Just as expected, Carbon was waiting at the entrance to Engineering - it had its own stop on the maglev line. It was the heart of the ship. On Human ships it was usually the single largest section, what with all the power generation and multiple methods of ship motivation going on. Unless he was mistaken - which he could be as he was just guessing at the moment as there was no speedometer on the maglev tram - it was about two-thirds of the way back from the bow. A human ship would usually have it all the way to the aft.
What he hadn’t expected was how Carbon was dressed. He’d gotten used to her in a lightly modified CPP coverall while back on the Kshlav’o, once she had stopped wearing the encounter suit. In retrospect, it should have been obvious that wasn’t her normal getup. It had all the exact same pockets as his - in what universe did two separate species both develop coveralls with the same pocket layout and nametag location?
Even the standard Tsla’o pants and jacket had been easy to adjust to.
This getup, on the other hand, made her look a little bit like a videogame character. Brown boots that nearly came up to her knees, with slabs of scuffed armor and soles so thick she was noticeably taller. Similarly heavy khaki-colored pants, made of thicker fabric than what she normally wore, reinforced impact patches at the knees, hips, and lower back. Absolutely resplendent with pockets. Looked like there were a few places to hook up a safety harness, and guides for a belt as well.
That all pretty much made sense. He understood the functionality. Above the beltline, on the other hand, was not as understandable. It looked mostly she was just wearing the smallest daman possible and a very short jacket as well - it looked like the same leather-like material as her boots, and even sported some matching armor. Despite that, it didn’t go past her rib cage, and appeared to stop at her elbows. Left pretty much the entire middle of her body exposed, which seemed a bit counterproductive.
There was a lot of technology integrated into the jacket. Sensor clusters around the collar glowed softly, and there were a few holographic emitters sitting dark dotting the area. Her antenna rested in slots around the back to interface with the built-in computer and any nearby networks.
Out of all of this, the most notable thing for Alex was that she looked so at ease here as she wrapped her arms around his torso and squeezed the life out of him. She looked happy in a way that she hadn’t until now.
“I hope you have slept well?” Carbon looked up, not a hint of tiredness in her face or voice despite having gotten up in the middle of the night to work.
“I actually did, yeah. Feels like I haven’t done that in awhile.” He did not bring up what he and Neya had talked about. Not standing around here in the open - he wasn’t up with the ins and outs of their culture, let alone the entire Zeshen thing, but it felt like the wrong place. They would have that talk once they were back at the cabin.
“Good.” Her smile was sublime, eyes squinting with an easy delight. She gestured at the package in his hands. “And what is this?”
Alex was pretty sure she had never looked this relaxed before. Maybe communing with the ship really was something she needed to be doing. “Gloves. Well, gauntlets. Sergeant Zenshen brought them over as I was heading out. She’s my military liaison now, I guess. Per Eleya’s orders.” His gaze kept dropping back to her exposed midriff for some reason.
Even mention of her aunt didn’t phase her, though her eyebrows did come down with a hint of chagrin. “She was acting as Colonel Lehnan’s liaison, and has just been attached to you? Though... They are already attached to the project concerning the artifact.” She had her phone out, tapping away at the screen.
“Yeah, she didn’t seem bothered by it?” He shrugged. In his estimation, the Sergeant had been having a pretty good time, except for that little hiccup in the corridor. It was probably a pretty easy assignment, all things considered. Most of the time. “Just keeping me from stepping on the wrong toes.”
“Be that as it may, I have asked Neya to look into how this was done - I do not want to leave the Colonel sitting on the riverbed.” She slipped the phone away into her entirely too short a jacket and looped her arm around his, a sly smirk on her muzzle as she directed them both off the tram platform. “Now, on to more pressing matters?”
“Sounds good. Where are you taking me?” His knowledge of the ship ran out just as soon as they walked through the archway, into a slightly busy corridor. These people were at work. They moved with purpose and many were carrying equipment he didn’t recognize, or pushing antigrav carts with large equipment he didn’t recognize, save for one poor duo trying to hover the biggest impeller press that he’d ever seen outside a dry dock through the crowd.
