~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“You know I could have guessed it, but you guys are way better at this than me,” Thomas said, running a hand through his curly brown hair.
“That is only natural, as our programming and design allow for rapid reflex and dexterous manipulation of our extremities,” Sixer said.
Thomas had invited the Padrino back to his quarters for an impromptu fighting game tournament. Sixer and Mace both attended, as well as one of the Galley named Odis, another of the engineers, and of course Roomba was there, though he was having difficulty handling the controller since it was about as big as he was.
Odis and Roomba had already been knocked out, the Galley by elimination and Roomba by… technical knockout, so it was just Thomas and Sixer left. Mace had winner.
“I refuse to lose, especially not while I’m wearing my lucky shirt,” Thomas said. Odis snorted, but the Padrino spun their heads to face him.
“Human Thomas, please explain how the apparel you are wearing will enhance your performance in this competition,” Mace asked, his synthetic voice as unchanging as always.
“Does the apparel provide some sort of stimulant to your body that will change the outcome of this match?” Sixer accused.
“No, nothing like that, it’s just lucky,” Thomas said.
“Please explain,” Mace pressed.
“Gimme a sec, round three is starting, I got this,” Thomas assured himself.
The game was human designed, an indie title called Galactic Brawl! It was your typical fighting game, but it was making the rounds on Earth due to it using characters similar to GAIL member species locked in mortal combat. The humans had assured the intergalactic market that it wasn’t in anyway meant to be detrimental to universal relationships, but to expose humans to other species in a fun and interesting way that younger humans would enjoy. Plus it made the other species look ‘very cool’, which the GAIL members were assured was a good thing.
The players were 1 win a piece, so this would be the tie breaker. Naturally the players had chosen their own race for the game, something Odis and Thomas thought was quite funny, although the characters were caricatures of the real thing. Very buffed up, with bigger action hero muscles and such.
Buttons were mashed, triggers were pulled, combos were pulled off, and Sixer had him on the ropes. But then Thomas got the BRAWL POWER meter all the way up and executed his ultimate move flawlessly, and came out with the win.
“Yes! I told you, lucky shirt!” Thomas cheered, Odis laughed so hard he fell over, and the Padrino sat there looking as dumbfounded as they could without actual faces.
“Please explain,” they said in unison.
“The shirt?” Thomas pulled the hem of the shirt down so they all could see its glory, a ratty old gray Tee with the sleeves cut off. It had smudged names all over both the front and back. “I got it at this punk concert right before I went into the academy, got all the band members to sign it for me after the show! Good show, too, they came into the crowd while they were still playing, and…”
“Easy, humy, just tell us why the shirt is lucky,” Odis said, tossing back some chips.
“Right, yeah. So I wore this shirt for every test, quiz, and exam I ever got during my training, aced all of them with flying colors. Scored me both a guy’s and a girl’s number on the same day, that was cool, and I was wearing it when I applied for my post on the Noah,” Thomas explained. “Bad things do not happen when I’m wearing the lucky shirt.”
“Yeah, they’re not gonna get that,” Odis said smirking.
“Human Thomas, explain this luck phenomenon,” Sixer requested.
“See?” Odis said. “The humans have this thing, they call it ‘being superstitious’, it’s something the humies believe controls the universe.”
“Explain,” requested Mace.
“Okay, so there’s, like, good luck, where good things will happen if you have it, or bad luck, where bad things happen,” Thomas said, trying to explain. “Think of it this way. It’s like little random acts turn out in your favor if you have good luck, like finding money on the ground or it’s pizza day in the cafeteria.”
“And bad luck breaks your mom’s back or something, right?” asked Odis, laughing.
“Yeah, if you step on a crack in the road or something,” Thomas said. “Or breaking a mirror gets your seven years bad luck.”
“You humies believe the most ridiculous things,” Odis said.
“There are acts that can accumulate negative impacts to your existence?” Mace asked.
“Totally man, tons of them. Like last week, I was having lunch in the mess hall, spilled salt everywhere!”
“And this entails what?” Sixer asked.
“Well it’s supposed to invite enmity and future problems, but I threw some over my left shoulder, so it was fine.”
“You humans are so gullible,” Odis said. “This is why we came to earth so often to mess with you.”
