Aeva
“So much for BSing our way out of this one.” Alex said, shaking his head.
I gave him a look. “Did you really think your people could lie your way out of this whole situation?”
“Well, if there’s one thing that humans excel at, it’s lying to each other. We’ve been doing it for as long as we have had sapience, and we’ve gotten pretty good at telling people what they want to hear.”
I blinked at him. “I don’t think that anyone is going to want to listen to you guys since you’ve kind of been lying about everything for as long you’ve been in the galactic community.”
He waved his hand dismissively before speaking, “I’m sure that all we need is one good speech explaining all the reasons that we did this, and it’ll all blow over. That is, except for the couple of species that will probably declare war on us or something like that.”
I shook my head. “You must have some good speakers if you think that your species can just make one speech and suddenly everyone will be ok with how much misinformation you’ve spread.”
Alex shrugged. “Well, at this point, there’s nothing I can really do right now so worrying about it is a waste of my brain power that could be used trying to get this mech working!” And with that he went down his little elevator thing, and made his way over to the closet, where he pulled out a series of tools and put them in a backpack.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“Well, I have about 45 minutes before I need to pick up that battery and wheelchair from the fabricator, so I need to get the mech itself ready for repairs. Pulling out what’s left of the original battery so that I can replace it when the time comes,” he said as he started to climb the mech.
I nodded. “I suppose that makes sense,” I said. “Do you need any help?”
He sighed as he tried to unscrew a tiny screw to dislodge a piece of battery and shrapnel. “Yeah, actually, I will. The battery itself is going to be about twice as big as me, and we usually have automated repair bays in our ships, so I will probably need some help,” he said before mumbling under his breath so quiet that I could barely hear him, “Good thing I’m an engineer.” He finally dislodged the piece of shrapnel and pulled out the battery piece that was attached to it. He looked at it for a second before tossing it onto the floor. “Once I get this thing up and running, I’ll start cleaning up the mess that I make.”
And with that, we got to work. We would end up spending most of the time pulling out the damaged components from the mech, with the occasional pop culture reference coming from Alex. Of course, I didn’t know what he was even talking about, because the most I knew about human culture was the very little that humanity even gave us in the first place. He seemed a bit crestfallen when I first said that but got increasingly irritated until he finally just pulled up a video on his holoprojector and left it on for me to view as we continued to pull apart the mech where it was broken. We had just finished as I heard Alex’s communicator go off.
He looked at it, looked back up to me, and said, “I just got a message that the fabrication is done. Could you get the battery and wheelchair for me? I would go with you, but I really don’t want to get on the captain’s bad side right now.”
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I rolled my eyes. “Of course, you start following the rules after you cause an incident that could throw your species into war.”
He chuckled. “Gotta start somewhere. Oh, and can you tell the crowd of about twenty people to stop lurking outside my door?”
I opened the door just a crack. Sure enough, there were about twenty people of various species lurking outside Alex’s cabin. I closed the door and turned to him. “How did you know how many people there were out there?” I asked.
“Don’t tell anyone that I told you this, but when I got here, I put a motion sensor outside, so I know if anyone’s trying to sneak up on me,” he said, still focusing on his communicator.
“Alright, don’t get kidnapped while I’m gone!” I said jokingly.
“I will make no such promises,” he said back.
And with that, I opened the door back up and stepped out into the hall. I did a headcount once again, finding Alex’s count to be accurate. They all seemed to be waiting there, expecting something to happen.
One of the group who I clocked as Kraark, a Chupir, one of the few species in the galaxy that is capable of flight with their wide wingspans, stepped forward. “Is Alex ok? We heard what happened, and just wanted to make sure he’s ok,” he said.
I gave a heavy sigh. “We both know that you couldn’t care less if he got hurt, you just want to see if the rumors about Alex are true,” I said as I tried to muscle my way through the crowd.
“Well, yeah, that is true,” he responded, “but we also want to know if he’s ok. That was a nasty breach in his suit that he had.”
I stopped and looked back at Kraark. “Well, he’s ok now, that’s all you really need to know. And can you leave him alone? He’s already gone through enough today without other people harassing him into showing his face when he doesn’t want to. You never cared about his wellbeing before this, so stop pretending to care now!”
There were a few mutters of acknowledgment before the entire crowd finally dispersed. I sighed and started making my way over to the fabricator. Occasionally I would get stopped by various people trying to get the latest from me about Alex, and I told them the same thing that I told everyone else. You’d think that they would have other things to gossip about but nooooo, they must focus on the one thing that they really shouldn’t be. If only I hadn’t been so nosy in the first place this probably never would have happened. I was snapped out of my introspection as I finally made it to the fabricator bay. I stepped in to see a fellow Cosholay manning the computer where they managed the incoming orders.
They looked up at me and the crest of their feathers popped up in a greeting. “Hello there, how can I help you?”
I popped up my crest in greeting as well. “I’m here to pick up a few things that a friend had fabricated, it was a battery and a wheelchair.” They nodded knowingly and went to the back of the bay and pulled out a small box on top of the wheelchair.
“It was a bit of an odd request, but hey, those Terrans are odd ones,” they said. They seemed to get a glint in their eye as they looked me over. “So, how long have you known the Terran for?”
I snorted. “The same amount of time as anyone else. But I did get to talk with him more often since we were both on the security team.”
“So did you know?” they asked.
“Of course I didn’t. The Terrans are so secretive, and for good reason too, considering how much the crew has been harassing him since everything happened.”
“It’s hard to imagine that they were lying about so much. It really makes you wonder what else they could be lying about.”
I pondered that for a moment before responding. “Alex has been nothing but honest and kind to me with the things that he can talk about. I trust him,” I said.
“Yeah, but how do you know that he really is?” they asked.
I thought back to the ready room, and the emotion that Alex showed. “I just know, ok?”
“Alright, I hope that you know what you’re doing,” they said, doubt evident in their voice.
With that I collected the battery and wheelchair and started back to Alex’s cabin. Luckily, I didn’t run into any more people trying to get the latest on our resident Terran. I finally walked into the cabin and saw him sitting on the bed looking at his communicator. I immediately knew something was wrong as he was a couple shades lighter than I had seen him previously. “What’s wrong?” I asked.
He looked up at me and said, “Someone just declared war on us.”