“There is a place here that is, I believe, much like your Noonan’s.” She had to speak up a little bit over the background noise here, but still very much in her preferred environment. “It is... The Hammer’s Rest, I think is a good translation. A place for crews who are on breaks or may be called up.”
“Oh neat.” It dawned on him that this was the first time he was seeing the actual crew of the Sword. Several wore powered environment suits in an eye-catching shade of red, but most were clad in the nearly the same outfit that Carbon wore. Some had long sleeves, others full length jackets. Anything that looked like leather was colored coded on theirs, as well. Blue, red, orange, purple... “Ok, honest question here - what’s up with the coat? Yours doesn’t seem very safe.”
“My coat?” She looked down at it, realization filling her eyes as she laughed. Carbon grasped the hem with both hands, thumbs resting on a subtle pair of buttons, and just pulled it down like a curtain. She let it go at her hip so it slightly overlapped her pants. “Adjustable, but it is common practice to have the sleeves and hem raised when one is off duty.”
“Hang on, does that extrude material?” His gaze fell on her abdomen again, now framed. Looks like he was learning something about himself this morning.
“Very good, it does. Allowing the user to adjust their equipment to their body and protective needs without custom tailoring or changing gear for different tasks.” She gestured at a passing crewmember in one of the red environment suits, helmet retracted and focused on whatever the holographic display before him was showing. “Though particularly dangerous tasks still require more.”
“Well damn, all right. It changes color too, right? All networked together?” Not a big jump, if they were stacking that much technology into protective gear.
“Correct again.” Carbon nearly sang it as she tugged him down a side corridor. “In Engineering they are for teams, though in other parts of the ship they may have specific jobs.”
“Like flightdeck crew.” The most obvious group who used color coding, off the top of his head.
“Exactly.” Their path turned again, this time through another archway that rivaled the size of the one into the tram station, holographic letters in the most garish colors possible stretched overhead.
Alex wanted to call it a restaurant, at first. It was huge compared to the other places he had been on board, about thirty meters to a side, and actually dim. The walls were lined with long tables, clusters of color-coded workers spread out around the place. The center of the room was taken up by a big square bar, though, which made it more of a pub or tavern - very much like Noonan’s.
Also like Noonan’s, everything was made of dark wood. The floor, stools, chairs, tables, the bar, all a sort of dark red-brown that occasionally dipped into black, metalwork done in gleaming steel. The walls carried a wattle and daub pastiche, wooden beams running floor to ceiling and horizontally from corner to corner, filled in with a checkerboard of dark green and blue stucco. While it didn’t have the big screen Noonan’s sported, there were a dozen or so smaller screens with a plethora of information about who was needed where.
“This feels like my kind of joint.” Even the curious glances being tossed his way felt normal. Like that’d be what any dumbass rolling in wearing a fancy jacket would get. The din of conversation was far and away the most surprising part - his translator was catching at least half of it, the banality of people waiting for something to happen crystal clear. “Tell me they sell t-shirts?”
“Wh- no, they do not sell t-shirts.” Carbon sighed with a smile and pointed out a door halfway down the far wall, their destination.
“Not yet.” He wouldn’t have minded a heads up about the overall casualness. Any excuse to dress down, honestly. Beyond the door was just a smaller, but similarly themed room with a fraction of the people in it. A bar ran halfway down one side, the rest of the floor containing smaller tables for two or four. The change in dress was noticeable, going from the engineering gear to stuff more like what Aena from the novel he’d been reading had been wearing - pants and a sleeveless vest. Manager clothes, though matching the colors everybody else outside wore.
She settled in at a shorter table in the corner, handing him a menu from the stack waiting there. “Everything they make is pretty good.”
“All right. No warnings about the chicken fingers?” He said, recalling the last time they’d been in a pub.
Carbon laughed. “No. Probably no drinking - it is a bit early in the day to start.”
“Yeah, not drinking before noon has treated me pretty well.” So far, anyway. “But now that you got me thinking about it, I kinda want a Mimosa.”
“A what?”
