Duval Dirtbag
The Stray
Chapter 44 - Bonding with Sam (Fusion)
With a huge inhale, Michael started the day. “Let’s make this happen.” He got up, ready and out the door. His morning commute had shifted from the office to the spaceport. He had been frustrated by this new position. It felt frustrating. It wasn’t what he was suited to; this wasn’t his vocation; he loved science and the idea of being in space but this wasn’t his idea of a good time.
Michael thought of what Bill had said over the weekend. This was his duty. He was doing what he was doing for the greater good. Not everything had to suit him, not everything had to be fun. Michael had to trust the system, trust Joph’rena perhaps, that she’d put him in this position for a reason. And so, Michael accepted his fate and felt the cool breeze press against him from the St. John’s River. He thought of the Litany Against Fear from Dune. He would permit this air, this duty, this time to pass over and through him; when it had gone past, Michael would still remain.
Speaking of space operas like Dune, Michael was still wrapping his noodle around the fact that he was getting on an alien spaceship to go to work. He assembled with the others in a common area where everyone other than the pilots strapped down until they were out of the atmosphere. It had become less intimidating over time but he still felt butterflies in his stomach when his ship lifted off the ground. Today is going to be a good day. Today is going to be a good day. Michael inhaled deeply again, like he’d done when he woke up. Today is going to be a good–
“Hey Pink Dick, stop hoggin’ the fresh air!” A voice growled from just outside of Michael’s field of vision. He turned, too far at first, then back at the grumpy Shil’vati. It was Pennar’dun. Pennar’dun, who had raped him on his first night at the Shil’vati base. Pennar’dun was on this ship. Michael was going to spend his work day on an enclosed space ship with Pennar’dun.
Michael closed his eyes, pretending Pennar’dun wasn’t there. Pretending, maybe, just maybe, that she’d leave him alone. He took another deep breath. Fear is the mind-killer, he began again.
“Hey!” Pennar’dun barked again. “Quit it!”
Michael smiled with his eyes still closed. He heard a new voice. “Lay off, Penn!” His smile faded until he saw who vouched for him; then his jaw dropped. This new speaker was Sam. Sam, who hadn’t been particularly friendly to Michael on an earlier shift was now speaking up for him.
Pennar’dun snorted at Sam. Sam scoffed, “How many hours have you logged in space?”
“Hours?” Pennar’dun chuckled sneeringly. “Countless.” She waved around the bay, “We may have an easier time trying to track the years.”
“Right.” Sam agreed matter of factly. “Michael, how many times have you been in space?”
Michael looked to the ceiling for a few moments, then looked directly at Sam, “Including right now?”
Sam made a face that looked like if they could have patted Michael on the head, they would have. “Point taken yet, Pennar’dun?” Her face made it obvious that she did not understand the point. Sam continued, “This pup still gets space sick. Let him breathe. The scrubbers work the same on Human air as it does on Shil’s.” Sam crossed their arms in front of them, “Besides, I know he showers more regularly than you.”
“I shower.” Pennar’dun protested.
Another voice that Michael couldn’t identify, even after he found who was speaking, jabbed, “If you think you’re gonna get laid.”
Pennar’dun’s bedroom proclivities seemed to be well known by everyone on the ship. They all shared a laugh and the moment passed. Michael didn’t join the laughter as jauntily as the others, he was just glad to no longer be the focus of her aggression. He looked over at Sam. Sam gave him a chin nod then looked away to follow the conversation that was continuing. Michael tried to disguise another deep breath.
***
At his station, Michael looked at his screens. No matter the dials he toggled or switches he flipped, he couldn’t make heads or tails of anything. Seeking to narrow the divide between himself and Sam, he made his way over to their station. “Hey.” Sam gave Michael a half glance then returned to their work. Michael blushed his embarassment. “Thanks for that back there.”
“It was nothing.”
“Maybe to you, but I appreciate it.”
Sam shrugged, “Yeah, sure.”
Michael tried to transition into more conversation casually. “What do you see as the purpose of this task?”
“We’re searching for the Aurors.”
“Sure, but like, how? Do they have some sort of telltale sign that Aurors are about?”
Sam smirked. “Like a literal sign that says something like, ‘Aurors were here?’”
“That’d be convenient.” Michael agreed. “I’ve noticed that they have a thing with gold.”
“Yeah.” Sam said more than sarcastically.
“Well, I mean Finley had these gold fronts.” Michael stuttered, “Gold, um, mouthpiece thing.”
“There’s that, plus ‘gold’ is ‘aurum’ in Latin.”
“You know Latin?” Michael gawked.
Sam settled into their seat more comfortably. “I know lots of things.”
“Good.” Michael grinned. “I have lots of questions.”
Sam accepted the challenge. They swung their seat away from the screen to face Michael. “What do you want to know?”
The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.
“Do we think they’re here in the asteroid belt mining for gold?”
“That makes sense but not necessarily their primary goal.”
“Well, like you said, it would be convenient if they had a flashing neon sign that said, ‘Aurors HQ’!” Michael smiled amiably.
Sam smiled back. “Yeah, I don’t think we’re going to be that lucky.” Michael took Sam’s moment of solemnity to really look at them. Sam had said previously that they weren’t happy with the gender they were assigned at birth. I am in no way qualified to judge a person based on their preferences or lifestyle, Michael thought, So I’m not sure what to think of Sam. They have seemed to be a bit of a know-it-all, but talking this way, they seem just as lost and frustrated as I am with this task.
Just then Michael thought of a different kind of question. “Is gold all that rare in the universe?”
Sam gave the question little thought. “Gold isn’t even rare on Earth.”
