079: STABILITY

The old crew don’t move into Habitation Ring 1 that day. I suspect they’re dawdling to keep Tinera company for as long as possible. Also, around midday their Public Universal Friend suddenly takes ill and ends up in the medbay with some kind of full-body muscular complaint. The other doctors insist it probably isn’t serious, but after all the random biological surprises we’ve had so far on this ship it puts me, at least, on edge.

It seems like everyone’s on edge over something. It’s not like there’s a lack of options for things to freak out about. There’s objects of worry to suit every taste on the Courageous. How lucky we are.

Captain Sands in particular has barely stepped away from a computer terminal since receiving Renn’s translation of Captain Kinoshita’s notes. He’s poring over them when I go to bed, and when I get up in the morning, he’s hidden away at the singular computer terminal in Engine Ring 1, a frown marring his face.

Normally, when people use a more isolated terminal like this instead of just going to a Network and Engineering Ring, it’s because they don’t want to be disturbed, but the captain has work to do and this isn’t it. I sidle up to him and have a peek at the screen – yep, it’s the translated notes.

“You know,” I say, “Kinoshita’s journal was interesting, but I don’t think it’s ‘several hours of study to the exclusion of all else’ interesting. The relevant parts don’t take this long to read.”

“The parts that Renn thinks are relevant,” Sands corrects me without taking his eyes off the screen. “He doesn’t have perfect knowledge and a lot of this still isn’t translated. He might have missed something.”

“You think you’re going to find answers in there? You think she took time out in someone’s session to carefully detail the effects of the new genesets over time, or note a miracle way to reverse the brain hijacking? Look, if her real purpose here was to work with the human AI, she must have copious notes on that, right? And they’re not in these journals. She kept her work separate. So it’s not like there’s going to be important details on other stuff we’re facing in there either.”

“I already have people searching the likely locations for her notes on the AI.”

“That’s not my point!” There’s no second chair next to the computer terminal, so I seat myself on a random nearby piece of engine hardware instead. “What are you looking for? Maybe I can help.”

He sighs. “Do you know why Renn wanted me to put off the next crew revival until after this? Why he thinks that this might affect my decisions?”

“Uh, no? I can’t see how it would.”

“Because he thinks it might be worth reviving some of the first crew after all, to see if they knew anything about this. To find out if Richard Rynn-Hatson was the only conspirator on his crew, and if we can find others, maybe they can explain what in the stars they were doing and why. I’m considering it.”

“Why, to raise even more crew drama? Like we don’t have enough right now? Even if the first crew is full of conspirators who’d be willing to tell us anything, why would they know anything useful to this crew? This sounds like something that should wait until we reach Hylara.”

Sands finally pulls his eyes away from the screen to peer at me. “I find it interesting that you of all people are encouraging me not to unearth this mystery.”

“I find it interesting that Captain ‘we have to focus on harmony and practicality and take the long-term view in all things!’ is suggesting such a reckless move. What, when we need an experienced crew you go reviving random colonists instead of the first crew, but now that you think that some of the first crew might be traitors you can’t wait to wake them up? How is any of this looking to the future, or beneficial for the colony?”

“Would you rather the developing colony have to deal with it?”

“Well… yeah? They’ll probably be in a better position to do so? You’ve got one crew member in a makeshift brig, half the crew scared out of their minds about their own DNA, and general tension everywhere. Maybe it’s time to be practical about the mysteries we pursue, and not go stirring up trouble that doesn’t promise any useful, actionable information.”

“And what, sit around watching zombie movies with an untrained skeleton crew while the ship breaks down around us?”

“Say what you want about my time as captain, but my crew never seriously fought. There were no ship-endangering fractures, no one hit each other, we all got to know each other and we all trusted each other. We were stable for a year and we would’ve stayed stable for the entire journey if we’d had a proper engineer. Now, when you woke up, you did fix the ship, and that was great; having a professional engineer’s eye on this place, especially one specifically familiar with Javelin ships, has been a real moonswell, but in terms of being captain? Your crew is an unstable, constantly stressed mess. We’ve made a lot of strides ‘forward’ in terms of gaining knowledge, and all of it has done a lot more harm to the crew, in terms of keeping us stable and able to do our jobs, than good. So, yeah. I do prefer my method.”

“You want my job again, is that it?”

“No! Stop being paranoid. Being captain sucks. I just… look. The other day, you implied that you weren’t sure you could trust our crew, even the ones you picked to revive. And now you’re dwelling over the notes of this traitor and how her people doomed this ship for hours and hours instead of doing actual important work. I’m worried about you.”

“You picked most of the new crew,” Sands points out.