“Orange juice and champagne.” He perused the menu, the translations an unhealthy mix of generic terms for food items and nouns that left him with no idea what anything was. Shoreline Broth with Root Vegetable left so much to the imagination. There were plenty of ways to interpret that which didn’t strike him as appetizing. Was it fish based? Did it remind one of low tide? How far into ‘alien taste sensation’ were they getting here, and what was the sensation he’d be feeling? “You usually drink them with brunch, which this is probably not.”
Carbon laughed and set her menu down with a bemused smile. “And what is brunch?”
“It’s a meal that’s later than br-eakfast, but before l-unch.” Alex split the words up into what was hopefully a clear explanation of the portmanteau, and set his menu down too. Time to go to the old standby. “Mostly breakfast food, though, and focusing more on socialization than a meal specifically. Hence a little morning drinking.”
She perked up as he explained it, ears shifting a little to focus on him. “That sounds... it sounds interesting.”
“If you want to go, I know a few places in Berkley, though I suppose anywhere in-system is accessible right now with a little planning.” He didn’t miss that she was interested. More interested than he’d seen her in human stuff since they had gone shopping. Maybe a bit of relaxation in her own culture was giving her the space to be interested in his... Though, brunch seemed a bit superficial. Whatever. It was interest in him and his culture, and it felt good.
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Made him really want a Belgian waffle, too.
“I would enjoy that.” Carbon petered off, turning to look at the waitress as she approached the table.
She had dark red fur, and was bundled up to an extent that Alex hadn’t seen yet on any Tsla’o outside of a powered suit - a blouse that actually closed around the neck and matching slacks in light weight, natural colored materials. Long boots, and gloves that ran up to her elbows, and an apron tied around her waist. There was a forced seriousness to her, staring straight at the green square of wall at the end of the table. She set a teapot down between them, shaking hands distributing a cup to each of them before she started speaking way too fast. “Hello we are ready to receive your order.”
Alex couldn’t put a finger on it, but she was familiar looking. A little on the short side, and he was pretty sure fairly young. Late teens, maybe. Her eyes seemed proportionally larger than an adult, which according to the massive peepers on Adana last night was a neotenous trait on the Tsla’o as well. Wait. “Oh- Akai, Haraya!”
Carbon looked from their stressed out waitress to Alex, and then back to Haraya. Then back to Alex, eyebrows raised in confusion. “How do you know her?”
“She’s the one who gave me directions last night. Thanks again for that, by the way.” He gave her a little nod. Looks like she knew who she was standing in front of this time. Probably expected him to still speak fluent Tsla, too, because she clearly didn’t understand what he was saying in English. That was a problem he had not foreseen last night.
She still made a strangled little sound that was in the general vicinity of positive and bowed deep enough to make the bartender look over.
“Oh. Yes, that was very appreciated.” Carbon spoke in Tsla as she looked back to Haraya, who was still staring intently at the wall. “Please, such formality is not required, or sought. I assure you.”
“Of course Princess.” Haraya replied, catching herself before she got too deep into another bow. Her eyes darted to Carbon with nervous energy. “What would you care to order?”
“Ah, just a bowl of simmered grass grains with fruit mash, please.” She favored the young woman with a friendly smile as the translator brutalized her language for a solid two seconds after she stopped speaking.
Alex balked. “Isn’t that what you always have?”
She switched languages without missing a beat. “Yes, it has served me well.”
“Ok, so I was just going to have what you’re having. Translator really does a number on food names and I kinda figured, you know, restaurant. We wouldn’t just be having something we make at home.” His expectation of that wasn’t panning out to be very interesting. After the ‘lace crackers’ and that sausage yesterday, breakfast was feeling like good territory to explore their cuisine. “So uh... Can you recommend something for me?”
“Mh. You make a good point. They have many ingredients we do not normally keep at home.” Carbon pondered the menu on the table for a moment while Haraya continued to look nervous. She had switched languages again when she looked up. “We will both have the Shoreline Broth with burnt noodles and chef’s decision.”
“Sounds.” Well that was an interesting hole to have stepped in. “Great.”
“Of course, thank you Princess. Prince. It will be ready soon.” The waitress gave them both little bows and walked away as fast as she could.
Alex waited until Haraya had gone through the doors to where he assumed the kitchen was. “She wasn’t like that when she gave me directions.”
