The quarantine airlock opened and Leon watched as Aden stepped out and into the hall followed closely by Natalia. The man looked haggard, his face unshaven and his clothes rumpled, but Aden smiled wide as he left the room and stepped out into the slightly curving hallway where Leon was waiting.
Leon extended a hand to Aden who clasped it like a drowning man, his expression showing the smallest depths of his true fatigue.
“God damn it’s good to get out of there. Leon, thank you.” Aden shook his hand, his grip firm despite his extended internment in the quarantine chamber.
Shaking his hand, Leon gestured to the smiling woman behind him “Don't thank me, thank Nat. She was the one responsible for assessing your mental health. She told me that you had made significant progress on your situation. And I trusted her, and you. I need you better, you are a vital member of the crew Aden, don't forget that.” He told the man sincerely.
Letting go of his hand, Aden nodded solemnly, his shoulders slumping ever so slightly as he seemed to remember the madness that had captivated his mind. “I make no apologies for what I said as it’s true. You know that, but I have come to the realization that it's not important. Not more important than all of you.” The man bowed his head reverently.
Leon reached out and patted the man's shoulder before pulling him into a tight bear hug.
Aden exclaimed “Wha.. Hey! What are you…” But after a moment he succumbed to the contact, his tense muscles relaxing and his grip tightening.
Leon patted the man on the back “I missed you Aden. I am glad to have you back with us. Don’t let your mental state get that bad again man, please. If you ever need to talk to me or Nat, don’t hesitate for a second to do so. I’m here for you.”
A small sob eked out of Aden before the man pushed him away. He wiped a tear that was forming and asked, his voice barely seeming to hold steady “I really appreciate that, you mean it?”
Natalia stepped forwards and placed a hand on the bedraggled man’s shoulder. “Of course we do, come on. We have a little surprise for you Aden.” She gestured down the hallway.
Aden looked a little apprehensive but followed her as she led them down the hall towards one of the nearby multipurpose rooms. He stopped before the door and said “Wait, you didn’t.” but he seemed to cut himself off as if afraid to say what was on his mind. As if this was a dream that would shatter into a million razored fragments if he acknowledged its existence.
“Didn’t what?” Leon said with a smile. He raised an arm towards the door and gave a small nod. “After you my friend.”
Aden smiled a little in response, he tentatively pressed the activation button. As the door slid open Aden jumped back, astounded.
“Surprise!!” The rest of the crew hollored loudly, quickly followed by the sound of laughter and the energized chatter of excited people.
Aden stepped through the portal slowly, his face a mask of shock and excitement in equal measure.
He looked back at Leon, his face showing pure excitement. “What is this? You planned a party for me?”
Leon stepped through the door and to the man’s side. Placing an arm around the shorter man’s shoulder, he gestured to the room and all the people in it. “Of course we did. It’s a big day after all.”
Aden frowned and asked “What?”
Oliver called out to Aden, Max coiled around his neck in a relaxed position. The strange alien creature now as much a part of the crew as Leon himself. “It’s your fuckin birthday mate. Any reason to throw a party is fine with me!”
Aden chuckled and said “Oh. I must have lost track of time.”
Leon patted his back before speaking quietly “You lost track of a lot of things Aden. But that's behind us now. Go, have some cake, Joice made it using some modified rice starch or some other black magic baking. I really don't know how she does it. It’s good though, that's what matters.”
Aden nodded. “It must be, I see that someone already took a bite out of it.”
Sabine stood forwards and held out a plate with the missing slice of cake. “That’s because I saved the first slice for you. Here you go Aden, it’s good to have you back.” She handed the man the cake and he thanked her.
Taking a bite he mumbled “Oh, that is very good. Thank you. Thank you all.” A chorus of pleasantries followed.
Leon stood to the side of the doorway as everybody moved in on the cake. Joice’s cakes were a bright light in the darkness of their seemingly eternal mission. A sweet taste of home that he liked to indulge the crew in whenever he could. It kept morale high and the crew tight knit, and that was the most important thing. Keeping them all together.
He felt a tap on his arm and smiled as Natalia handed him a slice of cake. “I saw you standing over here all serious like and figured you could use some cake.”
