In Which We Explore Our Future

by

Dan Leinir Turthra Jensen

Chapter 1

"Time to wake up". The sound of a gentle chime, followed by a just as gentle voice, designed to lead one out of sleep at a previously requested time. Newton station's system worked well, even to those who were not technically citizens.

The creation and training of nohnas was expensive. Very expensive. And if you were born with a debt, you were legally the ward of the creditor. And if you were the ward of someone else, you were not a citizen. The topic of a great many debates, in a great many court rooms of the early 2100s, and a great many bars today, it essentially meant that for all intents and purposes, until a nohnas had worked long and hard enough to pay off their debt, they were practically slaves to those who had paid for them.

"Time to wake up". The chime again, the voice less gentle this time. An insistence sneaking in, aimed at bringing the mind to attention. A ruffling of a duvet, a quiet groan, and wriggling of whiskers, attached to a short, white and orange striped muzzle, the only thing sticking out from underneath the duvet.

"Time to wake up!". The chime again, louder, and the voice now quite insistent. The target of this insistence stretched out and yawned widely, it being decidedly earlier than the time at which it normally found itself getting out of bed.

This day, however, was not a normal day. The first thing to help bring that fact to Turan's attention was the empty space in the bed beside it, where normally would be its partner. Normally, the first task of the day for it would be to unbuckle itself from the safety restraints on the bed and prepare a cup of coffee to wake up Shouta with. Today, however, the bed beside it contains only the crumpled up duvet and the pillow. Turan frowned, surprised, as its hand hit something hard sat on the pillow as its outstretched arm fell on it.

"Time to wake up!". Turan jolted at the now loud voice, and groaned, turning its head to see a pad sitting on the pillow.

"Alright, alright, I am up, already! Hub, stop alarm." Turan said, and with an experienced move unclipped the belt from the bed's restraints. Leaning back against the bulkhead in the bunk space, as much as the low ceiling allowed, it picked up the pad, and looked at it. On it was open a text, which simply read:

"Meet me at Berth 4-129 B. Come as you are now." Simply that. An intriguingly specific and short statement, giving away nothing. Normally when Shouta was hired as a pilot on one of the mining ships, they would know some time ahead. The trips took ages to set up properly, lots of planning needed doing and both pilots and their crew needed time to train. It was not just something you jumped into without work. So, as Shouta's partner and most-time assistant, what was going on?

"What has he been up to?" Turan asked itself as it put the pad down and slipped out of the bed. As it began to brush the soft fur covering its body and tail, and sort out the hair band holding up its top knot, the thought that went through its head was:

"How have I not known about it?"

---

He stepped out of the lift and onto the darkened flight deck, letting his gaze travel slowly over the work stations around the edge of the semi-circular space, which would soon be overflowing with information on their displays, and the three elaborately constructed seats at the centre of the deck, the navigator and communication officers stations towards the back, and the pilot's seat at the front.

Stepping up to that seat, he let his hand run over the broken leather, imagining what this place must have been like when the ship was brand new. Gleaming surfaces, all the stations alight and working, the bridge a buzz with activity as the 9 man crew went by their collective business. He sat down in the seat he knew that he would very soon be spending a very considerable chunk of his time in, the pilot of the independent Light Combined Universal class ship The Impression of Transience.

Transience. A silly word for a ship, which really should be anything but transient. Of course, the ship itself already proved that it is anything but transient. He held up the his tab and opened up the files the dealer had given him on it. She was commissioned by the CSG Extra Solar corporation on the 15th of September 2209, and left the dock with its first crew on the 26th of May 2212. Now, nearly 150 years later, with the transience of The Impression of Transience only an impression - Shouta could not help but chuckle as that thought passed through his mind - it had none the less ended up in the bargain bin at a used ships dealer.

It was the final ship from that order of nearly two hundred ships from the second wave of the corporation's push towards the stars. Nearly as old as the station they were on, the corporation had finally decided it was no longer needed and had left it at the planetside space port on the planet Newton station orbited. It had sat there for nearly ten years before it turned up in a search for ships for sale.

Sitting in that hangar at the high altitude space port turned out to have been good for the ship. Its engines were still operational, and while it was most certainly in need of work, its once gleaming surface scuffed and battered, it was structurally sound and space safe. So, a minimal refuelling and a trip into orbit to berth at Newton had taken little effort, after all the funds had been sorted out.

Shouta knew that while it was otherwise highly organised, the one thing his partner was not good at was to keep track of their expenses. So, he had managed to keep it a secret that their debt had not only disappeared over the years, but turned into savings. Fairly sizeable savings at that. Enough to put down a deposit on the ship. They were now in debt again, but this time it was a different debt - it was their choice, not one they were born with.

He sat in the chair, staring out of the viewport arching overhead, down onto the planet, at its odd bipartite surface, one side eternally frozen and one side eternally boiling warm, and the temperate band with its quadruped life scampering around in the eternally turbulent weather caused by the clash of temperatures, and the eternal twilight.

