Incompatible with Life

No Space for Family [Chapter 6]

The journey continued for several more days without a hitch. I talked with Hows as much as the time allowed. Well, I pretty much always snuck away to talk to him, usually when my dad was napping or after dinner when my he switched with my mom and took over piloting for the evening. I went early a few times, but somehow Grandma was always in the cargo hold midday talking with him. I never stuck around to find out what they were talking about. It was probably just old people stuff. And I definitely didn’t want Grandma in on my conversations.

One night, my family and I had the rare chance to all eat together. My mom waited until a long silence to announce the news. “Well, family, we’re almost at Grandma’s stop here,” she said, glancing at our pickily-eating guest. “If you want any souvenirs from Greenmire, you should ask now.”

Grandma rolled her head from side to side. “It’s a farming colony, not an amusement park. I can’t even imagine what they would have to offer as a souvenir. A sack of dried grain?”

“I think there was a culture long ago on Earth that used to offer bushels of wheat as gifts for charity,” I interjected, avoiding spraying half-eaten food out from my mouth.

Terren scooted away from me in an exaggerated motion. “If you’re not careful you’ll donate us a load of food from your face pouches,” he laughed.

Mom composed herself better than Dad after that comment. She slapped on the table for attention. “Well, let’s keep our individual bounties to ourselves. Mom, don’t forget to message ahead to check in to the lodging there on Greenmire. You can ask Terren or Sola for any help getting on the Galaxynet to find their contact info.”

Grandma continued eating little by little and nodding along with the reminder. “Of course. I might ask the boy, as Sola Rae here is too busy flirting with the Hows fellow. Probably learning about the birds and the bees.”

Mom rolled her eyes. Terren tried hard not to choke. Dad grinned across the table at me. I glared at him like a laser cutting through a sheet of metal to show how serious I was. “Dad, I’m not. I swear!”

He shrugged. “Not that I’d care, but at least she’s learning from someone qualified. And one who won’t make it as awkward as it was trying to explain it all to her brother.”

Terren clicked his tongue and sat up, wiping his mouth with a napkin to hide his snickering. “You were more nervous than me! Goes to show you, dealing with computers and dealing with people are totally different.”

Grandma sat back, seemingly oblivious to the mental damage we were undergoing. “I can’t say I won’t miss the robotic doctor, myself. He’s a good talker. Nice, proper gentleman.”

“Surely that’s just the bedside manner programmed into him,” Dad asserted.

“Hey, does that really matter? Says he can use the synthesizer to fashion some knee braces for me. The gravity has been terrible here, and no doubt it will be terrible down on Greenmire too. And don’t even get me started on the hike I’ll likely have to take to spread the ashes. And speaking of which, is it even safe to make food on these synthesizer jobbies that also make tools and whatnot? Getting chemicals all cross-contaminated?”

“It’s all just molecules, Gram,” Terren replied, raising his eyebrows back at me. “That’s what Sola’d say, I’d guess.”

“If you’re worried, there’s a synth in the cargo bay too. Only used for tools,” said Dad. “I’m sure Hows knows how to access it.”

Grandma sighed. “That’s now what I mean, but whatever…”

“What sort of planet is Hows going to end up on?” I interjected.

“That’s the interesting thing,” my dad leaned in excitedly, hand drumming on the edge of the table. “It’s actually not a planet at all. It’s a space station. Pretty remote according to the coordinates. It would make sense if they’re treating ultra-rare or ultra-contagious diseases. The clients don’t want to tell me much besides that, unfortunately. Not our business, anyways.”

“With Hows installed, it’s sure to be state of the art.” I nodded.

“We’ve been certainly lucky to get to interact with him, haven’t we?” Mom said, leaning closer to Grandma to share their own little conversation. “I’m sorry I couldn’t come down with you. There’s just a lot to pay attention to on this last leg. And offloading the AI, of course.”

Grandma shrugged. “Eh, not your horse or race, my girl.”