Leon smiled at her, the other bright spot in his life. “Thanks Nat. Thanks for helping to set this up. I think it’s exactly what he needed. I certainly won't complain either.” He chuckled as he spooned a piece of the sweet desert into his mouth.
She wrapped an arm around his middle and leaned her head on his shoulder. Planting a kiss on the crown of her head he heard her sigh contentedly. She glanced up at him and asked “It really makes you feel like everything is going to be alright, right?”
He nodded. It did, he held her tight as Aden listened to Oliver spin tales about what he had missed. It would be fine, they were tough. Nothing in this universe could hold them down for long.
**********
Leon was on the bridge, void suit on and strapped to his chair in the microgravity environment. They were about to drop out of warp, one of his least favorite activities so far into their mission, well besides almost getting dragged into a rogue black hole.
The flashing yellow of the warning lights was an all too familiar warning of an impending warp transition. As the lights turned a solid yellow he braced himself mentally. With a strange twisting feeling as if he was spinning down an endless drain the ship popped out of its artificially generated event horizon and was put back into contact with the wider universe.
Leon shook his head to clear it, the beginnings of a migraine forming under his temples which he began rubbing fervently. ‘If it wasn't one thing it was always another.’ he thought with a curse. ‘Why couldn't warp be as simple as driving a car or piloting a boat, why did the whole process have to be so damn uncomfortable?’
Before he could spiral further down the dark hallway of his inner monologue he was brought back to the present by Joice saying his name.
“Leon, are you alright?” The blond-haired woman gave him a look, concern written clearly on her face.
Leon shook his head to clear it. “No, it's just a headache. Nothing to be concerned about. What’s our status? Terry, report.”
Terry looked around and then down at her console. “It looks like we came out right where we were aiming. But I’m only detecting one terrestrial planet, not the two the Aori archive said should be here.” She paused. “It could be hidden behind the sun, recommend taking a position over the star’s pole.”
Leon cocked his head, his headache just beginning to fade. “Ok, but please give the crew at least half an hour before we warp. Some of us are a bit older than you kids.” he finished with a chuckle.
Samuel nodded “Wait for the geezers, aye aye Captain geezer.” The young pilot said with a hint of humour.
Leon scowled but he wasn't really mad. They had been living together on the ship long enough to be past such insecurities. He knew Samuel was just joking around. Part of him still twinged at the words though, he was getting older and he was keenly aware of the fact. With their mission being slated to last for the next seventeen and a half years, he would be nearly sixty-four by the time they returned to Earth.
Barring any accidents or health problems, that meant that Chris would realistically not be making it back home. At sixty years old, he was by far the oldest man on the ship followed by Oliver and Leon himself. But Chris had already made it apparent that he was willing to accept that he might never see their birth world ever again. Leon himself couldn't imagine never seeing Earth again, the thought of dying alone in space sent chills down his spine.
Once more his inner thoughts were interrupted by someone talking to him. This time it was Sabine, her voice smooth as she pointed to her console. “Leon, we should send out a mission to gather some asteroids. There is a nice debris belt between the third and fourth planets. If we pick up a nice carbon asteroid we can use it to synthesize more fertilizer for the hydroponics.”
Leon nodded. “Okay, do it. But take Samuel with you this time. I don't like having both you and Chris away from the ship at the same time.” she tried to interject but he waved a suited hand. “That’s an order, please don't make me enforce my authority on this. If something were to happen, god forbid, I don't want to lose both of my engineers. Is that understood?”
Sabine grumpily nodded and muttered “Nothing would happen.” but that was all, he knew she would comply.
Leon saw no point in pushing the issue and so began to unstrap from his seat. Joice looked over and gave him a curious look. “Where are you going?”
Leon finished the straps and grabbed his helmet before giving her a glance. “I’m no longer needed on the bridge at the moment. Everyone has their orders, you have the conn Joice.”
She shook her head, seemingly displeased with his decision. “Alright. But if something goes wrong because you weren't here I’m going to tell you exactly what I think about it later.”