He tested the thought, let it run through his mind, following the pathways the workings of which no one person today understood completely even if they started as simple algorithms in a computer on some AI designer's desk. A thought which brought with it strange connotations of pleasure, and a slight sense of abandonment. He closed his eyes and spoke the words out loud.

"We are free."

They bounced around the silent flight deck's metallic surfaces and back to his sensitive ears. They sounded right.

---

Turan finished brushing its fur and then sorted out the covers as it had done its entire life, since it left the child-care and entered the barracks at the rearing facilities where it received its training. Roll up the duvet, pillow inside, stow it and lift the bunk up to maximize the space underneath when it wasn't in use.

Newton station was the largest of the four stations in the Gliese 581 system. It was constructed in much the same way as other stations constructed by one of the megacorporations. A stack of isolated rings, rotating around a central hub, with each ring connected to the hub by four wide spokes, and with docks on the inside of the rings for Minimal, Light and Median class ships. Of course, ships without landing capabilities, such as the Greater and Carrier class ships could not dock directly, but had to rely on the support machinery and the help of Minimal class ships for fuel and support.

Even if the the station was the largest in the system, and with its 16 rings one of the largest out there, space was at a premium. No small place, the station was not just business, it was also home to hundreds of thousands of residents. Both humans, nohnas and aliens lived there. Skilled nohnas, such as pilots or techs, were eligible for their own quarters in the barracks in ring 1 if they registered as available for hire. It also meant that fifty percent of their wages went to station, and you didn't get to pick the jobs yourself. Expensive rent on a glorified broom cupboard, but at least you were mostly free to do as you wanted with the rest of it.

After lifting up the bunk against the ceiling, Turan walked the three paces past the tiny shower cubicle to the door and left their cabin. Walking down the long, anonymous hallway of red sector's nohnas barracks and into the rec room, where the first few people from first shift were getting ready, quietly, before the morning rush turned the space into a buzz of activity before second shift would turn it into a much louder and decidedly less businesslike buzz. It waved to a couple of familiar faces who had recognised the rushing feline, and when they waved for it to join them it shook its head and signed towards the exit.

"Sorry guys, been called to the dock, pilot's orders." it said loud enough for them to hear, and with a cheerful smile and deliberately perked ears added "Can't leave him waiting!"

No reason to let them know that it really had no idea what it was getting into. While there were pedestrian transports available on the larger thoroughfare corridors, biological nohnas were conditioned towards handling transport by their own means. With the station sectioned off by the hub spokes, and the barracks on the outside of the ring at one section seal, it was only a short dash of about 200 meters to the section's hub transport. Hardly a long walk, this, it would be more useful when it arrived down on the docks.

The barracks were in ring 1's red sector, at the outermost habitation deck. Apart from the barracks, red sector contained officers' quarters. Turan knew that while a naked non-reproductive nohnas was no problem in the barracks or on the docks, officers generally frowned on them not wearing uniform. So it was happy to make it to the lift without running into one of its superiors. It pushed the call button and waited, and groaned as it heard two officers walk past in the hallway, one of them saying loudly enough that Turan had no doubt it was meant to hear it:

"Damn serfs. What's it think it's doing out of uniform? Bah, hope its owner sorts that out good."

Even if Turan and Shouta weren't scheduled for a mission, an officer would still be able to put a nohnas on reprimand for no other reason than some arbitrary misconduct. Not being in uniform was a common one for a certain group of humans who felt that since it was humans who created the nohnas, they owned them. The courts did not agree, but that didn't change their thoughts on the matter. Turan knew that when they said it, they meant for it to be a description of a thing, not because the person they were discussing had no gender. Some of them didn't even consider nohnas people, just as serfs. You never quite got used to it.

The lift arrived and Turan entered it, and asked for the hub, which responded by starting the ascent towards the hub. After picking up another couple of passengers on deck 5, the last before the dock, the lift said:

"Please take hold as this lift will shortly be entering a low gravity zone."

It sped up as it began the trip towards the hub, 150 meters above the heads of the lift's passengers.

---

The seat was the familiar shape of a pilot's seat, it nestled his body gently but firmly. Supporting every part of his body as it needed to, letting him stay nimble during the long stillness of jump as well as the intense focus of high in-system speeds. He fingered the storage port, where lay hidden the for him useless tranquilliser packets. His partner used them, because it has to. As for himself, his artificially built mind meant he had no need for them. Not that he had any blood to inject them into anyway, of course.

Most biological creatures for some reason couldn't handle the experience of being aware of themselves and their surroundings when going through a jump. They needed to be put under, somehow. You could go into mechanically assisted hibernation, which many chose who were not spacers. The closer you got to the homewell, the more you found people who didn't feel comfortable with the drugs, even if you looked at the statistics. It was pretty clear that the drugs simply worked, they'd been working for longer than anybody alive remembered, they were stable. The hibernation chambers were mechanical.

