Breach
fiction by michael werneburg
Lieutenant Ilyana Marl stared at her console in dismay. There were an astonishing number of warnings here, more than she'd ever seen when inspecting one of the Corporation's toxic waste repository planets. Aliens had gotten into their repository. "10:23; I'm engaging the subtime engine," she announced. "Going down to 97% of the speed of nominal time."
She dragged a slider and let her console read her thumbprint. A faint shimmer passed through the ship as the subtime field was established. Any outside observer would have seen nothing but now might be astonished to see them suddenly move a great distance away in a heartbeat, or disappear altogether. On the other hand, if they moved to supertime, an outside observer might see them moving only very slowly. Trying to work out what was happening when parties were moving through time at different speeds sometimes took concentration. She chose subtime to give them more time to react and gain an advantage over any hostiles.
She glanced at it as the Ensign in the chair a meter to her right and saw him observing his screen with a similar look of concern. She gave him a warm smile, and said, "Let's not panic just yet."
With a wave at a folder in her heads-up display, she opened a report template and a pre-intervention checklist and sent both of those from her console to the main display with a gesture. She realized she was going to have to submit a report that would bring a lot of attention from Command and eventually all of Corporate. Everything she did now would matter, from following protocol to maintaining a positive and constructive atmosphere among the staff. Moreover, everything she did today would be scrutinized afterward, potentially leading to unforeseen ramifications. All of this with her Captain on leave and the unsuitable Prince aboard as a 'guest Captain'.
She closed her eyes, took a breath, and called out to the ship's AI. "Mother, please start populating the report as the figures come in," she asked.
The ship's neutral voice said, "Of course, Lieutenant." The two humans watched the report's various columns and boxes start to fill, and some written English begin to take shape.
"Concise language, please," she asked it. "And lean toward formal rather than informal, but not too stuffy, please. Approximate my written style where you can."
"My pleasure, Lieutenant."
Now; keeping the staff engaged and positive. She turned to the Ensign and told him, "We're going to have to get the entire checklist done. With this much red on the dashboard we're almost certainly doing an intervention. Our initial report alone is going to attract attention, let alone what happens if we intervene. These things must be taken seriously, but Ensign I want to be clear, we shall not panic, and we shall not suffer as a result of this. This will be challenging, but let's uphold our dignity."
"Understood." He nodded once, then to her surprise quoted the Tenets: «Let even hardships teach us.»
Her hand going to her heart, she said, «Why, Terrence, that's perfect!»
She admired him for a moment. They were from the same sect, and she had agreed to have him on her shift to ease his transition to the space-faring way of life far from their cherished community and traditions. He had a youthful, slender build and a stiff, conscientious demeanor. His surname, Hiram, was of note because in their sect it was occasionally given to orphans. As he worked, the Ensign was sitting very straight and stroking the edge of his console absently as if stimulating himself to calm himself.
When he didn't add anything else, she stood, did some simple stretches, took a deep breath and looked around the deck, taking stock. The cramped deck of the Virga had three chairs, including the Captain's chair behind them. Each had a console before it, and the curved hull before them was at once transparent and a display. The scuffed white deck and worn rear bulkhead with three doors showed signs of years of use. Willing herself to calm, she drew a breath through her nose but paused briefly halfway only to then completely draw the breath. She then exhaled through pursed lips.
She reached for the touch screen on her wristwatch and executed the command she'd prepared. The two other crew members that completed the ship's complement would be woken by the lights in their cabins gradually coming on, and a soothing set of natural sounds like water running and bird calls.
That done, she resumed her review of the bridge. Most of the light on the bridge came through the transparent hull before and above them. Dominating the view was a large planet, equally covered in land and water. Its alien beauty contrasted with Marl's growing misgivings about what might be happening down there. They were now parked in the planet's shadow, but the atmosphere was refracting plenty of light from the system's twin suns. The tall young Ensign had wiped a cloth on the transparent hull to deal with the moisture, that the air system couldn't quite eradicate. His effort had worked but had left some faint smears that made it clear where the hull was. He'd surprised her with that despite her previous warnings. She forced herself to ignore it and focus on the matter at hand, reminding herself that small distractions could lead to larger, very real, failures.