[From the author: Your comments have been so supportive, thank you so much! I'm blown away by the response. If you're starting the story here, I highly recommend going back to chapter one! It's going to be a long journey, you don't want to miss anything. Enjoy!]
As he sprinted toward his ship, all Jackson could think about was the fact that the Sela had no reason to create cars, or bikes, or even a skateboard. Anything to get him back faster. If only he could cram himself into one of those chutes, but it would definitely break every bone in his body.
After he'd confirmed Ace's request to override the locks, she had allowed Vera onto his ship with the wounded former Councilor Tinoqa. The last status update said Tinoqa had been poisoned, and her condition was proving difficult to stabilize. Ace had access to the Stellar Alliance's up to date medical database, but even that impressive collection lacked intimate knowledge of Sela biology, and it was another matter entirely what kind of toxins they might be susceptible to.
The buildings and people around him blurred as Jackson kept up his frantic pace, very thankful that cardio had been a strict requirement back at the academy. A few Sela asked if he was okay, or if needed help, and some yelled at him to slow down. He ignored it all. His tablet offered directions at each turn, so all he had to do was run. The trip from Yucce's home back to the starport lasted just over 5 minutes, but it felt like so much longer. When he finally saw his ship it just spurred him on, and he full out sprinted the last hundred feet.
"New personal record for distance of 1 mile," Jackson's tablet chirped, playing a short musical fanfare.
He must have managed to toggle the health and fitness mode when he was fumbling with it during his mad dash. Panting, his chest burning, he slammed his hand on the security pad to open the landing ramp. The long delay before the hatch opened gave him plenty of time to reflect on how much he hated everything about this ship. Well, everything but Ace.
Jackson's ship didn't have a name. It had the designation AAC-4302, short for AI-Assisted Class, and that had always been good enough. Most of the time there weren't any other Stellar Alliance vessels in the area, so his was always 'that Stellar Alliance ship.' It cut a squat, unaesthetic profile. Almost as wide as it was long, it would not be inaccurate to describe it as a donut stuffed inside a too-small box. The wide circular rim of the main compartment jutted out beyond the boxy frame of the ship on the left, right ,and front, with the back of the vessel flat with the landing ramp folded up against it. The upper deck of the ship had a sloped top, connecting smoothly with the edges of the square chassis. At the front of the vessel the cockpit protruded out, gangly and too thin in contrast to the bulk of the rest of the ship.
And of course, the paintjob. The ship bore the Stellar Alliance official colors: white, green, and blue, in all the wrong proportions and areas. Jackson wished the ramp would open faster. He knew it was related to filtering potential contaminants, but the hatch had already been opened twice on this planet, surely this step could be skipped?
A few seconds later, motors whirred and the ramp moved downward. It hadn't even reached the ground before Jackson scrambled up it.
"Jackson?" Vera's voice called out from inside the ship.
"I'm here!" Jackson yelled back, running toward the medbay.
The vessel's main compartment functioned as a makeshift meeting room that could seat 12 humanoids, in situations where Jackson needed to host negotiations on the most neutral ground possible. A ladder led through a small hatch to the upper deck. This level also had quarters for four guests, a small mess hall, some storage, and directly across from the landing ramp, a medbay. It had been positioned for ease of access so wounded personnel could be taken directly there upon entering the ship, one of the few smart decisions made in planning this bucket. It was all off-white and bright lights, with the pads on the chairs and a few lines in the walls an unappealing brown. Stellar Alliance reports indicated that brown was the least offensive color across all encountered species.
Jackson ran by the conference table, crossing the room in seconds to pass through the doorway labeled with a big, red cross. "I'm here," Jackson repeated, still panting.
The medbay had one intensive care bed, it wasn't designed to take care of more than one person at a time, and the bed currently held an amorphous teal blob that could only be Tinoqa. Jackson could tell immediately something was wrong. Tiny crystalline shapes were embedded in Tinoqa, each as unique as a snowflake but about the size of his palm in diameter. Dozens of them floated in her body, and micro-tears in Tinoqa's outer layer were leaking some kind of vital fluid.
Vera stood next to the care bed, her entire body a deep blue. One of her hands was partially immersed in Tinoqa's body and Jackson could see a subtle flow of material from Vera into Tinoqa.
"Welcome aboard, Captain," Ace said. Her voice came over the main medbay speaker, but with its volume reduced. "Tinoqa is in critical condition. She has been poisoned by what I believe is most analogous to a proteolytic hemotoxin. It is disrupting her ability to maintain viscosity, and causing portions of her body to condense into crystalline structures which are shredding her interior. The infection is making her... a fitting term might be dissociative weeping. She is losing fluid, and her body doesn't recognize the lost mass as part of itself, so it refuses to re-absorb it. Ambassador Vera is performing the equivalent of a blood transfusion, which is helping immensely, but is merely a stopgap."
Tinoqa spoke. "Don't kill yourself to save an old woman." The struggle had weakened her voice, but Jackson suspected she would sound quiet even in perfect health. World-weariness ran in every word. "If it's my time, so be it."
