Admiral Williams was going through the Intel that the captain of the Noctema had sent him. It was historic, all of it was pre-contact, but certainly better than nothing. He didn’t like the fleet hanging about like this. Some unfortunate Xeno might stumble upon them and die of shock, or at least something equally letal. He decided to split the fleet. The Noctema had given him a smallish bubble of space, all of which had suffered attacks. The Intec might be long gone, but until his Engineers had something more recent to give him, it would serve. He called his Captains. ‘ Alright people. There is a big-ass cube of space that we know suffered from Intec raiding for years. I’m sending you your orders. Sweep the place, see if you can find us something to play with.’ The fleet split into its preferred formation, with teams of twenty ships, all of whom had trained extensively together, moving to their target while supported by the rest of the fleet nearby, if they needed help or found a nice target.
Tay was, to be honest, enjoying her command. She recalled her military service as an endless series of repetitive and dull routines, followed by bursts of panic and sleepless nights. Now, she had a structure and a goal, with a mostly solid team. She had been right about Olly and Oskar, they really didn’t need supervision. They moved about like twins, finishing each other's sentences, unless they needed something. Then Olly did the talking. No wonder their Captain wanted them back. Roaden was solid, if not particularly imaginative, but he was working his way through the old tech on the Intec wreckage. So far, nothing useful, but she was willing to give him some space. Captain Sullivan had briefed her on the Admiral's plan, as well as sending her his own Intel. They still needed this ship to speak to them. Space was too damn big to go fishing. If she could just get Bork to join in, they might actually get somewhere.
Bork was panicking. He was supposed to represent his people, follow proudly in the trails of his clan. None of that was happening. He didn't understand humans, didn’t understand all the unspoken communication. They seemed to speak another language, some secret unknown to his translator. He faithfully updated it every morning, but still he didn’t understand. The new Chief had spoken little to the team, but the other engineers seemed to understand completely. Two of them wandered around, taking odd samples, pulling things apart in some weird understanding. The other one brought him random bits of the ship, apparently certain they contained the key to whatever it was the Chief wanted. It was even worse than on his last ship, as he couldn’t just sneak away unnoticed and unregarded. Then the call came, the one that made his legs tremble. ‘Chief wants to see you, she’s in the office.’
Tay wasn’t quite sure where the problem was, but unless she figured it out, Bork was on the next boat home. His reports were mechanical, uninformative, missing any of the details she needed. Oskar could have found the Holy Grail and all she’d get from Bork is ‘Cup, wooden, some wear, unknown origin. May cause immortality.’ Right now she had thousands of people watching over her shoulder, she needed better. Bork shuffled in, apparently ready to wait for death rather than speak. Tay smiled at him, ‘Bork, I think we are on the wrong page. In fact I think we are reading different books. I want you to sit, take a moment and tell me about your people’
Bork sat, not a position he was comfortable in, although he would never tell the Chief that. He was, again, entirely lost. There was a book? Did the other Engineers have the book? What page was he supposed to be on? He struggled, then dutifully repeated his introduction again, ‘I am from the Herlis system, a galactic standard world. My species does not colonise much, three worlds only. We are trying to learn from the other species, offering our labour for the opportunity to learn, to experience other cultures. I was the best Engineering student of my people, so the government put me with the humans. It has not been a success.’
Tay nodded, ‘Yes, this is true. Please tell me why you think it is failing.’
Bork was pleased, this human agreed. Other humans had said things like, ‘You will get used to it’ or ‘Give it time’. He could not give time, could humans give time? Always he felt confused. He looked at his new Chief, ‘It is failing because I do not understand. You speak, yet your words contain only a little. You have some way of speaking that I do not hear, and so I fail.’
Tay paused, ‘Bork, is your world beautiful? Is there somewhere that you love, that means a great deal to you?
Bork hesitated. This was not related to engineering. ‘Yes, Chief. It is beautiful.I have such a place.’ Tay seemed to be waiting, but he had answered the questions. What more did she wish?
Tay smiled to herself. ‘Bork, please describe, in the greatest detail you can, the place in your world that you love so much. I will simply listen. Do you understand?’
Bork nodded, again totally lost. Perhaps she wished to visit? ‘ My home, my clan’s home is high over a deep purple valley. Our houses are old, carved by a thousand generations from the stone and wood of the land. Every dawn, the light is guided through posts, older than the houses, they tell us the seasons. Below those posts lie our ancestors, blessed by every new day…’
A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
Tay listened. This was not a staffing issue, this was a first contact issue. Whoever had put Bork onto a human ship, without a solid briefing and serious help was an idiot. This poor bastard had been walking around in the dark for months. She raised her hand. Bork continued to speak. Of course he did. ‘Bork, stop. I have listened to you and enjoyed the description of your home. I also understand why we are failing to understand each other.’
