Aurelia
Illion doesn’t show up until nearly half past three in the morning. I hear the quiet swish of the door as it slides open and catch a quick glimpse of him, wet and messy haired, as he disappears into the bathroom.
He emerges a few minutes later in a set of navy pajamas, without his face-obscuring red glasses.
He doesn’t pay any attention to me; simply crosses straight over to his desk and begins pulling out textbook after textbook from the drawers.
“Is everything okay?” I ask, rubbing my eyes. He didn’t come back so late for no reason.
“Everything’s fine, go back to sleep.” Illion mutters, but the frustration in the way he flicks through the pages of a manual speaks louder.
“What happened to your glasses?”
“I just don’t want to wear them right now.” He huffs, swivelling in his office chair so his back is facing me.
Something’s wrong, but can I even do anything about it? I’ve only known him for a day.
“Would you like something to drink?” I pull back the covers; climb out of bed to the hot drink machine on the other side of the room. “Tea? Coffee? Or whatever this purple mystery button is?”
He pauses, turns to face me for a second before quickly looking away again. “Maybe some tea. Thank you, Aurelia.”
I press a yellow button on the machine, and it hisses. A cute little mug with steaming green tea pops out.
“Here.” I take it back to him and set it next to the pile of papers on his desk. He seems to be looking at diagrams of pipes, and maps of some sort.
“Thank you.” Illion murmurs, narrowing his eyes at a map of…something. It looks like a bunch of pipes and egg-shaped diagrams.
“If you need anything else, just…let me know.” I add nervously.
He looks so distraught I really want to hug him, but I decide against it and crawl back into bed; let him focus on whatever he’s doing.
He’s gone by the time by 6am alarm goes off. All the papers are packed away neatly, and the room like he was never here.
Did it even happen? Or did I dream it all?
“Good morning my dear passengers!” Illion’s voice crackles through the intercom, happy and upbeat as ever. “Hope you all slept well after that first day of work! Please keep the fighting to a minimum; the homebots did report a disturbance on floor eight last night. And even though throwing used tampons at other passengers isn’t technically illegal, it can be very damaging to the walls when you miss. Those responsible will be on wall cleaning duty today. Anyway, have a merry morning and a peachy day! Captain out.”
Illion doesn’t sound worn out like last night. It must have been a dream after all. Or maybe he’s just hiding it.
With a pained sigh, I roll out of bed and onto the fluffy carpet next to the bed.
Ugh, breakfast better be good. It’s my only thought as I struggle to my feet. My back is pretty sore for some reason. Apparently, that’s normal as our bodies adjust to artificial gravity (at least, according to Lolli-N).
Pulling on my uniform, I hobble out the door to the cafeteria in search of Enea.
I find her mulling around the donut station, with three donuts in each hand.
“Enea, you little backstabber.” I punch her arm jokingly, “who was supposed to meet me for dinner last night?”
“Oh, yeah, sorry.” She mumbles through full mouth of sprinkle donuts, “this hot guy asked me out, I couldn’t say no.”
“Oh.”
“Well, he was hot, okay Auri?” She shakes her head furiously at me, “not everyone is as lucky as you. I have to go hunting men in the wild!”
I turned Illion down for her, but she turned me down for a guy.
“Don’t worry.” I shrug my shoulders and hide my annoyance with a smile. “Did it go well at least?”
“Yeah!” She shoves another donut in her mouth, “so well! He left me at the kiddy play era because he had to ‘go get a drink’ and then he never came back! I ended up playing tag with some kids. Motherfucker.”
“I’m sorry.” But she kind of deserved that for ditching me.
“Really?” Enea gives me a side eye, “you’re smiling.”
“Sorry.” I wipe the smirk off my face and take a donut from her hand. “I heard Josa Mosa is single again though.”
Donut comes flying out of her mouth in shock. “He’s what? Bitch, where is he? Did you see him?”
“Holoreels said he was in the first-floor pools earlier this morning?”
“Right.” She shoves the rest of her donuts at me, “let’s go to the pools. Donuts are enough for breakfast.”
“Don’t you have shift at 7am?” I run behind her as she sprints through the cafeteria, dodging homebots as they carry in more pastries.
“Half the people in my room are skipping this morning, it’s fine!” She yells back at me.
“But Enea, I have shift at 7am. I can’t come!”
“Ugh, fine, be a party pooper.” She pauses at the elevator door to glare at me, “really, Aurelia. It’s okay to have fun sometimes.”
“But we have jobs to do. This ship isn’t going to run on its own.”
“Not everyone is skipping, just a few of us.”
“Enea! I can’t!” I huff, “you’re being ridiculous! Out of three billion people you got a chance at life, the least you can do is help look after the ship that’s going to take you there.”