“Tell that to the shirt man,” Thomas said.
“So the garment has… accumulated ‘good luck’, therefore you remain in a sustained field of positive chaos,” Sixer said.
“I guess, yeah,” Thomas said. He’d never heard it described that way before, it was probably the most scientifically accurate portrayal of ‘luck’ he’d ever heard.
“You two are not gonna make sense of this, it’s an illogical belief from a less evolved lifeform,” Odis said. “Next thing you know, the kid is going to tell you he doesn’t walk under ladders or let black cats cross his path.”
“First off, I love all cats,” Thomas said indignantly, “secondly, how do you know so much about earth superstitions?”
“Earth movies. You think you can keep the Galley in the dark? We’ve been sneaking onto Earth for generations.”
[Reminder: engineering staff are to head to the WARP core at 1900 hours for new maintenance procedures]
“Oh, man, is it that time already? We better head out,” Thomas said, zipping up his jumpsuit over his lucky shirt. “Thanks Roomba, I totally forgot the time.”
[Acknowledgments: you’re welcome]
“Smarter every day, good for you buddy. Alright, come on guys, let’s get to the core before Chief Nivan sticks us on plumbing duty,” Thomas clapped his hands together, ushering everyone out of the room.
“Human Thomas, if we may make a request, may we continue to observe you? This ‘lucky shirt’ phenomenon may lead to some observational data previously unknown to us,” Sixer said.
“Sure guys, whatever you need.”
“You’re not gonna get any data,” Odis chided. “The kid is just going to confuse you both.”
“Regardless, we will continue to observe,” Mace said.
The group made their way to the lifts, Odis still grumbling about how stupid the idea of a lucky shirt was, lucky anything really, the whole time. Thomas tried to explain, saying there were tons of lucky objects on Earth, like the rabbit’s foot.
“You mutilate another lifeform for its appendage just to positively charge your own chaos?” Mace asked, surprised.
“That seems counterproductive to what you have described as Karma,” Sixer said.
“Yeah, that wasn’t great, admittedly. Ancient Earthlings weren’t great at critical thinking yet. These days we have synthetic feet, so that doesn’t happen anymore, I don’t think. I got one on my keys, see?” Thomas pulled a key ring out of his pocket and showed off the foot.
“Double luck today,” he said, smiling.
“Fascinating,” the Padrino said in unison.
[Request: game pad, please?]
Thomas stuffed his keys back in place and pulled the pad out, giving it to the tiny droid on his bag. Roomba had recently started a new game, having earned the highest score possible on PAC-MAN a few cycles previously. Now he’d moved on to Galaga, another port Thomas had made.
“Hmm?” Thomas looked at Roomba in his bag.
[Statement: this new game is stimulating]
“Oh my god you’re so freaking cute Roomba,”Thomas gushed. The little droid was getting smarter by the day thanks to the cognitive upgrade the Padrino had given him. He was ‘talking’ in more complex sentences and could ask for more stuff as he wanted it, Thomas was overjoyed!
They stepped off the lift onto the Core deck, where the fuel was stored, as well as where the WARP core was kept. The thing always looked like a captured star to Thomas, suspended in the air by antigravity struts, a shining ball of orange and red fire behind the dozen or so walls of safety fields keeping the room from being vaporized. Chief engineer Nivan was already waiting for them, pouring over a data pad with another maintenance officer. The room itself was vast, lit by the core, at least the size of the cargo bay on the other side of the ship. Rows of control consoles lined the walls, as well as data screens and input terminals.
Thomas dropped his bag by the door and put Roomba on his shoulder where the little robot looped himself around the cord the human had sown into his jumpsuit for the little guy. Roomba muted the game pad but continued playing.
“Hey chief,” Thomas called out. “We’re here for that briefing on the new core terminal procedures like you asked.”
“Yes, thank you Human Thomas,” Nivan said, two of his four spindly arms waving in acknowledgment. Chief Nivan was a Zilont, whose species had no actual set amount of limbs. Some had 2 arms and legs like humans, some had up to 8 of each. Nivan himself had 4 arms, 3 legs, and his torso moved and bent around like rubber, since he had no spine. The species moved via a series of gas bladders, reminding Thomas of this uncomfortable movie he’d seen where a clown made a person out of balloon tubes. But Chief Nivan was an upstanding guy in his opinion, never pushed work onto his subordinates and tried to be as helpful around the engineering deck as possible. Thomas thought he was a cool boss to work for.