“Noted. Carry on.” Leon smiled. He turned and drifted off of the bridge and into the main bridge airlock. Undoing his suit’s harness he squirmed out of it and placed it on the rack to be aired out. The suits were void proof and the only thing standing between his tender flesh and explosive decompressive death in the case of a hull breach. But god damn were they uncomfortable to try to do anything in.
He finished racking his gear and then moved through the final airlock and out into the ship’s core. He checked his assistant and smiled, the person he was looking for was exactly where he wanted her to be. He quickly pulled himself along the ship's core using the numerous metal handholds scattered all across its tubular inner surface.
Leaving the bridge like that had likely been a bit irresponsible, but he didn’t really care about decorum at this point in the mission. He trusted Joice and the other members of the bridge crew to handle such a routine task just fine without him. And if they did end up needing him for something he wouldn't be very far away.
Before long he had reached the proper ladder shaft and ascended it to the bottom where the slowly spinning habitat ring emulated a percentage of normal gravity. It wasn’t perfect, but it was much better than being trapped in microgravity for twenty years. At least in the rings he could stand up.
He walked down the gently curving hallway till he reached a set of doors that opened at his presence. Immediately a wave of hot humid air washed over him and he stepped into the hydroponics section of the sixth ring, the door closing behind him with a soft sigh of electric motors.
Looking around he was once more enamored with the amount of greenery in the long and curving room. Everywhere he looked he saw another wall of fresh green leaves, small flower bulbs and thin stalks. The air smelled of life and decay, not putrid, just the smell of growing things.
He wound his way through the foliage quietly, stalking his target in a hunched and stealthy manner. As he rounded another large corrugated black tank he saw his quarry. The woman had her back turned to him but he knew immediately who she was. There was no way he could mistake her features.
Sneaking up he plopped his hands down on her shoulders while uttering “Hey Nat!” loudly.
She wailed in shock and jumped, her hands flailing in his direction as she dropped the small sample analyser she had been holding. “Don’t do that Leon!” she said breathlessly while giving his shoulder a firm slap.
Laughing, Leon wrapped her in a hug and apologised. “I’m sorry, but it was way too tempting for me to ignore. I missed you this morning.” he finished as she pushed him back a step.
Leon was forced to release her or trip over a low pipe behind him. “Woah, hey. Careful there, I could have fallen.” Leon shuffled a bit then regained his footing.
She chuckled and asked “Aren't you supposed to be up on the bridge or something?”
Leon frowned. Her tone of voice suggested that she was a little upset about something. But what could it be? Surely she wasn't actually upset over him pranking her just now, or was it the same thing that had been rubbing her the wrong way for the last three days. He decided to be blunt and ask.
“So, how are you feeling about…” but she cut him off.
“We are not having this conversation right now. I know you weren't about to ask me to see your side of it again.” she huffed and then turned back to her plants, grabbing the analyser tool off the floor where it had fallen.
Leon was a bit taken aback. She seemed really upset. If he had known the trouble it was going to cause he never would have asked her about it. But to be fair he hadn't really thought that hard about the issues involved. Terry and Taylor seemed to be getting along perfectly fine still, he had to wonder if the topic had come up between the two lovers as well.
He shrugged and walked to her side. “I didn't mean anything by it…” but he stopped. “I apologise Nat. I understand it's a sensitive subject, especially out here alone in the void. But it’s something that we are going to have to decide soon, or the choice is going to be taken away from us forever.”
She sighed and glanced at him. “There are a few things you would need to do before I would ever even consider it Leon. I love you, I truly do, more than anyone else I have ever met. But… It’s important to me that we follow the proper procedures. You know…” she bobbed her head as if to imply something, her head cocked slightly and an eyebrow raised in a questioning manner.
Leon knew almost immediately what she meant. He looked around, the room seemed empty. He leaned forwards, nervous “I understand. And I have been thinking about what you said.” He remained quiet as she continued to scrutinised him.
“That’s it? You have been thinking about it?” She turned and stamped her foot. Her frustration bubbling to the top. She was generally rather good at covering her emotions so for her to show such unrestraint she must really be upset.
This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.
Leon was a bit flabbergasted. He didn't know what to do, he usually had an answer for just about everything, but here he was lost. He felt himself start to sweat as nerves began to flare. “Well, there is nobody here to see if I were to…”
“And that's all that matters? Other people seeing you be a man?” she asked accusingly.
