Alternity Chapter 9 - House Guests

Alternity - Chapter 9

House Guests

"What's the status of our guests, Andromeda?" The question was addressed to the image of Andromeda displayed on the command deck's main viewscreen.

It had been two days since the shattered hulk of the Eureka Maru had been guided into one of the Andromeda's hanger bays and the badly injured man and shell-shocked woman taken to the larger ship's medical deck. The rescue had been a near thing. By the time Andromeda had located the Eureka Maru the freighter's emergency power supplies had been exhausted and the temperature in the freighter had dropped to well below the freezing point. The girl, who stated that she was the wife of the injured man, had spent the entire time since their arrival in Andromeda's sickbay, alternating her time between treating her husband and caring for her infant. So far all of Dylan's attempts to communicate with her had been met with monosyllabic responses.

"The man's burns are healing nicely the artificial skin grafts took quite well, if I do say so myself." There was a tone of satisfaction in her voice as she spoke . "The injury to his leg is almost completely healed, and I should have the MVLS virus cleared from his system by tomorrow. It will be about a week before he will be able to resume normal activities, and there will be some scarring on his chest and arms, but I feel confident that he will make a complete recovery. The woman has come out of her psychic shock and is responding to conversation. Interestingly my examinations revealed that the man suffered from severe malnutrition as a child. The woman shows signs of being malnourished as a child as well, though not as severely as the man."

"Disease, malnutrition, piracy, children having children; so much for the better world the future was supposed to bring," muttered Dylan. " What can you tell me about the girl and the child?"

The girl and her infant appear healthy enough, though the girl is of species unknown to me, and I have no baseline to compare her vitals against. The child's vitals fall more or less within human range, which is not too surprising if the man is her father. However, I must state that our guests are a disreputable bunch."

"I take it you were able to tap into the Halcyon police computer network."

The image gave a sniff of disapproval. "You would think that after 300 years someone would have thought to change the High Guard access codes."

"And?"

This time the sniff was followed by a sneer. "I had the Maria bots hide the good silverware. The only one of them who doesn’t have an extensive criminal record is the infant. Smuggling, fraud, grand theft spacecraft, interstellar flight to avoid prosecution, grand theft, petty theft, and public lewdness."

"Public lewdness?"

"Public lewdness. Additionally the man is suspected of having connections with organized crime. He is believed to be someone known as 'The Professor.' I recommend that we drop them off on the next drift or inhabitable world we encounter."

The air next to the man shimmered and a holographic image appeared beside the captain. The image was identical in appearance to the woman in the viewscreen, but there were subtle differences in her posture and facial expressions. While the woman in the viewscreen gave the impression of rigid imperiousness, the hologram gave the impression of thoughtfulness.

"I disagree with your recommendation concerning our visitors", she said. "I had a long talk with the girl, and think we should consider letting them stay on board as crew."

The image in the viewscreen glared at the newcomer, who returned the glare. Captain Hunt hastily moved to one side. His father had taught him not to get caught in the middle of an argument between sisters. Experience had taught him that when the sisters were parts of the same artificial intelligence to stay even further away.

"We've already discussed this, and I think they should be removed from the ship at the earliest possible moment." stated the image in the viewscreen, still glaring daggers at her holographic counterpart.

Captain Hunt decided it was time to rejoin the conversation. "Why do you think they should be allowed to stay Andromeda?" He addressed his question to the hologram

"I can give you three reasons." She flickered out of visibility for an instant, reappearing between the captain and her alter ego in the viewscreen, pointedly turning her back to her counterpart. A look of annoyance crossed the face of the image in the viewscreen. "One, they are natives of this time and place, we are not, their knowledge could be invaluable. Two, they have skills we lack. The woman is a far better pilot than you will ever be, Captain." She gave her commanding officer an apologetic look as she said this. "The girl has impressive skill as a medic, and the man has an active data port installed in his neck. Data ports are not implanted for show, only a master computer technician or engineer would have one."

The holographic image paused, a look of sadness passed over her face for a brief instant. "And three, disreputable crew members are nothing new to us. More than a few of our old crew, especially the Lancers, were on board because they had been given the choice of enlisting or serving time in a correctional facility."

"Assuming that we do allow them to stay aboard as crew," said Dylan, "what makes you think they would be receptive to the idea of rebuilding the Commonwealth?"

"I doubt that they will be," admitted the hologram

"Then why should we let them stay on as crew?" demanded the image in the viewscreen.

"Because of the child."

"Surely you're not suggesting that we take the child hostage," asked Captain Hunt.

"Of course not!" exclaimed the holograph, there was outrage in her voice. "I'm surprised that you would even consider such an option, Captain. But think for a minute. The Commonwealth we knew is just ancient history to these people. To them life is a struggle to simply stay alive. Pirates shot their craft to pieces; their source of earning a living has been destroyed. The man had MVLS and was forced to use viral inhibitors as a treatment because the cure is now prohibitively expensive. And have you seen his back, the scars on it? Both the man and the woman have been shot in the past, several times actually. Yet despite their questionable background, they are a family struggling to stay together and raise their child. They may not share your goals, but they will follow you," she stressed both the your goals and the you, "if you give them reason to. Like a chance for their children to grow and have a better life than they do."

"Loyalty to their leader rather than loyalty to a cause. You make me sound like a warlord from ancient Earth."

"It worked then, Captain. It will work now."

"That was quite a speech. Ok, I'll talk to them again. By the way, how did you get them to open up to you? They haven't been very communicative with me."

"I made a fuss over the baby," she replied with a tone of voice that told Dylan that the answer should have been obvious.

"Since when do we like babies?" asked the image in the viewscreen.

"Since when have we disliked them?"

The captain set out to talk to his house guests, leaving his ship to argue with herself.

Chapter 8

Chapter 10