“Lets get started”, Nivan said.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Chief Nivan got them working, showing them how the new terminals worked, and how to input commands into the core controls in case of emergencies. The Padrino picked it up while he was explaining it, but Odis and Thomas needed a demonstration. Thomas watched as Nivan’s odd balloon-esque tentacle limbs punched in commands, taking note of each key he hit.
“Got it?” Nivan asked. Thomas sometimes had a hard time gauging his emotions, what with the beak and all, but he thought the Zilont looked a little tired.
“I think so, yeah. You okay Chief?” Thomas asked. “Need me to grab you some salt water or something?”
“No, thank you Human Thomas. We’re getting run ragged down here. Odds and ends keep disappearing, tools and spare parts, and just yesterday somebody claimed they had their locker ransacked.”
“Yes, and the maintenance crew is already out of sorts. This is just adding fuel to the-”
The entire room shook violently.
Chief Nivan was cut off by a series of small electrical explosions from the wall of terminals behind him, throwing him a ways away. Thomas threw his arms up to shield his face, making sure to cover Roomba as well. The floor beneath their feet rocked, the entire ship seemingly to jerk several meters to the side. The lights blew out, raining sparks down around the crews working in the core room. Over a fourth of the crew in there were thrown to the side or into a wall at the sudden shift. The walls groaned and creaked at the rapid change, and Thomas saw something that stopped his blood cold. The safety fields holding back the core’s fire were flickering off one by one.
“EVERYONE OUT RIGHT NOW!!!” Thomas yelled, rushing to Nivan. He grabbed two of his four arms and started hauling him towards the door.
“Twins! What the hell happened?!” He questioned, looking to the two Padrino.
“Ships systems registered a local star released a wave of energetic ions creating a solar storm. Detecting multiple failed systems, including-”
“THE CORE YEAH I KNOW!” Thomas cut him off. “We have to get the hell outta here now! Is anyone else in here?”
“Multiple life signs detected. In approximately 3 minutes the last containment field will fail and the core will vaporize everything in this room.”
Thomas set Nivan down outside the safety doors.
“Okay, Mace, you call them out! Sixer, Odis, and I will go get them. MOVE!” Thomas ordered while he rushed up and over one of the hanging walkways. Odis didn’t have time to argue with him, Mace was in the doorway and Sixer was already on the move as well.
“SQUAL!” Odis yelled before getting in gear. Thomas didn’t need a translator for that one. Odis was Galley, and they were generally self centered. Not today.
Thomas must’ve moved 6 crew out of the core room in those first 2 minutes. He saw a third Padrino in the door now, a new unit he hadn’t met yet, talking to Mace and trying to contain the core. Thomas didn’t stop. Whether they bought more time or not, he wasn’t about to leave this room while anyone was still in it, not while time was still on the clock.
Finally the three minutes were almost up. The safety field was down to its last wall. Only a thin blue screen of light stood between them and obliteration. Thomas grabbed the last crewman on his side, a Zilgrat about half his size and started running back towards the door. From what Mace had said, it was just the space ferret and that should be it. Thomas looked over at the others.
Odis’s foot was caught in the railing.
The crewman he’d been sent to get had been thrown down to Sixer who was rushing him outside.
“There are only seconds left, Human Thomas! We must seal the door immediately.”
Thomas looked from the door to Odis.
Dropped the Zilgrat at the robot’s feet.
And sprinted towards the Galley.
His lungs hurt. His muscles ached. It was getting hot in the room, each layer missing from the security wall allowing more heat to escape containment.
Thomas jumped up the stairs to Odis.
“Sorry man!” He said as he grabbed the little gray alien’s leg and yanked. The foot dislodged with a sick crunch and Odis howled, high pitched and clutched at his leg.
Thomas had been counting. No time left. The Galley man didn’t weigh much.
He really wanted to keep playing games with these guys.
Thomas took Roomba from his shoulder and shoved the little droid into the Galley’s chest before hurling them both over the railing towards the safety of the blast doors. He actually threw them so far and so hard they struck Mace and forced the whole bunch out into the hall.