“Binary star system we’re going through, you know,” my dad said to me and my brother, starting another tangent. “Lots of sunlight for growing crops, lots of gravitational wackiness for anyone wanting to come through. So the lot of you better stay put in the common room or your bedroom as we make it to Greenmire.”

I left Hows alone that night, figuring Grandma would want to monopolize his attention one last time. When morning hit, Mom and Dad were already strapped into the cockpit watching over the instrument panels. We had dropped out of warp, meaning that someone had to be at the controls until we set down on the planet, nothing out of the ordinary. I made myself breakfast from the synthesizer and sat down to eat and read. I eventually settled into studying to take my mind off the boredom.

Terren awoke after me and took over for my mom in the cockpit while she made lunch. The glow of the binary stars, the system’s pair of suns, came streaming in through the cockpit windows and further into the common room. The exterior windows initiated their dimming features until they were at their darkest filtering.

“Shoot,” I heard my dad mutter from the front of the ship. He rarely cursed, let alone voiced his disapproval. I heard a low beep from the control panels. Mom pulled herself away from her half-eaten lunch plate and scuttled up to the front to join my dad and brother.

My curiosity brought me up front as well. “What’s going on?” I said, blinking through the still harsh glow.

Terren was shuffling out of the copilot seat to let my mom take the controls in tandem with my dad. My dad glanced back with a grin. “Seems to be an inconvenient time of the year here. Not to mention an awkward approach. The stars have aligned for the time being. Which usually is a saying that means things are going our way. However… Amelia, let’s plot a course so we can slingshot ourselves to a cooler zone.”

I held tight to the side seat. “Are we going to be okay?”

“Yeah, we are, certainly,” my dad nodded. “Since we’re not running the warp engines, our systems have plenty of passive cooling, don’t you worry. But… our AI friend in the back consumes a lot of power.”

“Which means a lot of heat?” I asked.

My dad glanced back at me with pursed his lips and nodded. “The cooling system runs refrigerant to the cold side of the ship. Only… two stars mean no cool side. Go figure. How is that course looking, Amelia?”

“Working on it,” my mom said impatiently. “Sending a preliminary path your way.”

I saw my dad’s eyes shifting from the viewscreen to the controls, then to a red flashing light on a console above his head. “Damn, the cargo bay keeps jumping up. If we fry the core and the storage array, it’s about another six months to rebuild.”

“Hows…” I muttered, thinking of how he was feeling.

“He’s a copy, Sola,” my brother assured me, hand on my shoulder. “It’s not a person that can die.”

“Yeah, well, all the tech that he’s inhabiting was expensive. The bank will kill me if I default on the loan,” said my dad through gritted teeth. “And this job was going to be able to pay off the last of the principal for us.”

“Focus, Jeff,” My mom muttered. “We’re getting the velocity we need.”

“Lovely, but we’re still in the hot zone. Grab a seat and strap in, kids.”

I had never felt the Ora rumble like it did then. The artificial gravity inside the ship was gradually overtaken by the opposite pull of the sun we were skirting. It felt as if I were being sucked back into my seat. I wanted to follow along with the path across our trajectory through my own screen, but my eyes almost seemed drawn by the interplanetary forces straight ahead.

“We’re about to breach the aphelion,” my mom said.

Suddenly, instead of being pushed into our seats, it was like we were floating, held down only by the straps across our shoulders. The glow of the nearest sun was only a few rays in the corner of our front viewport.

I clapped gently to praise my dad. “That’s our dad.”

He grumbled in response. “That’s all well and good, but we’re a critical limit back there. I hate to do this, but I suppose I didn’t design these systems for nothin’” he said, pushing himself up to reach one of his custom control panels way above the pilot’s seat.

A loud hiss encompassed the ship, seeming to crawl through the bulkheads like a small animal that had stowed away. The sharp sound faded as it traveled to the rear of the craft.

“What did you just do?” Terren asked, looking all about the surrounding bulkheads.

“I diverted the exhaust from the reverse thrusters, through the hull, and out into the cargo cooling systems. The force is enough to blast the access covers off and fill the space with liquid refrigerant. It evaporates almost instantly under normal pressure which causes rapid cooling. Makes a horrible mess which we’ll be cleaning up for a few days, but hey, we’re back to normal temperatures. Let’s get out of here.”