He swallowed heavily. This was it, the pivotal moment. The right action taken would see them together till the end of time, the wrong words might make her resent him forever.
Leon pushed down his pride and grabbed one of her hands before getting down on a single knee. “Natalia. I love you more than anyone in the universe, more than myself. I see now that I was being a coward. I ask you sincerely and with no other motives than my love for you. Natalia Garcia, will you marry me?”
He waited with his breath held as she smiled. Finally after a long pause she reached down and pulled him up, well, tried to pull him up. What resulted was him falling forwards and stumbling before managing to catch himself against the side of the black hydroponics tub next to them.
Natalia laughed and hugged him. “Of course I will you big goof. Why did you take so long to ask?” she almost sobbed.
He patted her back as she cried softly and ran a hand through her hair. “I know. I’m sorry, it’s just. I wasn't sure the best way to go about it. I’m almost fourteen years older than you. I thought it would be improper to ask…” he trailed off as she slapped his shoulder again, this time not as hard.
“You are such an ass. I don’t care about that, I love you. And it’s not like I have an overabundance of options anyways.” she joked.
He smiled and hugged her again. “I’m so blessed to have you in my life Nat. I don’t know what I would do without you.”
Leon rested his cheek on the side of her head as she was only a few inches shorter than he was. They stayed like that for a while before the sound of rustling plants disturbed them. Out of the bushy plants across the walkway Myung pushed through and stopped.
She pulled up short. “Oh, I’m sorry. Am I interrupting something?” she raised a hand and gave them a smirk.
Natalia pulled away and waved to her with a muttered “No. Hello Myung.”
Leon nodded to the woman and asked “How are the pipes holding up? Any more pump issues?”
Myung shook her head, dark hair in a ponytail that hung to the middle of her back. “No, nothing so far. Though we did have a major washout in one of the sand filter beds. We lost some of the reeds but I was able to save most of them. I checked and it looked like the mesh supports wore off. I guess the constant vibration of the sifters must have induced metal fatigue or something. Nothing that can’t be fixed, but it has set me back a few days. Luckily Natalia was here to help pick up some of the slack.” She walked to one of the large black tubs that contained tomato plants of some variety. Small green fruits ripening slowly on the crisp looking vines.
Leon wrapped an arm around Natalia’s shoulder. He nodded to Myung “Yeah, she is good at fixing things.”
Natalia started to speak but was interrupted as the yellow alert lights flicked on. Leon groaned quietly and muttered under his breath. “Oh not already.”
He felt Natalia grab one of his hands and give it a reassuring squeeze. Smiling at her appreciatively he nodded to Myung. “Well, it was good talking to you, but I need to get back to the bridge before we warp. Nat, please think about what we talked about. I love you.” He gave her a quick kiss before walking away. He turned to wave one more time and then left, he could hear Natalia start talking to Myung almost as soon as he turned the corner. He didn't want to think too hard about what had just happened.
It was as if he had just woken from a dream, the more he tried to solidify the events in his mind the harder they became to grasp. Instead he just pictured Natalia’s smiling face, it brought a measure of calm to his cold cybernetic heart.
**********
Leon was listening to Terry talk about the latest findings from his seat across from her in the mess hall when his CAMs device pinged him insistently. Frowning he held up a hand. “Hold that thought Terry please.” checking the wrist worn device he saw it was a message from Chris. Typing out a quick message back to the man one handed he looked back to Terry and asked “Okay sorry about that, start from that last sentence again. You found the missing planet?”
She shook her head slowly. She set down her fork and leaned towards him. “That's just the problem, I didn't find the missing planet, but I found something else where it should have been. An expansive debris field and small rocky mass that has only about a fourth of the mass of the planet that we suspected to be there. I don’t want to say it outright, but…” she trailed off.
Leon picked up what she was saying. “You think the entire world somehow disintegrated?” she gave a solemn nod. “But, how would that even be possible?” He grabbed his drink, a light fruit cocktail from concentrate. There was tons of the stuff on board, enough for the whole twenty-year mission if they rationed it efficiently.
