Previously, Tao and Abe investigated the corrupt Virtual instance personally, finding more strange human faces begging for release. Tao apparently decided to let the matter rest and head to dinner. We open on a normal meal time on this generation ship halfway through the voyage.
The dining hall was boisterous as Jewel entered with her husband Charles and their children, Angel and Peter. Around crowded tables, children told their parents about their school activities, while young adults laughed about their virtual adventures or commiserated with those who had to miss the fun for such glamorous jobs as noting the pressure in the sanitization tanks. Her mother had told her that when her generation were children they’d barely fill the room even if everyone ate at once, but now people ate in shifts, informally deciding by family to come earlier or later in the hour after the food was served. In one corner a young woman, Gina, was playing a tune on a venerable violin1, a look of concentration on her face.
The servers plopped into their bowls a steaming scoop of something called ‘Tex-Mex’, which meant vat-grown meat with a hint of chili powder, mixed beans, and greens. She found it palatable enough, but given the old timers used ‘vatgrown’ as an expletive, it was probably a pale imitation of Earth fare.
They found her grandfather sitting alone at a central table and took seats around him. “Hey there champ,” he said to her son Peter. “Any of these yours?” He gestured at the screens lining the walls, which had been set to exhibit vibrant, though decidedly amateur, artwork. This morning they had displayed a view as from an alpine hilltop. The faux windows had been nicer than the children’s scribbles, if a bit taunting.
“Uh-huh! We drew them on the desks in school today. Grandma Paige said we could display them tonight. Guess which one I did!” said the boy.
“You’re going to have to give me a clue. Is it one of the spaceships, or one of the animals?”
“Spaceships, of course,” Jewel said without looking over.
“Well that narrows it down a little.” He looked around at the series of grey eggs on the walls. “I’m going to guess… that one.” He pointed in the general direction.
“Yup! Mine’s the best because I drew the patch that uncle Alex put on the shields.”2
“Peter…” his father said quietly.
Phil nodded to his son-in-law. “It’s fine, Charles. Better remembered than forgotten.”
A group of six young adults made their way through the isle, sitting at the center table Phil and Jewel were facing. “Junior,” Phil said, addressing one of the young men.
A young man with shaggy sandy hair and stubble glanced their way. “Yeah?”
“Please come by the Section One lounge after dinner.”
“Hmm, sorry Captain, busy tonight.” He turned away.
“Please prioritize this. We’ll be brief.”
“Yeah, don’t wait up.” He shoved a pile of beans into his mouth. “Maybe tomorrow.”
Jewel glanced around. Most nearby were surreptitiously listening. She met Dima’s eye3, who was also watching intently. Junior’s parents weren’t here, although his mother-in-law, Aisha4, was watching. She seemed oddly amused by the insolence.
These looks weren’t lost on Phil. He paused, taking a sip of the algae juice. “We can meet tomorrow. Before breakfast.”
Sun was seated next to Conrad Junior, dragging down the average intelligence of an already unimpressive group of Jewel’s peers. He cocked his head at Phil and said jauntily, “Why not chill out, old man? We’re trying to enjoy the ambience.” He waved a hand around, eliciting giggles from his mates. Jewel rolled her eyes.
“I was addressing Conrad, Sun. Although perhaps you and I should also meet to discuss your performance.” Jewel watched her grandfather fail to prevent the confrontation. Grandma Kiri5 may have once been more adept at diffusing these kinds of situations, but it was his job. For now. Hopefully she’d be able to handle idiots a bit more adroitly than grandfather.
“Sure,” Sun said with mock fascination, “you can tell me some more fairy tales about ‘Earth’ and ‘Tau Ceti’.”
Phil glowered, dinner forgotten. “Does your pampered ass have a problem, boy?”
Sun’s fiancé Avani6 put her hand on his, rolling her eyes and giggling. Sun shrugged. “No problem at all, Captain sir.”
The door open and two young men entered, but their arrival wasn’t as interesting as the test of wills. “I’ll talk tomorrow with each of you — prior to any use of virtual.”
“Captain Peterson?” It was Tao’s voice, from the head of their table. He was standing next to Abe. Jewel caught Abe’s eye and grinned, but he seemed preoccupied and didn’t acknowledge missing the show. Pity.
Phil turned wearily to the speaker. “Hello again, Tao. Not the best time.”
“Apologies, again, but I’m afraid it cannot wait.” He took a deep breath, looking around. His wife had stopped playing and, along with everyone else, was watching the Captain’s table. “Do you know Gabriel is alive?”7 A silence followed, except for the clatter of Aisha’s silverware.