Jump space liked mechanics as much as it liked biologicals, which was to say not very much at all. Even if the hibernation chambers were unstable in jump space, their fallback was simple, a hypo with tranquilliser in it. It worked, but you heard about total failures. Chambers where even the hypo failed, leaving their living cargo to wake up in a world their minds would not let them understand. The medical facilities on most of the star stations had at least one permanent resident who never quite returned from their trips.

Piloting a ship into jump was a dubious undertaking for biologicals, so when the Honda corporation finally managed to pair a positronic mind with their powerful robotic bodies, it soon became obvious that they were the perfect choice for piloting starships. The corporation had become powerful enough by then that it not so much bought votes in the Japanese senate as just basically ran APEC. Through that, they were able to push legislation through which meant that humans would not be allowed to pilot starships for reasons of safety. The only thing they were not able to was to make their own products a requirement, but they seemed happy enough to leave it that way.

Anybody who wanted a pilot for a starship would need a nohnas, and as their robots by that time counted as sentient, they could advertise their work as the sensible choice - non-biological nohnas would not need tranq during jump, so they would not be groggy on reentry. At least, that was what their extensive and expensive marketing campaign was able to convince everybody.

And so, many years later, Shouta's model was constructed. A mostly solid form, the fox shaped kitsune model was constructed primarily for use as starship pilots. The brochure suggested that they would be useful in many ways, but that their primary purpose was to "serve as honourable guardians of your graceful transport in the skies". He shook his head as he remembered that statement. So many years since the language of trade became English in most places, and still the Japanese refused to ask for help when translating things.

Non-biological nohnas were most commonly created to order, and with certain options available. So Shouta's not very fox like colour of purple where a fox might otherwise be orange was the result of being ordered by a small shipping company, who thought that having their pilots being the corporate colours would be a great idea. At least it didn't clash with the pink they decided would be good instead of white for the other parts. And they had left his hands and feet intact, black as they should be. Oh well, one got used to it. Couldn't change it if he wanted to anyway.

He got up from the chair and walked back over to the lift, past the two other chairs and the table at the back with its holographic mapping system as inert as the rest of the ship's functions. He picked up the parcel he's placed on the table before and went into the lift, and pressed the down button. At least they worked, it was six decks down to the dock access. Turan would be here soon, and he wanted to be down there on the dock, waiting for him. He wanted to see its face when it stepped onto the dock. He smirked as he walked out of the access and onto the dock to wait.

---

The lift slowed down and attached itself to the hub with a bump and a clang. The passengers waited for the door to open and left, pulling themselves along hand over hand in the hub's low gravity. The hub was a long metal tube containing the majority of the energy production and the fuel containers for refuelling the large ships docked to the stationary parts at either end of the station. It also contained the enormous water tanks where the fish and algae most of the station's population, and the crews of a lot of the smaller ships, ate.

As it pulled itself along the rails towards ring 4, Turan looked up at one of the tanks, and thought of steak. It knew full well that that was an incredible luxury, it just took so much energy to produce that kind of meat, and it was just not something you had the space for in, well, space. They might have had the planet underneath, but introducing meat production animals to the world had been decided to be unacceptable, when the science guys found out that there was already a functioning ecosystem. That, however, didn't stop the feline part of its genes to bring the craving.

Berth 4-129 B was three rings across, and on the other side of the ring to their own red sector, in the unfashionable grey sector. Even if it weren't a place you would necessarily get stabbed just walking through it, it was not the sort of place pilots and their partners tended to frequent if they could help it. Turan reached ring 4, got in the lift and pressed the button for the dock.

"Please take hold, the lift will shortly be leaving the low gravity area. The floor is indicated by the downward pointed arrows." Turan smirked as one of the other people who had entered the elevator with it hurriedly moved from what had looked like a confident standing position on what would very soon become the ceiling. People who weren't used to gravity on board space stations and the large, rotating ships were fun. He'd not have had a real problem, would've just drifted down to the floor after a couple of minutes, it was the bashful reaction, painting them as newbies, which did it. But then, Turan remembered, it had done the same thing when it got to Sol 2. Everybody had to start somewhere.

The lift slowed down as it reached the dock level, and finally came to a stop, more quietly and gently than at the hub, and announced the arrival with the doors opening and the voice saying "Dock level". A rush of freezing cold air entered the lift cabin and Turan shivered as it rushed through its fur to its skin. It exited the lift and had a look around.

Ring 4's red section was structurally identical to Ring 1, of course, but it still seemed a little more grubby. Why that was, Turan really had no idea, but perhaps it was just that Ring 4 had a lot of small companies filling up the ring, and Ring 1 had CSG Extra Solar spanning most of red and yellow.

The pedestrian transport link running all the way around the ring, a simple, bi-directional tram system, was cheap and easy to use, and Turan was in a hurry. It stepped over to the rail, where a set of lines showed where the open sided tram would slow down enough for people to get on and off, lines tight together at two places. The trams ran automatically and made sure there was the same amount of time between each line, and it took only a couple of minutes for one to arrive. Turan stepped on as the tram slowed down at the second position, after people had left at the first.