My dad sat back while my mom punched away at her navigation console. Terren puffed out his cheeks with a sigh. I was the only one left looking around.

“Did you check to make sure Grandma wasn’t back there?”

Mom let out a small gasp and jerked sideways in her seat. “Jeff? Did you?”

My dad went pale as best as his dark skin could. “I…”

“Did you just kill my mother?” She said, flying out of her seat.

Dad jumped up after her, only stopping to yank my brother up from his seat. “Get us into any trajectory that isn’t closer to one of these suns and turn on autopilot.”

“Yes sir!” My brother complied weakly, glancing back and forth between me, my dad, the viewscreen, and the rear of the ship.

I hurried up after my dad who was after my mom who was rushing to the rear bulkhead door. “Mom! Please tell me you were in your room! Mom!”

I slammed at my bedroom door where Grandma could have been, but likely was not. Beyond it was nothing but the decorations and trinkets that I missed so much, and the bed that I wished I could be sleeping in.

Mom opened the door to the cargo hatch. My dad blocked me from following. “I doubt there’s anything you want to see in here, Sola.”

“Oh my god!” My mom shrieked. My dad rushed to her side while I remained halfway through the door, making sure it didn’t close.

The air wafting in from the cargo bay was chilly and smelled funny, but not like burning. It smelled almost sweet. All the metal surfaces were left with a cloudy film, while any plastic surfaces seemed more shiny and wavy. The chair that both me and Grandma had used a lot was still in the same place, with an unmoving figure in it.

Hows’ voice suddenly filled the room. “Do not touch or move her!”

Terren crept up beside me to watch the scene unfolding. Mom screamed and tore at her hair. Dad leaned down on his knees and stared at the floor.

“Listen to me now and she may be saved!” Hows said again, louder.

“I’m listening,” Mom huffed, jerking up to the core.

“This chamber experienced temperatures in high and low extremes incompatible with human life. According to my temperature sensors, her body is likely, clumsily so, in a near cryopreserved state. Any attempts to defrost her in an uncontrolled environment will cause great cell damage. Alas, I cannot promise her survival at the moment. But I can detect faint brain waves still active. Grab the device from the synthesizer once it is ready.”

I stepped in and glanced at the far wall where the synth bay was frantically printing something like a wide, stiff net about the size of a person’s head, shining with a metallic sheen.

“Prepare a cord for data transfer to my core,” Hows instructed without pause. “The more bandwidth the better.”

Mom and Dad exchanged glances. Mom went for the synthesizer and dad went for the storage cabinet to bring out one of the conduits used for AI transfers. Mom shifted back and forth on her feet before grabbing the printed device the moment the machine beeped.

“Place it on her head,” Hows directed.

“Is this going to do what I think it is?” Mom muttered.

Dad looked it up and down, examining the ports and the end of his cable for the right orientation. “One plug here, then one end to… the core?”

“You are correct, Mr. Umburter. Please proceed with haste.”

Mom daintily plopped the hard netting over Grandma’s still head. She backed up on her tiptoes, hand to her mouth. Dad ran about with the other end of the cord and plugged it in.

“Detecting… tracing neural pathways,” Hows described in a tone that didn’t seem like normal. “Beginning transfer.”

Mom grabbed onto my dad’s sleeve as they stood back. “Do you really think this could…”

He shook his head. “Any scientific studies pertaining to this sort of procedure are… fantastical, at best. Hows, how is this in your knowledge base?”

“Yes, I must tell you,” he said with a new tone, the lights surrounding the core growing quicker with every word. “My medical knowledge and training is only one part of my assigned duty. And my final destination is not a medical facility as you would expect. It could fall under the definition of a… prison.”

“Dude, what the heck,” Terren mumbled in my ear.

Dad shook his head and gritted his teeth. “This isn’t what the contract said. I’m in the business to spread knowledge and free people, not the other way around.”