CH12

“You think it’s safe?” Draco asked me, while looking at his bowl full of some green gruel.

In reality, it was not that bad. Salty and stodgy but I ate worse. It had no scent and looked utterly disgusting but according to our alien expert anthropologist it was the only thing on this ship that we could eat without worrying about poisoning. Well, that or…

“It’s either this or we need to set up a grill,” I said and noted that shivers ran through my brother’s body.

Ilmine informed us earlier that if we could not satisfy ourselves with the gruel, then those Sa’der we had killed would be a really nice source of proteins. She was only joking, of course. She did not smile and her voice was completely serious, but she was only joking. I was sure of that. Certainly, that was the case.

Anyway, Blaze was still a little bit disappointed when I told her that we would have to do without barbecue.

“After you’re done, I need you to go and look around the freighter. Blaze will go with you. Scavenge everything that may look useful. Clothes, weapons, maybe you will even find some ammo. There should also be at least half a dozen packs of dry emergency rations, but I doubt those will be any better than our tasty green barf.” Some things were simply unchangeable, regardless of time, and the quality of military food supplies was one of them.

“Will take care of that,” Draco waved his hand. “But there is something else I wanted to ask you. Don’t you think you got somehow carried away when you promised that red-eyed Na’vi that we’ll give up the ship? Hell, I still can’t believe in what is going on here but… Brother, this spaceship is probably the most advanced piece of technology any human being has ever seen. If— Or rather when we get back to Earth… Don’t you think we could use it? Don’t you think the Brotherhood could use it?”

Yeah, I thought about it too. Did I make a mistake? Not that I had much to choose from.

“Of course we could use it. But are you sure we would be able to secure it?” I asked, already knowing the answer. “Think about it. We barely survived one war and it left us bruised and battered, and that was only the UG trying to get rid of some criminals. They underestimated us and they paid the price for that, but we both know that they won’t make such basic mistakes again. They learned we fight and the only reason we’re still alive is that killing us all would be too costly. But an alien spaceship?! God dammit, that would give them more than just a pretext! Every major power on Earth would want to have it only for themselves. You think they would ask us politely to give it back or would they rather use the situation to get rid of us once and for good? And that’s the best case scenario, mind you.”

Draco sat in silence. My words seemed to convince him but I could still spot a bit of defiance on his face.

“Hmm, and what’s the worst?”

“Another full-scale world war,” I said and this time I was not joking at all. “And there would be no neutral parties this time. And no mercy for… collateral damage.”

That was it. If there was one thing any human being – regardless of race, religion or nationality – wanted to avoided at all costs, it was another global war. It was not about killing, material damage or possible chaos, at least not only about that. No, the reason was much more simple. We all knew the truth. That the next world war will be humanity’s last.

“Maybe you’re right. I suppose we could still get something out of that deal, but…” Draco shrugged.

“Oh, but we will get something more,” I stood up and smiled. It was time to visit again our precious alien friend. “I promised Ilmine that she will keep the boat, remember? I said nothing about what is on board and I’m sure there are some interesting toys here. We just have to look around… And when the UG comes for our throats again we will greet them properly.”

“You’re alone? I thought you all wanted to make sure I won’t trick you,” Ilmine greeted me.

She was standing almost in the same place as when we had met her for the first time. This time the two of us were the only people here. Well, one person and one petite alien.

I have to do something with all that name-calling or I’ll go crazy, I thought.

“Don’t worry. Blaze wanted to explore the ship and Draco is still working on his gruel. He’s making progress, but there will be only the two of us for now. Is everything ready?”

“Yes,” she finally looked at me over the control panel. “Do you have any other questions before we begin? If not, I will start the reset immediately.”

I sighed. What else could we do? When we talked yesterday I found out how limited we were in reality. From what Ilmine said, the reboot of the whole system was our only available option; but that did not mean we were completely screwed. Not yet. Our friend here told us a lot about the former Capitan of this ship – even though she called him a Codemaster – and his personality. Apparently, that Teo guy was not the bravest representative of his people. When he realized just how badly his plan had failed he decided to run. And where does a dog run to when he is scared? To his master, of course. And if we were lucky, to someone who could provide us with those damn coordinates, so we could get back to Earth.

Oh, I knew it would not be as easy as I hoped. Somebody there may want to… disagree with our priorities. They did, after all, hired those lizard mercs for some reason and we were more than just a liability for their plans, whatever those were. I could bet my life on that. Either way, I was grateful that Draco and Blaze were with me. Persuasion was our speciality.

“Actually, I do. How is that you understand our language? Teo didn’t seem like he was fond of talking,” I asked the first thing that came to my mind. Maybe I should have asked her that at the very beginning? God, am I getting old? And I am not even twenty five!

“Well, that’s only natural. I studied your species for three months. I simply learned your languages,” she said dismissively. “It also helped in my research.”

“Wait. Wait, wait, wait. You’ve learned how to speak Union English perfectly in three months!?” I could not believe that.

“Of course not. I learned all major languages Earthens speak. Mandarin, Russian, Australian English…” I heard pride in her voice. ”And it took me a month to master them all. But I didn’t bother with alphabets. Too primitive and crude, even for me.”

I stood there for a while, unable to say a word.

Wow. Just wow.

“However, I didn’t do it all by myself,” she continued. “This is due in large part to my translation module. Look.”

Ilmine took something out of her ear. It looked like a deaf aid, an old model. Even then it was pretty small. I did not even noticed it this whole time.

“Theoretically, this device was designed to help with communication between members of different species or cultures. The principle is really basic: it converts the language of the speaker into a wireless signal while the device of the listener deciphers and converts said signal again into recognizable speech sounds and phonemes, ” Ilmine explained. “I only… upgraded it a little, so it would help me learn faster.”

Well, that was reassuring. The only thing worse than being abducted by aliens was being abducted by genius aliens. That, and aliens with laser guns. Those would probably also be a fucking nightmare.

Never mind, tech upgrades or not, I was still impressed.

“Let’s get this done. Do you need me to help somehow?” At that point I would not be surprised if she told me to perform Cherokee’s Ghost Dance. Absurdity of the whole situation did not wear off yet.

“No, I told you, everything’s ready. The procedure itself is quite simple. I’m starting now,” Ilmine ran her fingers over the faintly glowing console.

…

Nothing happened.

“I never tried anything like that… It may take a while for the system to—”

Then it hit. The whole place exploded with light, as if we were inside a Christmas tree. I quickly cowered my eyes, unable to watch the show. It all lasted only few seconds but the sheer intensity left me crawling on the floor.

The world was dancing and my head hurt. Vaguely, I heard a voice speaking to us.

“..easure. How may I serve you, my dear crew?”