---

Shouta stood outside the berth's personnel airlock as Turan stepped off the ped transport at the nearest stop, about three berths spinward. Arms crossed and leaning back against the bulkhead beside it, the pilot was wearing a new pilot suit, and as Turan got closer, it could see that it was not just the stance which was confident. An almost cocky smirk was on its partner's pink muzzle, and as it approached 129-B he pushed away from the wall and started towards his partner.

Turan looked at the board on the dock bulkhead, where you'd normally have outbound destination and departure time underneath the ship's name, along with other useful information. It simply had the name, LCU The Impression of Transience.

"Huh."

The deck plates were freezing cold under Turan's feet, so it sped up to meet Shouta before he got too far. While they might share a bed, it wasn't a sensible business move to show too close association between a pilot and his assistant, so when they met, it was simply a hug.

"You got my message, good. Here, take this, would you?" Shouta said as they walked towards the lock, and held out the parcel he had under his arm.

"Sure!" Turan took the parcel and let its eyes run up and down its pilot as it did so, a move the fox was supposed to notice. Which he did.

"Like the new threads?" he said with a chuckle.

"Pretty stylish, there!" Turan replied. "What's going on? I mean, you know i have no problem following your orders, but normally they come with more warning... What's up?"

In the meantime they had reached the airlock, and as Shouta pushed the button to open the outer door and stepped inside, Turan followed and pushed the close button inside. The door closed with a metallic clang, and they both put their wrists on the scanner, which beeped in recognition and the panels at both doors activated in response to both occupants of the lock being registered and accepted. Shouta put a hand on the dock side door's open button and smiled to his assistant.

"I'm sure you noticed the board on dockside?"

"Yeah, I did. An LCU with no destination and departure time?"

Shouta just smiled, pushed the button and walked out of the door and onto the dock proper.

"Not exactly, no. Meet our ship, The Impression of Transience." he said, with an expansive gesture towards the ship standing on the dock.

Turan stopped in its tracks. The intonation did not escape its sensitive ears, trained on years of duty at the comms station, interpreting station and ship communications for its pilot. It frowned and looked at the ship. It looked old. Very old. It would have once been pretty, but that was obviously a long time ago. Most of the paint job had gone, the landing gear looked lop-sided and there had been an impact on the front right of the fuselage.

"What do you mean, our ship..."

Shouta stopped and turned to face Turan: "I mean that... You know how we've been skimping to pay off our debts?"

"Yeah?"

"Well, we managed to finish paying about two years ago... So, I thought I would surprise you by making our independence just a little more independent."

"You... bought this bucket?"

Shouta frowned "You know, sometimes you can be so negative. Yes, it's not new, but the class has proved itself, they are stable and will stand up to a serious pummelling. The higher systems aren't functioning, but I did check it out before doing any signature writing."

"What're you talking about, the thing's a wreck! I bet it can't even take off." Turan stood its ground, hands fisted on its hips.

"The FTL field emitters may be bust and the life support's not operating, but that's mostly because it wasn't used for FTL for years before it was decommissioned, and the life support's part biological. But as for taking off, I picked it up on the surface of Zarmina's and flew it up here. It flies just fine."

"So..." Turan closed both eyes and put a hand over its eyes, one arm over its belly and the elbow of the other resting on that, hiding a frown. "So, we are out of birth debt, and in stead own a ship which will do in-system trips, but no FTL and no life support..." It sighed and waved the hand not holding the parcel in no particular direction. "Alright, I guess that's actually kind of good news. Needs work, but not a total wreck... And... It is ours? Really ours? Mortgage, I guess, no one just buys a ship outright, no way we could make that kind of money up in two years, even with the jobs we've been given."

Shouta nodded and his smile returned. "Yes, it's really ours. We got a mortgage on it, but the company doesn't own us any longer. This is ours, we own our own contracts now. This baby's our future! We're independent now."

Turan tilted its head, and Shouta giggled, thinking his assistant suddenly looked much more like the orange tabby whose genes it shared.

"We're... Free?"

"Yes," Shouta replied. "We're free. Now, life support's not working, but the ship's on station air supply, so you'll be fine. Shall we take a look inside?" He held out an arm towards the ships entryway.

Turan nodded and they both started walking in the direction Shouta had indicated. "And this?" Turan held up the parcel.

Shouta chuckled and winked "Well, why do you think I asked you to come as you were? I can't be the only one getting a new uniform here."

Turan's eyebrows raised, and then it chuckled as well "No. No, I guess I do need to look nice as well."

Chapter 2

Jake was woken up by the sound of the other people he shared a cabin with chatting loudly and rummaging around, and the guy in the bunk under him stood up and gently shook him by the shoulder.

"Hey Jake, pal, time to get up, we're nearly there!"

Jake got up on his elbow "What, really? I slept through the call?" He flopped back down on his back and put a hand on his forehead, the spinning room having just reminded him about the previous night.

"Ouch... When did I get to bed last night? Wait...  How did I get to bed last night?"

The others laughed, and the same guy spoke again. Through the blurriness of having just woken up and a beginning hangover, Jack remembered the guy was called Jones. The others had spent most of the trip joking about the coincidence of their combined names being that of a defunct clothing company.