“Most youth do not... Have any experience with us. Nobles used to be rare, but they are truly scarce now. The number of Royals has increased recently, though. ” She smirked and lifted the teapot, pouring first into Alex’s cup, then filling her own. “I suppose they have not met many Humans, either. But that was not the nerves of meeting a new race on display.”
“I don’t think she thought I was actually, you know. Real. Which, given how I was dressed at the time, is completely understandable.” He scanned the bar, the only three other people there sitting at it. None of them seemed nearly as concerned about their presence. They all had signs of aging, silver gray fur standing out clearly on two, and nearly wreathing the head of the other.
Him and Carbon were the youngest people in here by years, at least.
“I think it may have been more that a Human appeared before her, on the flagship of the Tsla’o Empire.” She laughed and reached out to cup his hands. “How did you manage to get so lost on your adventure, anyway?”
“Ugh, all right.” He launched into a cut down version of events, where he spent way less time actually being lost and glossed over the fact he was just opening up electrical and communications closets. Very quickly getting to the interesting part with Adana finding him standing there in the hall, considering his options.
“He does sound very cute. By your description, I would say three to four years old. Perhaps he did not wish to speak to a stranger.” Carbon replied to his inquiry about how old the kids he’d just told her about were. “Haraya is probably sixteen. A little young to be working, but this area is quieter, less likely to be rowdy. And you say there were six children?”
“Six and Haraya, yes.” It did seem like a lot of kids. He knew of one family back in Berkley that had four kids. But seven? Parents must have been busy in a couple of different ways.
“That is... unusual for Tsla’o families. It is rare to have more than three.” She hummed softly, eyes turned towards the ceiling as she leaned back in her chair and pondered. “Deck 60, below the Stronghold complex, port side... I do not understand, there should be a frigate bay there. Not ‘civilian’ housing.”
“I dunno what to tell you. A lot of it looked new. Still smelled like a print forge.” Frigate bay? Damn this ship was big. He was sure Human carriers sported large launchable escorts as well, but it was weird to hear about them actually having internal storage.
Carbon activated the holographic emitters on her jacket and projected a schematic of the ship over the table between them, zooming in on the area he’d been in. “Did it smell greasy or acrid?”
“Greasy, why?”
“That is what a Human forge smells like. Ours produce a more astringent scent.” She manipulated the hologram further, isolating a subsection of the ship. “Hm. Removed both bays under the Stronghold entirely and refit them with self contained residential... communities. Most of it is housing, but there are a few public spaces. Power is mostly off the ship grid, same with the other utilities. Dedicated food production. Schools.”
So it had just been built, with parts from a Human sourced forge. Based on the doors and access panels, it had then been finished with Tsal’o technology. Alex leaned in, inspecting the cross section of decks. Most of it was turned inward, the doors opening to corridors that did not run to the rest of the ship, with a few small clusters of exceptions that seemed to be tacked on to fill out space. “The layout really reminds me of an arcology. Industry at the bottom, more livable space above. Just a continuous eighty decks tall.”
Carbon’s ears twitched and the hologram shut off just as Haraya emerged from the back with two large bowls on a tray.
Their waitress was more comfortable now, though her gaze remained steadfastly anywhere other than them as she delivered the steaming soup. “Thank you for your patience.” She said this at a much more normal speed as she laid out a setting of chopsticks and spoons for them.
Carbon replied first. “Of course, thank you for your efforts.”
“Thank you.” Alex echoed, in English. He thought about it for a second and realized that she wasn’t going to pick that one up. “Sa meha.”
Haraya bowed again, departing swiftly.
“Already getting tired of that.” He mumbled, picking up his chopsticks and inspecting the Shoreline Broth with burnt noodles and chef’s decision. It was mostly noodles and decision, the broth barely visible under the pile of... food items. It did not smell like low tide, so that was a point in its favor already. The scent actually reminded him of saimin. Salty, savory, very much with a seafood origin. The burnt noodles were thick tan disks that had a little crinkle of black scorch around the outside, a hole in the middle indicating they had been on a stick and grilled or broiled, then sliced after the fact. Had a nice bite to it, but no real flavor aside from the broth and a hint of sweet ash.
