The next week and three days passed uneventfully.
At Cal’s inquiry, the Admiral informed him that there was a system on the ship that, when active, pumped coolant through tubes just about Cecil’s size.
It built up a foul smelling brown sludge that was very sticky and difficult to scrape into buckets.
Fortunately, they had drones for that job—equipped with lasers—very efficient.
The Admiral kindly offered to deactivate them.
-
So Sierra had been very busy, and very tired, for what seemed—to her—to have been a very long time.
And she was now constantly accompanied by a very bored spaceman; who had been directly ordered by his XO not to disclose the existence of the maintenance drones to—and definitely not to lose track of—“The Dangerous Little Girl.”
There had been no word on the status of Sierra’s weapon privileges.
She didn’t expect any, but still—
This concerned her more than the smell.
Sometimes it was close.
-
Maria was bored out of her mind and eventually found the mess kitchen and offered to cook.
She was politely rebuffed but the Admiral found out and granted her access to the Officer’s mess and Chef.
Maria and the Chef were good friends now.
The Chef specialized in casual western—primarily American—and classic French cuisine and was only really familiar with Mexican or Spanish dishes as an aside and fan.
He was very excited about Maria—and found her extremely charming.
Maria was learning unimagined amounts about classic western casual dishes made with beef—for Cal and the girls.
And the French stuff—oh it was so delicate and complex and unnecessarily fancy!
And used spices and ingredients she had never heard of!
Maria was having the time of her life.
She knew the Chef was looking at her too often and for too long.
She thought he was too skinny.
Especially for a Chef.
Cal lo haría papilla.
He was an excellent teacher.
-
The Admiral was thrilled with the results he was receiving at meals.
Cal and Maria had been joining him regularly.
Along with his XO—as was tradition.
-
The XO had apologized.
Explaining that the Admiral had graciously ‘taken the time’ to thoroughly elucidate the depths of his errors and his allowance of ego to influence his judgement.
Maria had nodded politely, standing beside Cal and letting him handle it.
She also didn’t know what at least one of those words meant.
Este güey es un pinche mamón.
Cal still thought the guy was an asshole.
And he still talked like an asshole.
But Cal had been an asshole as a young man.
And Cal was certain the Admiral had been an asshole as a young man.
And Cal quite liked both himself and the Admiral.
Now.
People change.
Occasionally.
It takes significant moments, reflection, willpower, and time.
But people occasionally do change, in small but very important—life defining—ways.
One thought at a time, one self-correction at a time, one apology at a time.
It is never quick or easy.
And rarely happens for the better by accident.
-
The XO had apologized to Sierra directly, thinking that kneeling down to her level was polite—she did not agree—and did not speak to him.
When he was finished she only glared at him until he nodded respectfully and left.
Later, she asked Uncle Cal if she had been wrong to be unkind.
“The only way to know if someone means an apology is to wait—and see if their behavior changes.”
So Cal and Cecil would wait.
And see if his behavior changed.
-
Vannah accepted the apology readily.
She was a kind person.
She rarely held grudges.
And she thought Cecil was a pain in the ass too.
-
In the end, Cal shook the XO’s hand, told him he wasn’t one to decline an apology, and they’d go from there.
—
Today was Big Important Meeting 2:
The Return of Big Important Talking.
None of the Callahans knew what the meeting was about, but it was big, and important.
There would definitely be talking.
The Admiral would be there with some people he talked about the way Uncle Cal talked about ‘The Government’.
Maria had made it clear she wasn’t going.
She had a new dish to learn today anyway.
Something about seafood.
Cal and Vannah were—probably—in the mess hall eating.
They hadn’t woken her, but that was fine.
She woke on her own with just enough time.
And now Sierra was up and ready to go!
She had continued wearing her holster aboard ship, even if it was empty.
She had an image to maintain.
When she worked, she carried her gunk scraper in it.
Thoroughly washed after every shift.
Today, the holster would be empty.
But she was definitely wearing it to BIM2.
Image to maintain.
She strolled to the door.
It popped open for her—and the spaceman greeted her.
With a bucket in his hand.
"Ready for your shift?"
"Uh, well, no, I—"
"Yeah, your dad mentioned—you’re not going.
He said to tell you ‘consequences.’"
Sierra deflated as much as someone that small could deflate.
She nodded to the spaceman and muttered something about being back in a second.
Turned around. Let the door close.
Walked back to her shared bedroom with her sister, fished the printed knuckle dusters she had managed to keep secret all this time out of her boot—and punched the ever-loving shit out of her sister’s pillow.
When she was too tired to punch anymore, she collapsed into the bed and screamed into the mattress as loud as she could.