“No, you drafted a list of potential candidates and asked me for my advice. What is with you lately?”

“You’re right, it’s probably nothing.” He stands up. “Honestly, it’s irrelevant at this point. Everyone on Earth who would care about what happens to this ship is already dead. Apologies for the lapse, Aspen. I’ll get back to work.”

He goes to brush past me, but I’ve learned to sense when I’m being handled by now. The two things I know for sure about Captain Sands are that he’s as charismatic as a cat and three times as stubborn. One does not simply change the captain’s mind by whining at him. I grab his arm as he brushes past.

“Hang on,” I say. “Now I’m curious. What’s irrelevant? What were you even looking for?”

“Well, as I said, it’s irrelevant, so – ”

“I have less work than you right now,” I try. “I could keep looking?”

The look that flits across his face is wary.

Oh. He doesn’t trust me any more.

“It’s not that,” he says hastily, and I realise I must have spoken aloud. “I just have to be – ”

“Have to be prepared for every possibility, yeah, I know. And how has that strategy served you so far, on this ship? Can I at least know what I’m being accused of? Because I have absolutely nothing to go on here.”

He shakes my hand off. “Why did the AI wake you?”

“What?”

“The AI. On a broken ship. It lost Keiko Kinoshita, and then it woke one person just over a year later, and that person was you. Why you?”

“Well, I have a decent all-round skill set and one of the highest chances of surviving reviv – wait. Do you think I’m in league with whatever mad science bullshit was happening here?”

“You tell me, Aspen. You made your opinion of the Javelin Program quite clear on the Capricorn Plateau, according to the news, and yet somehow you showed up here. You were the replacement woken, and spent a whole year seeking absolutely no answers on this whole mess. What exactly am I supposed to think?”

“That paranoia is a really bad habit for a captain to get into? I mean, come on. Really?”

“I have work to do,” he snaps, and storms off.

Hoo boy. That’s not going to end well.

I know what I’m supposed to do, in a situation where somebody shows unstable behaviour like this, especially if it’s someone as critical as the captain. I’m supposed to suggest a psychological evaluation. Problem with that plan: our psychologist is Mr ‘Controlling People Via Brain Damage Is Fine Actually’, so, probably not someone that Sands would be happy taking direction from. That’s why the ship has an assistant psychologist, except that assistant psychologist is me, an even worse option. Also, given how Reimann was apparently gaslit by his senior psychologist about the whole mad science project, suggesting a psychological evaluation because Captain Sands is distrustful of his crew immediately after reading that would probably not be well received.

The unofficial logical way to deal with a captain whose command might create problems would be for the rest of the command chain to shoulder more of his responsibilities. Reduce the stress on him and soften the blows of any bad or impulsive decisions. If the crew trusts the second in command and takes direction from them, then that can help mitigate damage… except that the second in command is me, and the last thing I want to do right now is start ‘stealing’ command of this ship from the captain who doesn’t trust me. If he pushed back too vigorously, it either wouldn’t work, or could result in a coup. I cannot emphasise how much I do not fucking want to lead a coup.

The other option would be to hand some responsibility over to the person who was supposed to have my job, but she’s currently confined to quarters as a result of violently breaking a crewmate’s teeth, so. That’s not happening.

So my only real options are to either just let this fester and hope nothing bad comes of it, or snap Captain Sands out of it myself somehow. And I don’t know how to do that.

For the first time, I wish I was a psychologist instead of a sociologist. Maybe then I’d know what to do. Enlist help? No; that might look like talking behind his back.

Nothing for it. My only option is honest, frank, open discussion.

It can hardly make things worse, right?

I give him a couple of hours to calm down, and then go looking for him. I catch him coming out of the medbay in Recreation and Medical Ring 2, probably checking up on our bedridden Public Universal Friend. He shoots me a rueful, embarrassed smile as I walk over.

“Aspen. I wanted to apologise for my earlier behaviour. I’m a bit on edge at the moment and I never intended to accuse – ”

“There was an inciting incident,” I admit.

“… Excuse me?”

“For why I’m here. When you asked, I told you that the Exodus Phenomenon had grabbed me, which is true. I just woke up one morning with an unbearable need to run away to the stars and see what was out there. But it wasn’t… it didn’t come out of nowhere. There was an inciting incident, for my sudden change of heart towards this project.”

“You don’t have to tell me this, you know.”

“I think I probably do, actually.” I glance around to make sure that no one’s within immediate earshot. We’re still pretty close to the medbay, so I lower my voice. “I’m here,” I admit, “because of what happened to – because of what I did to – Acacia Greaves. My sister.”