Terry pulled a datapad from somewhere under the table, he wouldn't have been surprised if it had been sitting on the bench next to her specifically for this purpose. She spoke quickly and with a bit of hesitancy, unusual for her. “I have a theory. It’s not substantiated, but I think it might explain what I found.”
Leon looked at her for a moment before gesturing for her to continue. She jerked slightly and continued “Sorry, of course I have been over this several times with Henry's help. Don’t worry I didn't toggle any of his logic gates off, I wouldn't make the same mistake twice. It looks as if the planet was struck by a truly cataclysmic impact some few hundred thousand years ago. It was recent enough that the debris field has not yet stabilized, that's why the main mass is still so much lower than expected. It hasn't been long enough for the materials to have fully settled.”
Leon raised an eyebrow. That would fit in almost perfectly with their other observations about the fall of the Aori species. The best they could figure they must have been wiped out somewhere about two hundred thousand years ago. A truly mind-boggling amount of time to him, but a mere instant on the geological scale.
Terry seemed to sense his interest as she continued to speak. “Well, I did some analysis of the debris field and the gas surrounding it. While most of the vapor seems to have been ionized and blown away by the solar wind I am still detecting a rather significant amount of water ice and nitrogen compounds. The planet likely had large oceans and potentially even life as there is evidence of organic compounds in the debris as well.” she sat back, looking quite pleased with her report.
Leon leaned forwards and laced his hands together on the table. “This is most disturbing. This means that in all likelihood, every planet we try to visit from the Aori archives is going to be dead.”
Terry looked at him and nodded. “We have more than enough evidence to suggest that they fell to some hostile force. Every time we visit one of these systems I’m afraid we are going to run into these so called Ruiners face to face. We are taking a terrible risk Leon.” she sat up straight as he stood and cleared his place.
“I understand that. But if there is even a snowball's chance in hell of finding these Aori and making contact then I want to pursue it. I’ll tell you what, I can talk to Joice about it and maybe we’ll put it to a vote. Would that be satisfactory?” she nodded. “Ok then, thank you for the briefing, but it looks like Chris has some emergency he needs me for. See if you can get Taylor or Oliver to help you with the analysis.”
Terry stood as well, her datapad held tight like some precious treasure or family jewel. “Yes, I will get right on that. Er, you are fine if i do this from the secondary command center right? After sitting on the bridge in micro all morning…” Leon nodded and she thanked him before rushing off out of the mess hall. She left in such a hurry she forgot her used dishes on the table.
With a small chuckle he grabbed them for her and took his haul to the food reclamation bin and dirty dish tray. The ship was a clean environment, no flies or pestering insects had snuck aboard that he had seen. So the only danger to leaving the dirty dishes out is that mold might take root, one of the few things they hadn't been able to eradicate completely.
Leon walked out of the small cafeteria room, the long tables and inviting refrigeration units left behind as he entered the long and slightly curved hall. He had been on the ship for years now but this sight was still a bit of an oddity to him, the feeling of constantly walking uphill stuck with him as he reached one of the spoke ladders and ascended it to the ship's non-rotating core.
He had been on ring three of six, the main habitation ring. But Chris was in the mineral extraction lab on the fifth ring. Because of the counter-rotational nature of the rings, there was no easy way to move from one to another. Instead he took the ladder to the ship's core where he pulled himself in the microgravity to the fifth ring’s ladder junction. He started up it quickly, the gravity slowly growing till he was descending into the ring in a more conventional manner.
As Leon reached the floor he checked his wrist device to see if Chris was in the lab still. It looked like he was, the geologist’s ping showing a solid green in the room ahead.
Leon entered through the automatic doors and looked around. He was in a large room, pretty much as physically big as a room aboard one of the habitat rings could get. At the far end of the room was a mass of machinery and piping that constituted the onboard refinery. It used electrical arc furnaces to both melt and then extract the various metals and compounds from anything they might drag on board. It was also equipped with sample reducers and crushers to render large pieces of less metallic rock into more easily assayable parts.
It was by this large mass of machinery that Chris stood, the older man’s back towards Leon. Leon stepped forwards to the safety railing that led to the stairs. The room was warm, the ship’s large radiator array deployed but still unable to pull the tremendous amount of heat fully out of the room.
