes in the same body?"
"Of course Joan, that's why I'm
so concerned..." then pausing as the realization rocked through
her, she slowly added "you mean you're normally this way...
your sexes are divided like that?"
"Yes Ssarrabi
Oh that's why
we thought you
were all females, and why you were so uncomfortable around the
men of the crew."
"You mean those of you whose bodies
are so different? The ones with shrunken breasts?"
"Yes... you must have thought they
were sick or something."
"So you really are divided into
two forms, those with the male organs and those with female?"
Ssarrabi looked very incredulous at Joan's affirmation. "We've
seen that before, in some of the strange animals of our world,
but it's very rare and we never thought it would happen in a species
so advanced and with sentience..." her voice trailing off
as she pondered the ramifications of this.
It was then Joan's turn to be a little
offended at the comparison to local fauna, but she was more concerned
with the ideas that were beginning to flood her consciousness.
How could a species like that function? Her mind reeling in quiet
revulsion.
"I would have never thought it
would be possible to see a well-developed race with the sexes
split like that... Why would the Maker create you with such limited
forms?" Ssarrabi was caught up in her own thoughts of turmoil,
softly shuddering as a stray thought caught her attention, perhaps
thinking of what it might be like to be without such an integral
and intimate part of her anatomy, as Joan was forced to live everyday.
The extreme discomfort of the situation
was shortly shattered by an outburst from a speaker hidden nearby,
the barrage of alien language disrupting their thoughts with its
perfect timing. "Ssarrabi, what did that message say?"
Joan asked, seeing her jump to alertness at the unknown words.
"The translator only works between people wearing the headsets."
"There's been an accident, Joan,
in one of the cargo bays where the engineers are working on the
equipment your crew brought over. There's been some sort of a
power surge and besides incapacitating everyone working on it,
it has also damaged the circuits to the force-field generator
closing the mouth of the bay, and they're starting to falter."
"Then if the field cuts out...
?" her voice echoing Ssarrabi's concern.
"Yes, they'll all be blown out
into space. We need to get down there quickly and try and save
them."
Moving with Ssarrabi as she gathered
up her essential instruments, Joan grabbed at the translator unit
and the few implements she'd brought with her. Then following
her out the door of the medical suite, the two of them raced down
the hall.
Arriving minutes later outside the cargo
bay, their path was blocked by the large metallic doors forced
shut over the entrance. Two rrakith rescue technicians were frantically
working on the situation, having taken off a large access panel
near the door to grapple with the complex circuitry inside. Ssarrabi
asked them the status of the situation, with great urgency, but
Joan could not comprehend the technician's hurried response.
Struggling against the pressures of
the situation, their efforts paid off, and the heavy doors finally
parted to give them entrance. Behind the opening, the situation
looked intimidating, as the main lights had failed, leaving only
flickering emergency lights. Warning klaxons blared away as signal
lights on various devices, including a unit on the far wall near
the bay opening, flashed in distress. Amidst it all lay the members
of the engineering staff, two rrakith and a human, caught in the
blast of the surge, now lying still, paused
in the uncertainty between unconsciousness and death.
The four of them quickly surveyed the
situation and rushed into the room. The two technicians took the
job of attending to the damaged equipment, while Ssarrabi ran
to one of the fallen rrakith and Joan knelt down next to the human
victim. As she was frantically checking for life signs, one of
the technicians shouted something. Looking over at Ssarrabi, she
translated for her. "The field generator is still fluctuating.
They don't know how long they can keep it from failing... We need
to get out of here soon!"
Turning back to the human lying before
her, Joan continued to search for signs of life. Her job was difficult
though, with all the distractions around her, the warning bells
still sounding and the lights flickering in chaotic patterns.
To make things worse, the few instruments she had were not really
suited for the job. They gave some readings, but were not as robust
as the tools in any standard terran vessel emergency medical kit,
of which she was without one in the present situation.
Struggling with the meager
instruments she had with her, she was able to get a few basic
readings, but they were far from conclusive. His life signs were
definitely weak, but under these circumstances there wasn't much
she could tell of his condition, and even worse, there was little
she could do to alter the situation.
Flooded with frustration and concern,
her pulse racing and her mind reeling, she glanced to Ssarrabi
once again to see her busy with her own patient, her attention
consumed by her task. Then looking over to one of the technicians,
she saw that she was beginning to examine the device which had
most likely caused the surge in the first place.
Standing in front of the alien equipment
of the hyperspace stabilizing-field generator, the technician
looked down at the unit which had been recently patched into the
ships power lines. Studying the foreign controls and readouts,
the technician looked confused, at an impasse at how to handle
this unknown, and possibly unsteady device.