She rolls her eyes, “one day isn’t going to hurt anyone. It’s just once. You’re just being stubborn and silly and childish. Illion must be rubbing off on you.”
Anger flashes over my face, but I hide it quickly. Not trusting my tongue, I turn away from her and storm off in the opposite direction, towards the mechanical centre.
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“Auri! Come back! I didn’t mean that!” She calls after me, but I ignore her. And she doesn’t chase me. She’ll probably send me a bunch of apology texts later, but I know my disapproval won’t stop her from going to the pools.
“Good morning, Mrs. Marillion!” Lolli-N greets me cheerily as I enter the workshop, and I see a line of homebots queued up behind her.
“Good morning.” I answer tiredly and pull out my chair in front of the table of tools.
“How’s the Captain?” I ask the question as nonchalantly as possible, and Lolli-N’s face melts into a beam.
She chuckles, “he’s a bit tired, but aren’t we all?”
“Hm.” I smile down and spread out my tool kit as the first homebot approaches. “At least he’s holding up.”
She nods, and when I look up again, she’s gone. With a quiet sigh, I beckon for my first patient to take a seat.
The homebots sit across from me one by one, and like the day before, I mostly end up doing patch up jobs, and small aesthetic procedures, like adding earrings, or fixing noses.
It’s pretty standard, until one lanky server bot limps over.
“Something chewed my toes off last night.” He laments, lifting his right foot up and placing it on my work bench. Five sparking stubs stare back at me, loose wires hanging out like spaghetti.
“Oh wow.” I pull my magnification goggles on, “how’d that happen?”
“I was in charging bay, and something came out of vents when I was on rest.” He says, “it resembled a deformed frog.”
Fiddling around in a few boxes, I discover a few extra toes at the bottom of one.
“It really hurt.” The bot’s lip trembles, “and my feet are so ugly now. I used to have painted nails with little teddy bears.”
“I don’t know if I can give you teddy bears on your nails,” I sigh, and begin sawdering new toes on. “But I’m sure there’s an artist around somewhere who can help you with that. Did you report this attack to the Captain?”
“Yes, Lolli-N sent it in.”
“Okay, good.” It takes about ten minutes to replace his toes and paint the edges so the welding can’t be seen, and then the homebot’s on his merry way.
Something biting toes off? That’s odd.
Illion
Last night was the worst night in a while. After I nearly drowned, I somehow washed up in a kiddy pool on the furthest end of floor two. All the heating was off, but luckily, I was near an elevator so I could get out in time before the floorplan shifted again, thus avoiding freezing into a human popsicle.
But my main plan didn’t work, and the engines for floor two are still offline. Clean water supply on The Marillion is running low. The pools on floor one are sucking up about half, and the rest is going to showers, laundromat, and kitchens. This isn’t going to last for long.
But floor two is dangerous. That incident last night slapped me back into reality. Captain or not, the mind-boggling map is misleading. The floor plan is ever changing – I don’t even remember why it was made like that, but it’s tricky to navigate. And I have to give it a second try.
“Lolli-N, where are you? It’s 7:05am.” I grumble into my intercom. She was supposed to be here at the bridge ten minutes ago to help me find the engine room on floor two, but she’s still not here.
“Captain, we have reports of cybernetic infestations on floor four.” Miith calls to me from the other end of the bridge, “Lolli-N filed a few from the charging centre. Toes are being chewed off.”
“Fuck.” I give up with the intercom and turn to Dust at his computer. “Send Tassle and Dorg to the charging center and have them tear the place apart.”
“Yes, sir.”
At that second, the doors to the bridge hiss open, and Lolli-N wheelies in, brushing strands of white hair out of her face, “sorry, Captain! We’re just dealing with a bit of worker strike right now. Everyone’s gone to the pools.”
“Worker strike?!” Dust, Miith, and I exclaim in unison.
“Yes.” She pauses to catch a breath, “I was rounding up the key workers for kitchens and laundromat, but I just saw your missed calls. Sorry for the delay.”
“It’s alright.” I pat her shoulder, “we’ll go down to floor two in a minute. I just need to make an announcement.”
Pulling the microphone out of the side of my Captain’s seat, I give Dust a nod.
“Dear crew and passengers. It appears, that a number of people have decided to skive their work duties this lovely morning. Now, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but everyone needs to do their assigned jobs, regardless of whether they like it or not. We’re already overcrowded and believe me the airlocks are greased up and ready. Don’t think you’re exempt. Captain out.”
I slam the microphone back in its place. “Dust, make a list of everyone who skived this morning. Miith, prepare the rerouting program for floor two. Lolli-N, let’s go.”
With Lolli-N behind me, I’m out of the bridge heading towards the elevator.