Phil met his gaze. “Yes.” Jewel started, eyes on her grandfather. ‘Gabriel’ was a name from a fable as far as the youth were concerned, a tragedy warning against the consequences of impulsive behavior. There were vids of those days, virtual recreations of a blond boy with an infectious grin who had been slain by her uncle Alex. The degree of culpability shifted depending on the telling, but no one had ever hinted his death was anything less than certain, and his absence had marked one family as an oddity.
Aisha rose from her seat. She was just younger than Jewel’s mother, and Aisha and Paige had been friends, long ago. Though the years had been harsher on the raven-haired woman, she still struck an imperious figure staring over at Tao with piercing eyes. “Explain yourself.”
“This was not the time nor place, Tao,” Phil said, shaking his head.
“I did not want John to interfere. I believe he has been altering our perceptions in the medical lab. Which is why my son claimed he saw a man there prior to his Cyonic implant. In a one-on-one discussion, you probably would not have even heard me. I was hoping he wouldn’t have the ability to filter the words from every ear at once.”
“Captain, what’s he saying?” Nahid, Aisha’s child by Gabriel, rose from the table with Sun and Conrad and went to her mother’s side. Her comforting touch didn’t soften Aisha’s rigid posture.
Phil addressed Aisha. “Your husband’s body has been kept alive on life support in the surgical lab. John has been using his brain as memory.” Jewel’s eyes widened. It made a certain amount of utilitarian sense, but she’d never considered the implants could augment the computer half of the partnership rather than vice versa.
He did not flinch. “Aisha… I will make no apologies for this. John informed me he was running out of digital storage space. Gabriel was comatose and not expected to ever awaken. We had a funeral. It was just another form of recycling.” Phil’s voice was gravelly but steady.
“You have been using my husband’s body? Damn you! Damn that computer!”
Phil reached over and picked up a salt shaker from the tabletop, shoving it in her face. “Guess what? He ain’t the only one we’ve been using. Waste not, want not. How much of my wife do you think is in here?” Jewel felt her stomach turn. By unspoken agreement, the tightness of the circle of life aboard Ship was seldom referenced, especially not here. Dinner went down easier if it didn’t have a name.
“Why was this kept from me?”
“That was my idea,” John finally spoke. “I estimated a swifter emotional recovery time for all involved if there was not constant physical reminder of the tragedy.”
Aisha ignored the voice, continuing to direct her ire at Phillip. “You do not get to off-load responsibility to that! You are human, you should know better!”
“As useful as blame may be,” Tao said, “I wasn’t clear. Gabriel is conscious. Awake, I think.”
John’s voice was strangely distant. “That’s… impossible. I checked—oh. Wait please.”
“Why do you say that, son?” Phillip asked, ignoring John’s confusion, troubling as that was, and addressing Tao.
“Someone made alterations to Abe’s program. Seems like Gabriel was begging for release via proxies in the virtual instance. I realized when the image called me ‘the baby.’ I was the youngest aboard when Gabriel was put into a coma.”
“By your son.” Aisha flung the words at Phil, and for the first time he looked injured.
John’s voice returned. “Tao, thank you for the deduction. We have truly miraculous healing at times, don’t we?8 I had given up on Gabriel’s recovery. Zero recognizable endogenous brain activity for years. Perhaps the high level of Cyonic activity his cooperation allowed is responsible for stimulating his brain into recovery.”
They stood in silence a second, aghast at the absurdly cheerful voice. Then Aisha turned and stalked out, everyone else following.
And regulations say we have to end this installment mid-scene… We’ll pick up in one week in the hall outside the medical lab, wherein a dead man awakens. In the meantime, tell me how you feel about this revelation!
Here’s the family tree of the viewpoint character here, Jewel:
Gina is Tao’s wife, although she’s mostly background here, we’ll meet her grandkids someday! There’s been a fun running theme this chapter of relics of Earth, brought in that sparse personal space first mentioned in Selection, Part 10. You’re welcome to speculate in the comments what you think other characters brought or what you would bring given such a choice.
Alex being, of course, the Captain’s son, who was both the villain and the hero of Impact, and one of only two crew to have gone Outside. Alas, it appears he’s no longer with them. Radiation sucks.
Phil’s wife, the New Zealander Kiri, first introduced in Selection, Part 5, and featuring through Impact, is also no longer with them. Twenty-five years is a long time.
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