Vera looked at Jackson. She said nothing, but her eyes begged him to help. To do something. Anything.
"Ace," Jackson said, walking over to the care bed, "can we put Tinoqa in stasis?"
"Unknown. The stasis field is calibrated for humans and only has modification templates available for other monoform species."
"Well, make it known, Ace. Do some research." Jackson turned to Vera. "Is there anyone we can call? A Sela doctor or something?"
Tinoqa answered before Vera could say anything. "No doctors. This is an assassination, Jackson, though attempted or successful remains to be determined. Putting me in a hospital would constrain you to either stay and watch me, or leave and consign me to death anyway."
Jackson felt his irritation rising. "With all due respect, Tinoqa, then what the hell should we do? Ace won't stop trying to save your life, but everything I learn makes the Sela look more and more like an authoritarian dictatorship, and if there's sensitive information you need to share..." he let the sentence end there.
"Your respect is noted but unneeded," Tinoqa said, her formless blob shuddering as another crystal formed. She let out a short cry of pain.
"Do you want to use a gem?" Vera asked. "Would it help?"
"No, no, I need nothing. Jackson, I understand your frustration. I have felt it for much of the last decade. But the truth is so much worse. You must get me to the Rhorak before I die."
Vera started crying, her blue hue deepening into the darkness of the ocean depths.
"Okay, I can do that," Jackson said. "Hey Ace," he turned toward the speaker in the room out of habit, "did you get Yucce's data?"
"Confirmed, Captain."
"Plot a course for wherever you think is the best place for first contact with the Rhorak. I trust your judgment." The ship started humming as its engines spun up. Jackson turned back to Vera and said, more quietly. "Take care of Tinoqa, okay? I need to get up to the cockpit. Ace can handle most of the flying but I'm worried about unexpected complications."
"Okay," Vera said. "Can I uh... ask Ace for food or something? I'm losing a lot of mass keeping Tinoqa stable."
Jackson nodded, wincing a little when he realized he hadn't asked if she needed anything. "Ace? One more thing. Give Vera co-pilot status."
"Co-pilot Vera confirmed, nickname pending."
"Nickname?" Vera asked.
"It's a personality thing," Jackson said, shaking his head. "I'll explain later. There's a food synthesizer in the mess hall," he pointed toward the doorway out of the medbay, "you can ask Ace to make you stuff besides food too, we have a small mass fabricator in the storage room."
"I'm also an engaging conversation partner, and can communicate with multiple individuals simultaneously," Ace said.
"Yes," Jackson said, louder for Ace's benefit. "You're very charming, Ace." To Vera, he said, "She's fully integrated with the ship, so anything you need just ask."
Vera nodded. "Thanks, Jackson. Let me know if I can help with anything."
"You can help by keeping Tinoqa alive," he said. He wanted to hug her, to tell her he missed her, but the mission had to come first. Even in her weakened state, in the middle of a crisis, she captivated him. The soft roundness of her cheeks, the gentle kindness in her eyes. He realized he was staring at her. "I'll come back once we're en route, okay?" he said.
"Okay," Vera said, her voice quiet. "This is all falling apart," she muttered.
"This is pretty typical diplomat stuff, actually." Jackson started toward the exit, calling back over his shoulder, "I've gotten through worse!"
He hadn't been through worse, but she needed him to be strong right now. Leadership, Jackson remembered one of his academy teachers emphasizing. That professor had a habit of thrusting his hand into the air when he spoke, one finger extended, as though making a point to the stars themselves.
As Jackson left the medbay he heard Vera trying to describe a Sela food cube to Ace to synthesize. Jackson walked over to the ladder and hauled himself into the upper deck. He was tired and sore. It had been an incredibly long day, and all he wanted to do was nap.
The upper deck extended, long and narrow, away from the access hatch. At the far end stood the captain's chair, with its twin armrests, cushy back, and a pair of touchscreen display panels. A keypad flipped out from the side and could be folded over his lap while he sat, allowing Jackson to control just about everything on the ship from here. Additionally, a throttle and stick control setup leaned away from the front of the chair, ready to be pulled in close for manual flying.
The main viewscreen wrapped around the end of the deck, spanning close to a 180 degree arc, and currently showing the starport outside. It wasn't actually a window, those were far too fragile, rather a display screen connected to a variety of exterior sensors.
Two doors led out of the upper deck, the door on Jackson's right went into his quarters, and the door on his left led to the escape pod. Everything he needed was up here, except for the medbay, and the official advice was just to avoid suffering serious injury while on the upper deck. There were a lot of things Jackson hated about this ship, and that didn't even make the top half.
"Hey Ace? How long from now 'til touchdown at the meeting site?" Jackson dropped himself into the captain's chair. He eyed the manual controls tentatively. He'd been re-certified as a pilot a little over a year ago, but AIs did all non-emergency flying so he hadn't put his hands on a ship's controls since then. He hoped it wouldn't come to that, Ace should be able to take care of whatever came up.
"Seventy-five minutes," Ace said. "We could save time by either disregarding Sela air traffic policy, or by exceeding airspeed regulations."