It'd taken him three weeks to get from Earth Station to Sol 2, and from there it had taken two weeks to get to the jump point for Gliese 581, and after the jump another nearly four weeks to get to Newton. The last two legs had been on board Forcefully Deterministic, one of the Carrier Combined Universal class ships part of the Earth fleet. They didn't do transportation, they weren't allowed to run a business like that, but an unbound nohnas could get transport by signing for a single trip, if there was a job opening.

Jake had been trained as environmental technician, and was lucky enough that Forcefully was in need of someone to take over for one of the signed crew, who was on maternity for the trip. They had, however, been back on the job for a week, so Jake had the rest of the journey to himself. His roomies were all crew, but had been taking care of him, and making sure that he had spent way too much time in the rec room - most definitely too much time in the bar. The beer was nasty, but really cheap, and being part shark meant he needed a lot more liquid than the others. So, needing to drink a lot, he was able to do it pretty quickly as well. Good party trick, but kind of a dangerous one if you weren't really used to the alcohol.

His webbed fingers covered his face, blocking out the light, which right now seemed way too bright. He groaned and nodded as he slowly sat up, legs dangling over the edge and his grey mottled forehead resting in his hand as he got ready to get up.

"Guys, seriously, thanks for last night, but... hope I didn't make an idiot of myself, I really... I remember nothing at all from around shift end..."

Jones stood up again, with a broad smirk, and slapped the shark on his shoulder, with obvious knowledge of what that kind of motion did to a hung over person.

"Nah, you were fine, pal, didn't throw up or anything! Pretty sure the karaoke system's going to need going over, though, not sure it could handle that kind of abuse. Impressive voice you got!"

Jake groaned loudly, and Jones and the others laughed heartily. Hung over was fun, to others. Their laughter wasn't malicious, though, they were just enjoying a bit of fun at the expense of a guy they wouldn't be seeing again. Someone who they, so they said, had enjoyed bunking with. Jones confirmed Jake's thoughts.

"But seriously, pal, really, you were good. It's been great having you with us. We're going on station if you want to join us, jump a couple of the bars on grey 4."

Jake arched an eye ridge, and Jones laughed.

"That sobered you alright. Yeah, alright, I know what they say about the place. Don't worry, pal, you're with us. You'll be fine. Anyway, it's on us. We had a chat after we got you into your bunk yesterday, we wanna give you a proper sending off. Been great having you, and we didn't want to just kick you out, you know?"

Jake lowered himself onto the floor and stood to face Jones. Looked around to the other two, who looked amused, but serious enough, and then back to Jones.

"Seriously?"

"Seriously. Just get your gear together. Dock is going to happen in about an hour, you want to be sorted before then. Can't have anything floating about."

Jake remembered the outward journey. The ship was too big for AG fields to work right, so it had to use rotation to keep the crew attached to the floor, but it also meant that there was no gravity while the ship was going in and out of dock. The navigation adjustments they needed to make for the docking procedures were just too fine, and the stability the rotation normally granted the ship became a problem, so they stopped it for the duration. The intercom speaker crackled to life with a beep demanding attention.

"Attention." The captain's voice left no question that that's what her position was on the ship. "Docking in an hour. Make sure you are safe. Those on dock privilege, make sure your duffle bag is stowed with the equipment station before takehold is called."

"We should go pretty soon, there's always a line. Should've woken you sooner, Jake, but you looked like you needed it." One of the others said as he tossed his duffle on the lower bunk on their side after packing it.

"It's alright. Need to do a quick run to the showers first." Jake had been stuffing his duffle, and now grabbed a towel and stripped down. "Drying out a bit here, gonna get really bad before we get onto the dock."

"Oh yeah! Not used to hanging with watery peeps. You know where the showers are, we'll wait for ya."

"Thanks guys!"

---

Jake walked out of the door and into the barracks, and headed towards the showers. Lot of traffic in the corridor, mostly headed forward to the lifts, and some headed the same way as the shark. He got to the showers and hung the towel on one of the hooks, and went into one of the cubicles. After closing the door he held his wrist to the reader by the panel, which beeped and presented the available options and he pressed the extra-wet button. He held up his arms, and the water rushed out of the jets and onto his grey and white skin, and he sighed pleasurably as he felt it loosen up again, after having gone tight over night as usual.

The eternal problem of a semi-aquatic nohnas, skin drying out when up in the air. At least the air in Forcefully Deterministic's barracks was a reasonable humidity, but it wasn't exactly a pool of water. Jake was very happy that at least the military ensured the water rations for aquas was higher than usual, the were able to shower often, and not just with steam jets, but with actual water jets. Helped keep it at bay when you weren't sorting out the water tanks themselves.

The water stopped and the drying cycle kicked in. Jake let it run for a moment and then hit the cancel button for it. He was doing this to stop his skin being dry. Didn't need the dryer to mess that up. He exited the shower and went over to grab his towel, and as he was towelling off a few stray droplets, someone came out of one of the other cubicles. They came over and slapped him on the back.