“One day in and it’s chaos again.” I sigh, leaning against the arm rail once we’re both in the elevator. “I love The Marillion.”
Lolli-N presses the button for floor two. “Aurelia asked about you this morning.”
“Oh?”
“Mhm. She looked a bit worried.”
“She saw me come in soaked last night.” I groan, pinching the bridge of my nose. “Please tell her everything is fine. I’m the cheeriest I’ve ever been.”
“I just said you’re a bit tired.” Lolli-N frowns, “no point lying.”
“No point inciting worry.” I wiggle my eyebrows at her and push my new glasses back up again. “Or rumours.”
“Her sister gossips, not her. Did you at least ask her out for dinner last night like I told you to?”
“I did. And she said no.”
“Why?”
“Something with her sister.”
“So, you offered to reschedule? Right?”
I can feel my cheeks tinting red.
“Right, Illion?” Lolli-N’s tone is almost threatening.
“Not…exactly.”
“Oh, for gods’ sake.” She lets out a loud groan and drags her fingers down her cheeks in a show of complete frustration, “I bet you ran away, didn’t you?”
“I had work! I have to protect my palace!” I exclaim in defence of my honour, “and she didn’t seem exhilarated anyway!”
Lolli-N gives me the most disappointed look; with her hands on her hips, and a pout; she seems more childish than serious.
“That’s pointless now, we have other issues to deal with.” I wave the matter away, “like this boggle of water supply. Dust!” I flick my intercom back on, “drain the pools on floor one, will you? That will buy us some time and get the skivers back to work.”
“Yes, captain. On it.” Comes the reply.
“Devious.” Lolli-N shakes her head with a grin, “I like it.”
“At least I won’t have to airlock anyone.” I chuckle. “Yet.”
***
The second floor is set to variation 56 when we arrive. I found the entire map collection in my desk last night, something I neglected to do the first time. Hypersleep symptoms seem to have caught up a bit!
“After the flower tunnels we should get to the flower chamber.” I mutter, turning the map over and over.
A narrow dirt path leads the way through the blindingly white tunnel. If I were to reach my arms out to either side, I could touch the walls. Along the side of the path are white and purple flowers, clustered so tightly together it looks like a tight-knit rug of wool.
“These daisies and lobelias are sucking up a lot of water.” Lolli-N comments, “is it a good idea to keep this section of the floor running in the long term?”
“Once everyone is settled in, and we’ve barricaded off the dangerous areas, I’m sure the flower chamber will be a roaring attraction. Just like the pools on floor one.”
“You just drained the pools.”
“Right.”
We’ve reached the end of the tunnel, and it opens up to a low ceiling chamber. The lights are off. Flowers and pillars stretch well into the distance. All around, sneezeweed seeps across the chamber like a lake of fiery red and orange, dimmed to a muted rouge from the small amount of tunnel light.
“Ah, electricity is out again.” I pull a flashlight from my belt, but just as I’m about to switch it on, a red glow lights up behind a pillar several yards away.
Odd.
“What is that?” I grab Lolli-N’s arm.
“I don’t know, sir.”
With my flashlight ready in my hand, I sneak forward towards the light – that’s when I hear it; a low crackling sounds; static.
It starts off relatively quiet, but the closer I draw the louder it becomes; a cacophony of sounds in a dialect unknown. I’m a few pillars away from the light, and with some careful manoeuvring, I’m in a position to see what it is.
It’s a projection of unfamiliar symbols, emanating from a small black lump sitting in the flowers.
And then it’s gone. Silence. The light is gone, and darkness covers the chambers again.
“Lolli-N, run!” I exclaim, flicking the switch on my own light so I don’t run headfirst into a pillar.
Sprinting like there’s a million scorpions at my heels, I cross the entire flower chamber in about 30 seconds (that must be a galactic record). Lolli-N is right behind me, and by the time we reach the end and find the exit tunnel behind another pillar, we’re both gasping for breath.
“Cybernetic.” I pant in between breaths, “cybernetic!”
“Those symbols…”
“It’s not Raeg.” I lean against the wall, covering my face, “it’s not one of ours.”
“The others didn’t have identifiable markers, bio or otherwise.”
“But it was receiving orders from somewhere!”
“Those symbols were Zyxien.” Lolli-N hisses, “we’re in a lot of trouble, Captain.”
“Fuck.” I stifle the growing urge to scream in anger, instead clenching my fists so hard I’m probably going to break skin. “We need to turn the engines on, and deal with the water first. Call the bridge and have them collect all the cybernetic specimens we have. Bring them to the mechanic workshop after duty. And get me an update on that Zyxien fleet heading for Osticara.”
“Yes, sir.”