“I think she is reacting based on how she has seen Nobles presented in media. They usually start as aloof and quick-tempered.” Carbon had tucked in without delay, pausing to talk with a bunch of shredded vegetables gripped in her chopsticks. “Though by the end of those stories they have learned humility one way or another, and are on their way to becoming good people.”
“Sounds like we started at the end.” Alex found a piece of that spicy moss he liked and picked it out. He could do with a dab of Chinese mustard in the broth to add another layer of flavor, but otherwise he was a little annoyed that this monstrously named dish was starting to grow on him. Maybe not as a breakfast, but he could see having it for dinner. “Is it rude to add seasoning to food? Wouldn’t mind a little more heat in this.”
“If there are spices on the table, it is acceptable.” She slid a little jar at the far end of the table over to his bowl before reactivating the holographic display. It was a little dimmer this time and at a smaller scale, rotating slowly as she ate. “This is based on our community towers. Largely self-contained buildings with shopping, restaurants, utilities and work areas on the lower floors, and apartments of varying sizes above them. It is very much like your arcologies, on a smaller scale.”
“Alright, that answers that.” The pot was split into three segments, a little spoon resting in each. He carefully tasted all of them, a drop of each onto his chopsticks so he could determine what he was getting into. One salty, one a sort of sweet vinegar, and the third a gentle warmth with no discernable flavor. He heaped a few spoonfuls of the third into his bowl.
“It does.” She reached over and added a spoonful of the vinegar to her own bowl.
“Looks like... Six hundred apartments of varying sizes?” There was nearly as much of a weird shredded vegetable in the bowl as there were noodles. It was like a cabbage and a potato had been combined into something Alex couldn’t tell if he liked or not. “So they added... what, two thousand people in each tower? Four thousand people total.”
“If they are putting seven children into one larger home... Hopefully with at least two adults, it could be closer to five thousand.” She idly stirred her bowl, zooming back out to the entire ship again, shuffling through something that changed which section of the ship was being highlighted. “Renovated several areas into senatorial offices. One floor of the Stronghold seems to contain a parliamentary chamber now, as well. I believe Eleya has had the Sword of the Morning Light converted to act as a mobile capital.”
“So it’s an actual capital ship now?” Alex tried to hide the smirk that came with that pun but failed miserably as it turned into a broad grin. “Does explain why there’s so many senators on board.”
Carbon glared at him for a second, a sigh shifting into a quiet laugh. “And why she brought it to Sol.”
He chewed on some more of the cabbage-potato abomination that he was rapidly leaning towards not liking, sussing Eleya’s reasoning out. “Defense?”
She nodded in agreement. “How far into Sol do you suppose an unscheduled ship could get?”
“Wouldn’t even make it through the Oort cloud. That’s where the first layer of interdiction is.” He lifted what was clearly some kind of larva out of the broth and ate it, a burst of umami and the warmth of alcohol on his tongue. How did they get it to do that? “You guys have an interdiction system too, right?”
“Of course. Nearly as large as the one around Sol.”
The puzzle was starting to come together for him. “If she is legitimately concerned about the Empire fracturing, the threats to the Sword wouldn’t necessarily be coming from outside your home system. It could be coming from another ship in their own carrier group.”
“Here they will need permission to enter Confederate space, and Sol itself. I would not be surprised if Eleya was in communication with the Confederation about which Tsla’o ships should have access.” Carbon poked around in the bowl, searching for something particular. “Even one of our stealth craft would find making the trip undetected difficult, or extremely time consuming.”
“And for the time being it’s under the guise of further exploration of the artifact, not just taking advantage of the distance and local security to keep threats at bay.” Alex poured himself more tea and topped off Carbon, thinking about Eleya’s request of him last night. To take Carbon and request asylum in the Confederation should the Empire fall. Being right here at the seat of power would make the trip to ask real quick.
“Gives intelligence more time to work on those threats, as well.” She picked her tea up and nodded in thanks before taking a long sip.
“Alright, gotta give her credit for that.” He set about separating all of the cab-tato from the rest of the selection of items in the broth. Maybe he’d revisit it with different vegetables, but that part really wasn’t working with the flavor of the broth for him. “That’s a pretty good plan.”