"Nice singing voice you got, serf!"

Jake frowned, and turned, and came face to face with the one person he'd hoped to avoid. Everywhere had them. They'd had them on Earth Station, they'd had them in the training facilities where he grew up. The military officially did not consider there to be any difference between nohnas and human personnel, but not all of their people had that opinion.

"Ha, thanks, man." Jake tried his best to shrug off the attention and continued towelling himself. He started towards the exit, as he felt not so much a slap as a shove on his back. He stumbled forward and Lawrence stepped forward towards him. Jake should have not been surprised, Lawrence had tried it on before, but not bodily.

"Too good to spend time with your fans, huh, serf?" Lawrence shoved him again, hard, and Jake was pushed into the corner of the entrance, and fell into the hallway. Lawrence was right behind him.

"How come a shoulderless freak like you think they're better than us? We made you!"

Lawrence moved to kick Jake, who only just managed to roll out of the way.

"What is wrong with you?!" Jake tried to get up, but Lawrence was there, a foot landed in Jake's stomach. Jake roared and rolled onto his back with the force of the kick. Lawrence stood above him, kicked the shark again.

"Get up, freak!" And again.

"Attention on deck!"

A booming voice cut through the corridor, and loud, heavy footsteps came closer. Lawrence stopped kicking and stood to attention, leaving Jake to curl up around his painful midsection. The footsteps stopped immediately in front of Lawrence, and lieutenant Mills spoke in a much less loud, but no less serious sounding voice.

"What the hell is going on here, Mr Jackson? What could be so bad that our guest here needed a pummelling?"

"Sir! Self defence, Sir!"

"Are you lying, Mr Jackson?"

"No, Sir!"

"I think you are, Mr Jackson." Mills turned around to face the others in the corridor, who had been stopped in their tracks, surprised enough by the sudden outbreak to do nothing.

"And I don't suppose any of you lot saw anything?" Silence from everybody through the corridor. Jake had uncurled and managed to sit up with his back against the bulkhead. Panting, an arm wrapped around his torso, he had his eyes closed, and a trickle of blood running down the side of his face. It took no small effort to put a hole through a shark's skin, and Lawrence hadn't been holding back.

Mills kneeled down beside Jake, and gently held up his head with a hand, looked at the wound, let go of the chin and looked down over him, and then stood back up. He motioned for two of the others in the corridor.

"Simmons. Wallace. Get him to the meds for a checkup. Takehold's in fourtyfive minutes, people, let's be sharp here. And you, Mr Jackson." Mills turned back to face him. "You're a tech. You just won latrine duty for the next month, you can put your skills to good use there. Understood?"

"Understood, Sir."

"Dismissed." Mills left, and Lawrence glared after Jake and the two who were helping him towards med deck.

"I'll see you on Newton, serf."

---

Arnold Jones looked across the table at the others with a heavy frown, and they looked back with equally serious expressions. He looked from Marley, down on the table. Up to Tamashiro and back to his hands. He threw the cards on the table.

"I fold." He leaned back against the bulkhead of his bunk and sighed: "Guys, he's been a while."

"You think he's alright?" Tamashiro threw his cards on the table as well. "Wanna go go check?"

Jones nodded. "Yeah, kind of do. Getting a bit close." As though called, the speaker rang out.

"Flight deck here. We're on the clock, people, 30 minutes until takehold. 30 minutes."

"Right, going to check." Jones got up from his bunk and moved to leave.

"Hang on, I'll come with you." Tamashiro got up as well. "Marley, hang back and keep an eye out, call us if he comes back and we missed him?"

Marley nodded, and the two others left the room and came into an uncharacteristically quiet corridor, considering it was getting close to dock time. Jones frowned as they walked quickly to the showers, and after a quick look could conclude that Jake wasn't there.

"Jake? Jake, you here?" Tamashiro asked, loudly.

One of the others, engineer called Steil, came up and leaned against the bulkhead outside the shower room, arms crossed, and looked at them for a bit.

"Lawrence." He said, and Jones suddenly got an unpleasant, sinking feeling in his gut. His face must have shown it.

"Jake's alright. Bruised, but that skin of his is tough stuff, he'll be fine. Simmons and Wallace took him down to the meds, they came back and said he was ok. He was asking for you, Jones, guess they didn't get to finding you."

"Shit." Tamashiro muttered  "Hell with that guy, why's he got to be like that?"

"Don't know" Steil said. "But he earned himself latrine duty for it."

Jones grunted a not exactly heart felt laugh. "Guess there's that." He looked to Steil. "He's alright to take visitors, then?"

"Think so." Steil pushed off from the wall and started down the corridor towards the lifts to the rec hall, and looked back over his shoulder a moment. "Med 2"

"Thanks, man." Jones put a hand on Tamashiro's shoulder and nodded in the other direction. "Shall we?"

Tamashiro nodded, and as they started towards the med deck, he pointed down the hallway, towards their cabin. "Pick up Marley on the way?"