Again she let him think about what she had said.’ I have a question. Do your people dance?’
Bork had nearly lost himself, lost in the memories. He felt homesick. When the Chief told him to stop, he nearly wept. Then another odd question. He did not want to dance. ‘Yes, Chief, my people dance. We have many dances. I do not wish to dance.’ The Chief nodded. Good she did not want to dance with him. ‘Bork, every human interaction, every human conversion is a dance. We spend many, many years learning these dances. Our spoken language is part of that dance. If you do not dance, or you do not know the particular dance, you will fail. That is why we are failing.’
Bork tried to understand, ‘I do not see you dance. I see you speak, I see you nod in greeting. I have seen human dancing. It is not the same’
‘Bork, when I raised my hand as you were speaking, why did I do that?
‘Chief, I do not know. Humans always move their hands, their faces. You are never still.’
‘Bork, that was a very small human dance, a gesture we call it. It means I am asking you to stop. Human conversation is made of many such gestures, as a way of conveying opinions, instructions and emotions. You should never have been placed on a human ship without training in these things. I will arrange it with the XCC. You will come to me if you are uncertain of any particular dance or gesture. Do you understand?’ Bork nodded. ‘In the meantime, you will continue your work, but you will watch our gestures, you will try and understand how and why we move as we do. Is that clear?’
When Bork left the office she called his XCC supervisor and in vivid detail explained the importance of gesture, metaphor, tone and the difference between ‘open’ and ‘closed’ questions. Examples she used were related to his relationship with cattle, the ancestry of his parents, the use of the middle finger to indicate disapproval and volume as an indication of emotion. She felt he got the message. Borks training would begin immediately.
Once she had explained to the other engineers that, if you wanted anything useful from Bork, you needed to be explicit, unemotional and exact, they quickly grasped the point. They were engineers, not social workers. Exact and unemotional, that was easy. Almost immediately the work rate improved, Bork seemed to relax and then they, finally, found something.
Her team crowded into her office, obviously pleased with themselves. Roaden started, ‘We found something. Bork will explain.’
Tay squinted at him. This team building was fine, but Bork wasn’t her first choice for explanations. ‘Bork, tell me exactly what you have found out about the Intec ship that may prove useful.’ Then she realised that firstly, her little team was now welded together, and secondly, that they wanted her to play the same game that she had insisted on.
Bork had been enjoying his time. Suddenly everything was easier. The team spoke to him in ways that he could understand, he could come to the Chief if he was confused and even their XCC person had spent many, many hours explaining things to him. He felt like a crewmember now. Now he was speaking for the team. He could be proud of his trail. ‘Chief, we identified a very poorly constructed part. Such poor construction that it could not be accidental. I analysed the components and they only have one match within the parameters you set. This component was designed to fail and it was constructed on a light-gravity world, orbiting a red-spectrum star. We have the exact wavelength imprinted on the device. We do not believe that was accidental, but clever sabotage. Engineer Roaden has the coordinates.’
If Captain Sullivan could have teleported he would have when Tay called to say that she had a target. ‘Tell me. Make it simple, because I’m going to have to explain this to a bunch of Admirals and Captains.’
‘Sir, over a century ago, on a world orbiting this sun, an Intec slave hid the address of the system where it was being held, then designed this component to fail. When the Intec ship got caught up in the Australian nuclear event, it worked as designed and allowed the shielding on the crew quarters and bridge to fail, causing them to die. It’s why the human cargo survived. There was an Intec slave world at these coordinates then and we have nothing listed in the database for that system. Sir, no-one has attacked or even mentioned that system since before this component was built. Chances are good that it still exists.’
Admiral Williams examined the report. It was everything he had hoped for. Captain Sullivan reported that Tay had welded her team into something special, that she had even integrated the odd Xeno into the team. A target. Time to call the fleet home. The Fay had chewed up every trace of the Intec, quite literally in some cases. This time they would find the enemy.
Two weeks later, the HOF had taken every surrounding system. There would be no escape for the Intec. Stealth probes had mapped several space stations orbiting the planet, along with a multitude of mismatched ships in orbit. For the past week, anything leaving or attempting to enter the system had died a quick and violent death. Intel was busy stripping them of information. Tay and her crew had watched her Australian Intec ship being dumped into the local sun, only to be replaced by another. Her crew was on a steep learning curve.
Tay watched it burn. It meant nothing to the Fleet, busy as they were with other things, but she wanted to remember its death. A single slaver, one single ship from these poisonous people, had inflicted a legacy of misery on her people. Time to crush these bastards.