Chris must have heard him descending the stairs for as Leon reached the slightly lower ground floor the geologist turned and smiled. “Ah, Leon. I am so very glad you came, I wanted to show you something strange I found while going over the latest mineral samples Sabine brought in.” Chris waved him over towards a mess of tables and examination equipment.
Leon followed curiously, Chris was not a man to get easily excited or make frivolous claims. If he said he had found something strange then it must be quite exciting indeed.
With this perspective firmly in mind, Leon walked slowly behind the grey haired man and to one large table in particular. On it was a large slightly greenish blue chunk of what appeared to be rock. It had no defined crystal structure that he could glean and in fact was covered in blob-like nodules that seemed entirely random in their size and placement.
Chris sidled up to the sample and began to excitedly worry over it, touching it in a few places with various instruments before nodding contentedly. After another moment of this odd behavior he seemed to realize that Leon was still just standing there in mild amusement and confusion. “Oh, you.” was all the man said, his strange goggles magnifying his eyes in a peculiar manner that almost caused Leon to laugh out loud.
Leon shook his head instead. “Yes, me. What was so important that you decided to use the words…” Leon checked his wrist communicator again, “...highly significant to our advanced understanding of the universe? Pretty potent wording if you ask me.”
Chris nodded and gestured frantically to the nobby stone in front of him. “Look come, come. Please, use these.” Leon grabbed the goggles from the man’s slightly shaking grip. He slipped them on over his head, the settings were intuitive and after a moment spent fiddling with the dials on its side, he turned his attention back to the rock that had the older man in such a tizzy.
At first he saw nothing but that same slightly greenish blue rock, but as he scrutinised it closer he started to notice patterns and details. The nodules all seemed to have a similar shape and striations. He looked closer, his face scrunching up as he tried to make out the details and why they seemed at once so familiar and so alien. They almost looked like… shells.
Chris leaned close, surprising him as he asked “Do you see them?”
Leon jumped away from the rock a little and gasped “Jesus! Chris, could have been any more startling? No, I am not at all sure what I’m looking at. What am I supposed to be seeing?”
Chris pulled him over to another adjoining table. On its surface were several of the strange almost almond shaped mineral outcroppings. Chris picked one up with a gloved hand “I thought they were some strange form of calcium carbonate that had undergone extreme metamorphic stress, but the closer I looked the more that seemed to not make sense. They don't seem to have undergone high temperatures or even pressures. So of course I then attempted to break one open to analyze the inside, and found this.”
Leon watched curiously as Chris reached out and grabbed one of the smaller mineral chunks and with a slight twist, popped it in half. Leon was a bit taken aback, the inside of the formation was hollow, a shiny almost iridescent red layer coating its surface.
“What the... What did you just do?” Leon exclaimed as Chris handed him the two shiny halves.
Chris asked “You remember those things we discovered in the protostar system last year? The things that Taylor named Glimmer Drorns?”
Leon nodded, not exactly sure where the other man was taking the conversation.
Chris continued with a slight pause “Well, what if, and this is a big what if, there was more life in the void than we originally thought?”
The room was silent, only the low thrum of electronics and the subtle hiss of the refinery were heard for long seconds. Leon shook his head “No, I can't immediately jump to that conclusion.” He held up a hand as Chris tried to defend his idea. “It isn't that I don’t believe you, it’s just that in order for a scientific explanation to be reached we need an expert's opinion. And while I trust you on anything geological or otherwise inorganic, you must forgive me for suggesting that Joice takes a look to verify your claims.”
Reluctantly the older man nodded and Leon pulled up a direct verbal link to Joice’s CAMs device. “Joice, this is Leon.”
“Yea? I’m working on something at the moment, Leon. What is it?” the woman said in a slightly annoyed manner.
Shaking his head with a slight chuckle he replied “I think you are going to want to come and see this. It meets your specific qualifications if you catch my meaning.”
After a brief pause she growled “You had better not be messing with me Leon, cause if you are I’ll…” but Leon didn't let her finish the comment.