"Yeah, be good to have him along."

They stopped at the cabin and Marley was already ready to leave, having spent the time packing away the cards and the chips, stowing the table, and generally making the cabin safe for dock.

Marley wasn't a big talker, he wasn't the smoothest FTL emitter lens and Jones had always tried to go easy on him at the poker table, but he was a very useful guy to have around. He was big, really big, and his claws meant not even Lawrence had tried it on with him yet. When Jones told him where Jake was, he nodded and got up without a word, and went with them.

They walked hastily towards the med deck, around a third around the ring from their cabin.

---

Jake found himself held up by two people, he'd been barely aware that he was walking along, the world a blur that didn't quite make sense. Someone said something about putting something somewhere, and he felt himself lowered onto something soft. A sharp pain on his neck and the world slowly came back into focus.

Someone in a medic uniform stood beside him, and put something on a tray. "Just a hypo with stims, Jake, need you awake for this one." The medic bent over him, and looked at the side of his face, though unlike the bits on the other side of the room, the medic still seemed pretty badly blurry.

"Please keep as still as you can, Ser." The medic stood back up again and turned around.

"He'll be alright, thanks for bringing him down, though. Dismissed." He picked up something from the tray and turned back again to face Jake.

"Just going to poke you with something to numb your face a bit, alright? Sure you already know I can't use the wipes on you, got to stick this in you." He held up a syringe with a short needle.

"You won't feel it, just lie still." He put it against Jake's face and as he'd said, Jake didn't feel a thing.

"There we go. Going to take a look at that gash you got here, see if we can't get you fixed up quickly before takehold. Just try and lie as still as you can, alright?"

Jake nodded shortly, and the medic swapped the syringe for something else Jake couldn't see.

"The others told me that you got a booted in the face a couple of times, and to be honest, it kind of looks like it. Your left eye's going to need a bit of time before it's back to being right again. Don't worry, though, I've seen worse, back when it was all happening out by Upsilon Andromedae, things out there you just wouldn't believe."

All the while he was talking, he was poking at the left side of Jake's face. It was really odd, it didn't hurt much, but the guy kept putting bits of gauze to one side which looked more red than Jake normally liked things to be after they'd been in contact with his body.

Jake tried to adjust himself and pain to shoot up his side. He groaned loudly and held onto his side. The medic put a hand gently on his chest and frowned at him.

"Please lie still, Ser. Your model may have cartilagenous skeletons, but you still took a couple of kicks to the chest and it's going to hurt. I'm just finishing up the gash on your face here, but the scan was fine, no bleeding internally, just some bruising and a bit of tissue damage. You'll be fine, but right now, just lie still, alright?"

"Yes Sir, don't have to say that twice." Jake laid back down and groaned again, more quietly, as the medic continued working on his face.

---

Just as the three stepped through the inner door of the med deck's airlock, the medic was standing up from beside a bed where the grey bulk of a battered bipedal shark was laying on his back. He looked down at Jake and Jones could hear him speaking.

"That will keep the bleeding stopped. I cleaned the wound up and sewed it up. There's going to be a scar, but you'll be alright. Your eye might never be what it was, but you'll at least have sight left, but there might be a scar over some of it, so there's going to be some oddness there."

"He what?!" Tamashiro exclaimed. "Bugger that Lawrence, just wait 'till I get my hands on that bastard!"

Marley put an enormous hand on Tamashiro's shoulder, as small as the hand was big. "Relax" he said.

Jones nodded. "Take care of that later on, yeah."

The medic had turned to face them at Tamashiro's outburst. "Gentlemen. Our newest patient's bunkmates, I take it?"

Jones nodded again. "Yes, Sir, we are. How's he doing?"

"Thought you might be coming. He's taken a pretty hard beating, but he'll be alright. Going to keep him here during docking. I should really be sending you guys down to rec for takehold, but med deck's pretty quiet, so I'll log that I ordered you to stay here to stand security to Jake. Five minutes isn't really long enough, and I don't want you ending up up here after takehold's released."

"Yes Sir, thank you, Sir." Jones had seen what happened if you missed a takehold. During one of his first tours out, he and a couple of other privates had failed to respect the call for takehold in time. The reverse thrusters had started, and the deceleration had turned what had been a fun jumping around in the weightlessness of the ship's corridors into a death trap. Jones and two others had been lucky enough to be inside one of the rings, but one guy had been right outside the lengthways corridor, stretching all the way from one end of the ship to the other.

From the privates' barracks, it was close to 200 meters to the front bulkhead. At 3G of deceleration, it was bad enough to land on the bulkhead of the ring corridor. It was a very different story to fall those 200 meters. At least they'd not had to clean it up. First, the pile of jelly and bones was their friend. Second, they weren't part of the hazmat team, and it was that bad. No stretcher, just buckets. Jones still woke up bathed in sweat some nights, the scream of the falling guy ringing in his ears, and the horrified, confused face in that moment before he suddenly stopped hanging in the air and disappeared past the edge of the corridor's bulkhead.