Watching her tentatively touch the unit,
hesitating to access any of the controls, a small thought tugged
at the bottom of Joan's consciousness, yearning to break free
and surface to clarity. Recalling safety-protocol lectures from
her training so long ago, the glimmer of a memory
became more bothersome. That, paired with a flash of intuition,
spurred her thought processes on.
Perhaps she'd seen a glimpse of the
warning icons on the generator's display, meaningless symbols
to the technician, or maybe it was just a burst of inspiration,
whatever it was, the realization hit her with full force. Struggling
to react, she turned and yelled to Ssarrabi "get down and
take cover!"
Jumping up from her crouching position,
then lunging ahead towards the technician, she repeated her warning,
but of course it was lost on her, without the benefit of a translator.
Crossing the distance between them in
moments, she grabbed the confused rrakith and roughly pushed her
aside, catching her off
guard and managing to throw her to the floor. Then colliding into
the generator, she glanced down at the display with its flashing
red warning displays.
With a desperate motion she grabbed
at the emergency disconnect lever, pulling it back towards her
as she tried to duck out of the way. Her timing was too late though,
and as she broke the switch's contacts a bright flash of light
erupted from the unit. Caught in the surge, she was thrown backwards
by the force, her nerve endings burning in the rush of energy.
Smashing to the floor with a pounding crash, her body collapsed
like a discarded doll, and for Joan everything went black.
Consciousness came back slowly for her,
as she gradually became aware of the light forcing its way through
her closed eyelids. Opening her eyes to blink at the brightness,
the blurry image resolved into Ssarrabi's visage, looking down
at her with a concerned and protective expression on her feline
face.
"How do you feel Joan?"
Looking up, she could see the translator
headband on the rrakith's
forehead, and apparently she was wearing one herself. Taking stock
of the situation, she finally replied "okay, I guess... What
happened?"
At that point, Ssarrabi's face was joined
by that of Daniel's. "You had quite an accident Joan. Luckily
you caught the second surge when you did though, or things could
have been a lot worse for everybody."
"We were too hasty with trying
to integrate our equipment with their systems. Their were some
power fluctuations that we didn't understand which caused the
first surge. The second surge was then slowly building up, and
if you hadn't caught it when you did, everyone could've been hurt
and they wouldn't have been able to get to work on you as quickly...
Things could've turned out very bad." He shivered slightly
at that.
"The technician I pushed out of
the way... is she okay?" the events slowly coming back to
her.
"Yes, she's fine, you were the
only one to take the full brunt of the surge. She caught some
of it, but wasn't wounded nearly as bad, and like you, they were
able to get to her quickly. She's very thankful to you, and will
be stopping by later to see you in person. In fact everyone is
impressed with your heroics."
Her thoughts becoming more coherent,
a matter of importance jumped to the forefront of her mind. "Nile...
is he okay?"
His expression darkened and he paused
momentarily before answering her. "No, it was too late for
him, as it was for one of the rrakith. There was only so much
they could do. We were lucky that the surge you caught must not
have been as powerful, plus they were able to rush you to immediate
medical attention."
"I guess it was lucky that the
accident happened on their ship too... Their
medical technology is more advanced than ours, at least in a couple
of key places. I don't know if there would have been too much
we could've done for you, especially with the time it would've
taken to get you back on board the Stargazer."
"They have developed some form
of suspended animation," he continued, "and were able
to hold your biological functions in stasis while they worked
with our doctors to learn more about our anatomy, and fleshed
out a way to help you. They're also further along in tissue repair
and regrowth, which made a world of difference with some of the
extensive damage you received. I'm told by both sets of physicians
that you're as good as new."
Her mind still tumbling, sorting everything
out, she managed to smile weakly up at him.
"You'll be fine Joan, you just
need some rest," then with a quick glance toward Ssarrabi
he added "and you're in excellent hands. She put in long
hours these past few days making sure everything went right. I
think your daring sacrifice has gotten a lot of attention, and
you've made some fast friends because of it." With that he
finished, and left to let her get some rest.
Looking up at Ssarrabi who was watching
her warmly with caring emotions, Joan reached out a hand. When
Ssarrabi took it gently, Joan softly said "I'm glad that
we've met, even with these circumstances... It's just nice to
know that humanity is no longer alone..."
Tilting her head slightly to the side
in the rrakith version of a nod, Ssarrabi held Joan's hand firmly
in hers and smiled at her, watching her as she passed into a sound
sleep.
Copyright 1996, Will A. Sanborn -
was1@shore.net
The Rrakith copyright 1996, Will A. Sanborn and
Bernard Doove