“SHUT THE DOORS NOW!” Thomas ordered. The Padrino unit he hadn’t met yet, and now probably wouldn’t, hit the release, and the doors slammed shut as the last field lost power.
Thomas threw himself behind a console as vaporized plasma filled the room. The temperature must’ve leapt by several hundred degrees…
Then the safety fields sprung back to life, holding back the fire. Thomas sucked in oxygen as the ship’s automatic air filters kicked in, sucking the heat out of the room. Emergency coolers clicked on, rapidly suppressing the temperature fluctuations. His skin hurt, and he caught a vague whiff of burning hair.
The console he’d hid behind seemed to shield him from the sheer worst of it, but Thomas would be very glad to get to Med Bay in the next few minutes. Everything burned. Finally shock and lack of clean oxygen let him pass out.
Thomas awoke to the sound of Odis and the Padrino… were they yelling?
“I’m telling you,” Odis was saying to someone in a nurse uniform, “if you cut that shirt off him, I will personally teach you how the Galley get even…”
Thomas started laughing softly, on his bed in the med bay, covered in burn gel.
“I told you guys…” he said hoarsely, “it’s a lucky shirt.”
“Kid!” Odis was standing next to him, leg in a cast. “Kid what the hell were you thinking? Why didn’t you just leave??!”
“Human Thomas, we are please you have not expired,” Sixer said.
“Thanks guys,” Thomas coughed. “Sorry about the leg, dude, there wasn’t time…”
“My leg? Kid you just got cooked and you’re worried about my leg?” Odis looked at him in disbelief. “You humies are so freaking weird, you should’ve just left me there.”
“Nah… I had that. It’s my lucky day, remember?”
Roomba was sitting on the side table next to his bed. He was holding the game pad, but it wasn’t on.
“What’s up buddy? You okay? Sorry I threw you,” Thomas said.
[Is your unit going to be repaired?]
“Yeah buddy, I’ll be okay. Just got a little too hot in there for a second.”
[Statement: Unit Thomas is required to be repaired, or ability to complete task {hang out together} will be incomplete]
“Yeah, I love you too buddy,” Thomas said.
A quick 2 cycle stint in a regen-pod got Thomas back on his feet and the worst of his burns treated, though he was significantly more tan than he was before. He’d had a short meeting with the captain and first officer, both of whom said something to the effect of ‘what is it with you humans, throwing yourselves into danger?’
He was on his way to the Padrino now, they’d taken Roomba and his main translator for repairs, and to see if they could finally retrace that weird signal he’d heard the other cycle. Since he was told by both the doctors and Odis to focus or rest and recovery, he’d agreed to them babysitting. The spare device in his ear was itchy. He’d be happy to have his back.
When the lift opened, there was Odis the Galley. His cast had been replaced with a prosthetic boot. Thomas stepped in. The doors closed and Odis cleared his throat.
“Listen kid,” the little gray alien started, “that was a real decent thing you did back there the other cycle.”
Thomas looked down at him and shrugged.
“I’m not gonna say it wasn’t a big deal,” Thomas said, “I definitely thought I was gonna die in there. It just didn’t need to be all of us, is all.”
Thomas rummaged around in his pocket and pulled out his keys. He slid the rabbits foot off the ring and held it out to the Galley.
“Here. I think we both need some luck on this ship right now. Have it.”
Odis looked from him to the foot.
“…you sure kid? Didn’t that thing save your life?” Odis said, his usual smirk coming back a little.
“Nah, the shirt saved my life. Plus I feel like I owe you a foot, yeah?”
Odis laughed, shoulders shaking. He took the rabbits foot and stuck it in his pocket.
“Lucky severed animal feet huh? You humies are such deathworlders it’s not even funny.”
“Then why are you laughing, close encounters?”
The lift erupted in laughing fits from the both of them as they made their way down to engineering.
On the engineering deck, the Padrino, along with the small unit known as Roomba, watched the pair leave the lift.
“The human should have expired in the core room,” said Sixer.
“But he did not,” said Sixer.
“A good thing, yes,” said Mace.
[Statement: agreed, this is a good thing. New observations can be made now. And new games can be played still]
“Agreed,” said the Padrino in unison.