“Just get down here and look for yourself. I promise it's not a false alarm.” the link cut from the other side and he sighed. She would never fully forgive him for the accident that had caused them to leave the Terralia system early. But hopefully this would peak her interest enough to make her more amenable.
After a few minutes of looking at some more samples with Chris, the airlock opened and Joice walked in. She was wearing a pair of standard grey overalls and her startlingly blond hair was done back into a severe ponytail that seemed to do nothing to alleviate the annoyed look on her face.
“Okay, I’m here now. Hello Chris, what is it that requires my attention so immediately?” she huffed slightly as she made her way to the table.
Chris handed her the same pair of magnifying goggles from before. “Here Joice, I found a strange sample that I have suspicions may be more than it originally appears.”
She took one of the unbroken pieces and looked it over. Leon watched as her shoulders untensed and she slowly started to get more excited by the small greenish blue rock.
Joice turned it over several times in her hands and exclaimed “This looks organic. Can you see these striations, almost like growth rings on some sort of shell. It’s so light too, it must be incredibly porous on the inside.”
Leon glanced at Chris who was smiling. He reached out for the small, opened piece that the geologist was still holding. Chris handed it to him a bit hesitant as if he was worried what the determination would be. “Here Joice, look at this piece.” he said as he handed it to her. “Chris broke it open.”
Joice grabbed it and pulled the two halves apart. With a gasp of wonder she began to examine the internal structures of the formation. “This is… This is not what I was expecting.” she looked up at them, her eyes magnified by the goggles she was wearing.
She held the pieces up into the light and examined them closely. Meanwhile Chris had gone back to tapping at the main block sitting on the other table. After a minute he extracted another full specimen.
Joice watched as he carefully broke it open, the two halves separating along a natural crack too straight to be natural as the nodules didn't seem to be crystals.
She reached out a hand and Chris handed her the newly opened stone. Its startlingly red interior was smooth and glassy almost in comparison to its rough exterior. Joice shook the new sample as she exclaimed “This isn't a mineral formation. It has all the hallmarks of a biological formation. See these small indentations where the inside becomes slightly rougher? They look like the anchor points for some sort of mollusk-like creature. The whole thing looks like a mussel shell actually…”. She quieted and looked at Chris. “Where did you get this? I need to know immediately!”
The sudden change of her tone took both Chris and him aback, she seemed almost desperate to know.
Chris pointed at the large greenish blue rock “Sabine brought that back from their collection mission yesterday. As far as I know she got it from the same asteroid belt that all the other ones came from?” The man looked a bit at a loss for words.
Joice looked at him, Leon just shrugged. “I don’t know where they came from, as far as I know they were just space debris.”
Joice looked around. “Can I take some of these samples with me Chris? I need to do a more in depth examination on these to determine their source. I need to…”. She paused. Looking at him she nodded and gave him a smile “Thanks for thinking of me Leon. That means a lot to me.”
Leon nodded and patted her shoulder as he smiled back. “Yeah. I hope you can find out what they are exactly. If anyone can, it’s you.” He told her respectfully.
Nodding absently at his comment, Joice loaded up with a few more of the samples as well as a small piece of the rock itself and rushed out of the room without another word. As the doors closed behind her automatically he glanced at Chris.
“Well, I'm sure of one thing.” He said to the older man.
Chris looked askance at his features “Yeah? What’s that?”
“I’m sure that she isn't going to find it in her heart to forgive me yet.” Leon chuckled.
Chris just shook his head and walked to the table that still held the largest fragment of rock. “Never underestimate the gift of purpose Leon. Trust me, she will come out of this more on your side than not. Now, if you will excuse me I have to monitor the latest smelting process, last time I let it go unattended the slag clogged the outlet feed and the dross froze the outlet shut.”
Leon nodded. “Alright then, I will be seeing you then.”
Chris just gave him a short wave as Leon walked up the stairs and out of the warm room. He walked a few steps before leaning up against the wall. He let out a sigh, it had been a long and rather trying few days. He was looking forward to getting back underway honestly. At least in the safety of warp things seemed relatively normal, as if the rest of the universe didn't exist.
Leon walked down the gently curving hallway, no destination in mind as he thought of the long future and the grim inevitability of fate and all its quirks.