first pick for boarding crews, Sunspot.”
Mementos
The glass Jonas Valent had last drunk out of had been encased in a small glass display box. Jake Valance stared at it after setting it down in the middle of his Ready Quarters office desk. He had no idea what to do with it after placing it inside the case consisting of a simple black base and transparesteel surround. The writing on its base said; A Drink With Jonas.
As he quietly looked around the office for a place to put it, perhaps a good spot for a small shelf without it drawing too much attention but a place he'd look to often enough, the door chimed. “Come in,” Jake said quietly.
The heavily armoured door was drawn out of the jam and Alice stepped inside. Over her black vacsuit she wore her flight jacket, something that was making an appearance all over the ship with anyone who fancied themselves a good pilot. She was the first to make it part of the uniform by adding the Triton skull to the right shoulder. Many senior staff members in the engineering, gunnery and security departments had started to wear long coats much like Jakes', but either addition to their uniforms were considered luxury items, and since they were dense protective garments it took several days worth of materialization rations to create them.
Alice's smile still brought his spirits up, it was something he hoped would never change. “How was the day watch?” she asked brightly.
“Filled with good and bad news. The crew are responding to the general difficulty of the training simulations increasing ship wide as a challenge, I'm not hearing many people complaining. Our live combat drills are still getting better, and we've had thirty one people qualify in their departments to become full crew.”
“Thirty one? That's twice as much as yesterday.”
“People are embracing their roles, getting together into groups and helping each other out. Crew members who are working as a unit are qualifying for their posts faster. We should see at least two hundred more graduated members in the next three days. The bad news is that we'll still be left with half the crew not fully qualified. That's something we expected, but I also have a problem with the civilian volunteer group.”
Alice sat down and made herself comfortable in the seat across from him, she was right at home, during the evening shift the office was hers. Jake slept just above most of the time in a small sleeping cabin. If there were any problems he was just a hatch away and she had only had to call on him twice. “Last I checked half the civilians were signing up as damage control or part time security. I even saw a couple people trying out as fighter pilots.”
“That's the problem. The training regimen we're on is made to prepare the non-civilian crew for a kind of warfare that doesn't allow much opportunity to take prisoners. We both know that Triton is being groomed as a killer, every department knows it. The default disposition for everyone aboard with the exception of the civilians is to kill anyone trying to board us or anything circling outside.”
“It's working, in true condition simulations our casualties are continually decreasing despite the fact that you keep making them more and more difficult. Even in missions where we have to determine that each opponent is armed before firing the aggressive attitude is ensuring early surrenders and quicker suppression times.”
“I know, and that's good, but eventually we may find ourselves outside of a war zone. If we're all as hard as nails and ready to open fire at the slightest indication of trouble, we'll be of no use to anyone. It's the civilians that will keep us human, aware that there's a grey area to this friend or foe mentality that's built into all our training.”
Alice didn't respond right away and just looked at him, glancing at his new trophy before replying. “You're right. I'll be honest, I'd expect that kind of thinking more from Liam, but you're right. Are you going to stop civilians from qualifying for different positions on the ship?”
“No, but we should start compiling a list of people the civilians have requested us to pick up. We have a lot of room left in the habitation section in the Botanical Gallery.”
“What about children?”
Jake hesitated a moment, it was something he had been thinking about for several days. “It feels wrong to have them aboard a ship of war. I'm still against it.”
“I agree. It's going to cut a lot of people from that list though. The civvies that are requesting to bring family aboard have a lot of brothers, sisters and others who have kids.”
“We'll have to live with it, I need to know that everyone aboard made a concious choice to be here.”
“Speaking of family, is that what I think it is?” Alice asked, gesturing towards the encased drinking glass.
“It is. I didn't know what to do with it after finishing the testing, so I…” he gestured towards it and shrugged.
“It's good, I mean, it's not like he was able to leave much behind. What did the tests turn up?”
“Well, his results show natural ageing, mine show that I'm almost seven years old and a large percentage of my physiology shows signs of mass regeneration. He was the original, that's for sure.”
“Laura was saying that you're like his moodier brother,” Alice smirked.
Jacob burst out laughing and nodded. “That fits. How are you two getting along?”
“Great, if there's anyone in engineering or our civilian research volunteers with nothing to do, she gives them a challenge. I don't know what she's been up to since I last saw her before I made the switch from AI to human, but it's given her the ability to command, demand respect and delegate. The more I watch her the more I learn, even though she keeps trying to convince me that I'm the great commander.”
“You are, if I were to take you off the bridge night watch the graveyard crew would probably mutiny. I don't know what I'd do without you.”
“I learned everything about command from you.”
“You mean from Jonas,” Jake corrected with a thin smile.
“You're right, mostly, anyway,” Alice replied with a slow nod. “I'm sorry, I see more of him in you every day, even though you look a little different.”
“Now that's what you have to thank Liam and my real father for. I was made by one of the inventors of framework technology and he left me a message.”
Alice's eyes went wide, her interest was keenly piqued; “what did he say?”
“Not much, only that there's someone with more information on Zingara Station.”
“That can't be a coincidence.”
“No, I'm pretty sure he chose Zingara because he knew it would remain independent and that I would remember being there as Jonas.”
“With Ayan.”
The light mood that accompanied the revelation Jake was sharing with her drained out of him. He looked older somehow, tired, more like the Jake Valance she had first met weeks before.
“I'm sorry, it's my day for saying all the wrong things I guess,” Alice apologized quietly. “I'm guessing taking these memories on is a whole package deal, the bad comes with the good and you still miss her.”
Jake nodded. “You're right, and if I could thank Ayan I would. Somehow I still expect her to come through that door with two cups of coffee. Remembering her brings back so much, especially about Zingara Station. Meeting her changed everything.”
“You know the civilians who are rebuilding the Botanical Garden just finished making a monument honouring all the people who died taking the ship. They put an image of Ayan and Jonas at the top since most of the crew see Jonas as the last one who died in that fight. You should go down and see it.”
“I know, things have been busy. I haven't seen my own quarters for weeks. Maintenance keeps asking for permission to go in and clean up but I just push it to the bottom of the priority list.”
“You're going to have to finish moving in someday Jake,” Alice smiled wryly. “A few of the Samson crew aren't moving their stuff from the old ship into their new quarters until they see you do it first.”
“It's not that I'm not here for good. Even if Sol Defence came along and tried to get her back, I'd still try to strike a deal for Triton. My mind is always on the crew, the ship, what we're doing and how we're doing it.”