Thinking back, Michael replied, “Yeah, I think I had a gold chain when I was a young kid. Some other kid was wearing one and I asked for one.” Michael shifted in his seat. “I was trying to fit in and be cool.” He looked down with further recognition, “That only lasted a couple of weeks before the clasp broke.”
“Yeah,” Sam nodded. “Gold is a malleable metal.”
“Malleable? Weak?” Michael frowned. “Then why do people like it in the first place?”
“You’ll find wearing a lead chain would become uncomfortable quickly.”
“Touché.” Michael admitted. He rubbed his nose with the back of his hand. “So it’s not rare. It could be everywhere.”
“It is everywhere.” Sam swathed their hand to the screen. “Through this karatmeter you can see that almost everything that glitters is gold.”
“Really? That much?” Michael pondered. “Where could all that come from?”
Sam considered, “It could occur naturally from some of the asteroids. It could come from our ships if we attuned them a certain way.”
“What?” Michael asked incredulously.
“Let’s take a step back.” Sam began. “You know how our ships work, right?”
Michael feigned knowledge that he didn’t have. “Sure.”
“No you don’t.” Sam concluded before using a screen to bring up a schematic of a Shil’vati ship. “A ship, see?”
Michael saw a purple wire-drawing of a brick on the screen. “Yes.”
Sam narrated as the screen showed the refueling process of the Shil’vati ships. “We take hydrogen from gas giants. If we’re in deep space, we can do it directly.” The screen showed a vortex that appeared to siphon like a wide end of the cone from a blue-green simulacrum of a gas planet to the narrow portion at the middle of the purple wire ship.
“We prefer to set up and use waystations that are positioned near gas giants so we can get more concentrated fuel quicker.” Sam explained. “Plus it’s an excuse to get a change in scenery for a while. Get some different food, stay in a new bed, get a break in the tedium of space travel while not actually leaving space.”
“Okay.” Michael accepted. “But how does that get us gold?”
Sam squinted. “Do you know how atoms work?”
“Nucleus. Electrons. Neutrons. Sure?”
Sam rolled their eyes. “When you take light atoms like hydrogen and helium and smoosh them together like we do in an engine, you can take those smaller pieces and make larger pieces.”
“Like Legos.” Michael nodded in faux comprehension.
Sam agreed doubtfully. “If that’s what works for you, yes.” They shook their head. “No, because if you put Legos together into a bigger thing, they’re still Legos.” They took their fingers and piled them together then locked eyes with Michael. “No, very science-y stuff happens in the engines of spaceships, but for our purposes, magic happens.” Sam whirled their hands together in a flourish then presented them again as if they were a magician making a dove appear where once was nothing. Sam blinked at Michael deliberately. Michael nodded obsequiously. Sam continued. “Hydrogen atoms combine to make heavier elements.”
“Fusion?” Michael asked. “You mean fusion?”
Sam started rifling through their pockets and drawers. “Yes! Fusion! Let me see if I’ve got a treat..!”
Michael rolled his eyes. “I get the idea of fusion. Are you telling me that your ships can swallow hydrogen and poop out gold?”
Sam’s pantomiming came to a sudden stop. “Yes.” They said dully. “Our ships can ‘poop gold’ if we wanted them to.”
“So what’s the point?” Michael asked pointedly.
“What do you mean, ‘what’s the point?’?”
Michael stood up abruptly. “If you can just make gold willard nillard, then why bother mining for it in an asteroid belt?”
“That’s above my pay grade.” Sam said dejectedly.
Michael sat down as quickly as he had stood. His chair rolled toward his station. He looked at his screens. He looked over at Sam, who seemed to be happy to be looking at their screens, but seemed also to see the point in Michael’s exasperation. “What is the point?” Sam asked no one in particular.
After several minutes of silence, Sam looked over at Michael. “You asked me if gold was rare in the universe.” They paused for a beat. “No.” Pausing another beat. “And don’t ask about other ‘precious metals’ when several of your planets rain diamonds.” They used their fingers to make air quotes on precious metals.
Sam waited several more minutes before speaking their mind again. “No, what’s rare is organics. People. Plants. Animals. Those are rare.”
Michael thought back to science fiction he’d read in his past. “Have you heard of the Human author Isaac Asimov?”
“The guy who wrote 2001?” Sam clarified.
“Yes.”
“Yeah, 2001 was a boring movie.”
“Agreed, but I read some other books and short stories.” Michael looked to Sam for permission to continue. “So one was about using water as a shell for spaceships and water on Earth had become even rarer because of space travel.” Sam chuckled the chuckle of a species who knew better. “Anyway, some enterprising people went to Saturn and grabbed a gigantic chunk of ice from its rings. They went back and had some ridiculous amount of water that was more than had ever been on Earth or some such business.”
“Hmm.” Sam nodded. “We can make gold as an element, but it would take a lot of fuel to make an appreciable amount of it.” Sam rocked in their chair. “That’s why we don’t tune our ships to, ahem, poop out gold, usually.”
Michael smiled that Sam was coming to accept his turn of phrase. “Inefficient, I’m sure.”
“I’m sure.” Sam smiled in thought. “That ice thing, that’s not a terrible idea.”
“Oh yeah?” Michael asked. “How so?”
“We could do something like that to terraform planets.”
“You know, Humans have wanted to live on Mars for the longest.”
“Is that so?” Sam mused. “I might have to tell my cousin about that.”
“Your cousin?”
“They call her ‘Minnie’. She’s making a name for herself with racing.”
“Oh.” Michael grunted. “The wreck in Daytona was enough for me to have had enough with racing for a lifetime.”
“Wreck?” Sam scoffed. “You mean the terrorist attack?” Sam leaned forward. “You mean the terrorist attack that’s the basis for our search for the Aurors?”
“Yes, I do.” And just like that, Michael and Sam were back on task: looking for any sign of the Aurors.