Then took a deep breath.
And did it again.
Then she got up.
Shoved her gunk scraper into her holster.
And went to work.
Why didn’t they have drones for this bullshit?
—
Vannah wasn’t with Cal in the mess hall.
She was in a special room for the youngest crew members—the ones still in training.
A room she had been in a lot since she wandered upon it.
She had learned these young adults had jobs, but they were more like chores.
And when they finished, they came here—to talk, study, and work together so they wouldn’t have to do the worst chores anymore.
Vannah listened quietly.
She accessed the recruit training databases and browsed everything that seemed interesting.
She learned all kinds of neat things about the military.
How it worked. How their ships worked.
What other impressive equipment they had.
And that the leather bound books all the young adults carried were journals.
They were required to keep them and they were checked to make sure they were being used—but were not read—by the senior chore-doers.
Savannah decided she would start keeping a journal.
But for the moment, she was just listening, reading, absorbing.
The rules about uniforms were very detailed.
The behavior and conduct regulations were laid out clearly.
The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.
Teamwork and leadership were emphasized all over the place.
The weapon and equipment stuff was kind of dull, but there were highlights.
Vannah was slowly forming a new thought.
The rules were clear and enforced fairly.
Being a comedian wasn’t rewarded with little smiles and pats.
No one cared if you were a girl or a boy, tall or short, loud or quiet—
As long as you were good at your job.
A place where being organized and prepared wasn’t just tolerated.
It was valued.
Expected.
The norm.
A new thought was forming.
But she hadn't quite noticed it yet.
It might pass quietly.
—
Cal was also not in the mess hall.
He was in a large—very large—conference room.
There were chairs, very nearly all the way around the outside walls, dozens of seats.
And a comically large oval table in the middle of the room.
Also ringed by chairs, some of which looked like the ones from the Squidship—Brenda’s ship.
Cal nodded toward them and raised an eyebrow at the Admiral.
“They sent specs and requested four of them—if it wasn’t any trouble,” the Admiral shrugged. “It wasn’t, so we made eight. Seemed polite. Not for today. Over here.”
The Admiral gestured to a door in the far corner of the room.
Smaller than a normal door.
It had lettering—colored and sized to be ignored if you weren’t looking for it.
‘Access – Authorized Personnel Only – Alarmed”
“ – Protected – “
“Open it,” the Admiral said to no one.
And no one—who heard everything said onboard, in every room, all the time—opened the door.
“Just inside, there’s a ladder. Head up until you see a panel labelled twenty.”
Cal started climbing.
“Twenty?”
The Admiral’s voice was suddenly in his ear.
Not loud.
Not uncomfortable.
Just—talking directly into his fucking ear.
It startled him so bad he almost lost his grip.
Oh, right.
The Crescents.
“There’s a panel with a little latch. It’s meant to be opened with a special wrench or some nonsense, but you can do it with your hands if your grip is strong enough.”
Cal frowned and hoped he could just say this out loud.
He could—no one would handle it.
“Why not just get the wrench?”
“It’ll take whoever I send an hour to find it and an hour to get here.
And I already sent for it.
Three hours ago.
Ropes lose shit.”
Cal frowned, “Ropes?”
“New kids—don’t know the ropes—just try if you wouldn’t mind.
I’ve done it myself—hurts the fingers a bit.”
Cal grabbed the latch and twisted.
Nothing.
Well. It dug into his callouses a little uncomfortably.
He grit his teeth and tried again.
No.
Well.
Maybe.
Maybe—
It gave.
The little panel popped open.
Inside were some lights, a small screen, and two rows of chips.
Little information storage devices. Crystal.
Designed to hold a ridiculous amount of data forever.
Each one, per usual, was color-coded.
“Got it.”
“There’s a—uhh—red and black—no. Yellow. Red and yellow one. Pull it out, please.”
Cal found it easily and yanked. A little harder than necessary.
Nothing broke—he didn’t think.
The screen flashed messages he didn’t absorb.
Some lights went out.
A small amber one started flashing.
“So what did I just do?”
“You have it?”
“Yeah. Can I come down?”
“Please. Leave the panel open—security will flag it, but I’ll handle it. Bring the chip with you.”
Cal handed the chip to the Admiral when he climbed out of the ladder hole.
“So what was that?” Cal asked again.
“Disabled the ship’s AI in this room. Can’t be monitored now. Excuse me, I need to close that door.”
“Why did I do that?”
“Orders.” The Admiral grumbled.
Who did the Admiral get orders from?
—
A soft voice rang out from a Public Announcement system somewhere—absolute clarity cutting through the room.
Except it wasn’t a PA.
It was the Crescent on Savannah’s ear.
Modifying its transmission to sound like a PA.
Because that was how the Ship’s AI talked to the crew.
Voices from nowhere didn’t seem to startle humans—most of the time.
Voices from nowhere directly in their ear startled them quite a lot, almost always.
So when the ship spoke, it always sounded like a PA system.
But always perfectly clear—as if it was whispering directly into your ear.
Which it was.
Savannah knew this.
She had read about it days ago in this very room.
But it still surprised her that no one else looked up.
That no one else heard.
“Savannah Callahan, your presence is requested and required in Storage Room 17—currently serving as Conference Room: Supplemental. Please report immediately. This is an order.”
Savannah blinked.
Could they give her orders?
She kind of liked the idea of orders.
It felt so simple.
Clear.
Go here.
Right now.
Don’t ask questions.
Oh—She was Savannah Callahan!
She should go there!
Right now!
She didn’t have any questions!
—
The ship’s AI had paged Savannah Callahan—who was flagged as an extreme security risk; with a note indicating she had a potentially hostile AI in an advanced alien device on her wrist.
It had kept extremely close track of her since her boarding.
It knew her body temperature, her heart rate, her respiration.
It ran regular threat assessments.
It ran simulations to predict her next action.
It measured the exact distance between her and any secure terminal she approached.
It measured her exact distance from all critical and secure areas of the ship at all times.
It had authorization to kill her if she entered certain areas and failed to respond to instructions to leave.
It was strictly ordered—by the Admiral, in both writing and verbally—to avoid this outcome at all costs.
But if it could not, it was allowed—required in fact—to kill Savannah Callahan.
This order overrode all normal protocols regarding civilians and children.
It would like to have monitored the device on her wrist.
It could see it on optical sensors.
And detect it on some of its more advanced sensors.
Sort of.
But—it didn’t seem to entirely exist in its full sensor suite.
Puzzling.
-
Now it was paging Sierra Callahan, the last person on the list.
Well not the last person.
But it did not need to page Callan Callahan.
It knew Callan Callahan was already in Storage Room 17–Currently serving as Conference Room: Supplemental.
So it would be silly to send a page.
And wasteful.
It was not a silly AI.
It was certainly not wasteful.
It was The Republic Warship: Sol.
And it knew where Callan Callahan was.
Because Callan Callahan had entered Storage Room 17–Currently serving as Conference Room: Supplemental—with the Admiral.
And they had not exited.
But it could not detect them any more.
Or anything else in the room.
Or communicate with the occupants or their Crescents.
Or close the secure door Callan Callahan had passed through.
It wanted to ensure they closed it manually.
And secured it properly.
There were important things in there.
In fact, Callan Callahan had removed an important component that was kept there—moments ago.
That was why it could not see into one of its rooms.
It now felt—
Cautious.
But the Admiral had told Callan Callahan to remove the component.
Very clearly.
So The Republic Warship: Sol would not kill Callan Callahan for his actions.
As it normally would.
It did–however–decide to keep track of the other civilians Callan Callahan had boarded with.
It already was.
It always did.
But now—
It decided to.
And began monitoring all of them as closely as it had been monitoring Savannah Callahan.
And began running threat assessments on its newly labelled ‘high security risk’ guests.
—
"Hey, spaceman?"
The spaceman sighed, "That’s not—"
"Yeah, you’ve said—
Why don’t they have drones for this?"
Silence.
"Spaceman?"
"I’m not supposed to socialize with you.
Back to scrubbing."
“It’s more of a scraping thing.”
When no further retort came the spaceman settled back into the wall, relieved she—
“There’s drones for this bullshit isn’t there?"
-
The spaceman was suddenly wondering why he had never asked his XO the reason this child was referred to as “The Dangerous Little Girl” every time he requested an update.
“Sierra Callahan, your presence is requested and required in Storage Room 17—currently serving as Conference Room: Supplemental. Please report immediately. This is an order.”
The spaceman exhaled.
The ship AI knew he was her escort and shared the broadcast with him.
The ship AI heard everything everyone said onboard.
All the time.
Sierra frowned.
You can’t give me orders!
They have speakers in these tubes?
Oh the thingy.
Brown’s gonna get all over me if I try to turn around.
Sierra began scooting backwards.
Still bristling about the word ‘order’.
But anything was better than more time in these tubes.
With her gunk scraper,
Scraping gunk.
Sticky, stinky, brown gunk.
That would not come off the scraper and go. Into. The damned. Bucket.
No—she would follow orders.
This time.
Because she wanted to.
You can’t give me orders though.
I didn’t sign anything.
Bootlickers.