Jones shivered at the thought, and shook his head as they walked over to the bed. They stood around it and Jake looked up at them.

"Hi guys. Sorry I didn't make it back in time."

Marley laughed heartily, and Tamashiro arched an eyebrow at him. "Dude, you for real?"

Jones smiled. "Doc fixed you up alright, then. How do you feel?"

Jake raised up a hand and closed his eyes, putting the hand over them "Worse than the hangover, that's for sure." He let the arm fall again, and looked around at them with his good eye. The other seemed to have some trouble focusing, like the doctor had suggested.

The speakers crackled into life. "Flight deck here. Takehold in sixty seconds, people. Sixty seconds. Countdown at ten. Deceleration begins thirty seconds after takehold and will continue for 2 hours."

The medic came up to them again. "Right. The AG field does help, but the sudden movements still mean takehold's vital. Jake is already strapped down here, but you guys need to get over there and strap yourselves in." He pointed in the direction of a row of fold-down seats on the forward bulkhead beside the airlock.

"Yes, Sir." Jones and the two others went where they had been told, and the medic went over to his work console and strapped himself in there. As the last buckle clicked into place, the speakers began the countdown.

"Ten. Nine. Eight. Seven. Six. Five. Four. Three. Two, thrusters igniting. One. Zero, takehold, rotation stopping."

A jolt of the deck as the ring slowed, and then stopped. They felt a slight change in the gravity, as the med deck's separate AG field kicked in. The place was essentially a separate ship, and in an emergency it could be undocked from the rest of the ship. It was easily small enough that it could sustain an AG field, so when the rotation shut down, the AG field was turned on. Standard procedure on most larger ships, which made sure that patients in med deck were safer during takehold situations. Though, for the hard burns when they left and arrived in systems was pretty hard, even with the AG field available.

"Deceleration begins in five. Four. Three. Two. One. Firing."

The feeling was dulled compared to the free floating sensation of the rec hall's takehold stations, but it was still pretty much like being punched by a giant fist, and forced against the back of the seat. Jake's bed had rotated some in response to the ship's new relative orientation to keep him from being pushed against the straps.

"Two hours, guys." Jones said. "Just two hours."

Jake groaned.

---

The pain in his side was excruciating. It had to be getting close to two hours now. He had his eyes closed, and they had been that way almost since decel began, so even if there was a clock over the med deck airlock, Jake didn't know. But he hoped. Really hoped. Doc had said the side was fine, that it was just bruising and that he hadn't snapped any of his cartilage. But it hurt really badly.

At least his skin was still moist enough from the shower. Oh that shower. Just a quick one before going back and stuffing their duffles. Sure. Damn that guy. He didn't even know the guy's name. Would've been on his chest, but he'd been so quick that Jake hadn't seen anything before the fist had landed in his face. He hadn't seen much afterwards either. Might have thick skin, but the guy had hard knuckles. And boots.

"Flight deck here. Deceleration stops in five, four, three, two, one, retros off." Jake gasped at the sudden jolt of the gravity returning to the standard again, the AG field keeping them in place after an initial juggle of repositioning. "Takehold is now released. Docking in twelve hours, takehold will be in effect at that time. Repeat. Takehold is released. Docking in twelve hours."

"Twelve hours?" Jake said. "That's kind of short, isn't it?"

He opened his eyes and turned his head, looking over to the others, who were unbuckling themselves and folding up the seats again. Jones looked over to him and shook his head.

"Nah, the speed restrictions out here aren't as crazy as in Sol. You never went very far from the homewell, so I'm sure that'll be a bit funny. This system, the speed restrictions are pretty close to nonexistent up to the g-zone mark. Jump entry restrictions kind of are, though, you're not supposed to do your entry much closer than the outermost planet, so those two weeks we've been travelling since reentry have been pretty speedy. First time I came in here, we entered way too far out our v was really low and even when we burnt nearly half our reserve fuel it still took us near enough a month to get to Newton. Two weeks is good here."

The medic had unbuckled as well, and stepped to Jake's side. He began to undo the straps holding him down.

"Now, you will need to take good care of your stitches. They should hold up alright, but try and avoid running into any more fists, would you?"

The last he said looking at Jake out the side of his eye. Jake was pretty sure he spotted a smirk on his previously serious face, but being on the side where the stitches were, he couldn't see too well.

"Right, let's get you up to sitting." The medic took Jake's hand and helped him sit up.

A dull, throbbing pain pushed its way up through his body, making sure that he was in no doubt that he had been introduced to some guy's boots earlier. "Aaaarh, that really smarts."

The medic leaned closer to look closer at the eye and he heard the others walking over from the forward bulkhead. As they were approaching, Tamashiro asked: "Doc, that eye doesn't look good... You sure it's going to be alright?"

"Guys, come on, I can't see my own face." He nearly moved, but the medic stopped him with a hand on the side of his head as he continued his frowning investigations. "Sorry, Sir. Is there a mirror? I'd kind of like to see how it looks... I think."

"You sure?"

Jones punched Tamashiro lightly on the shoulder: "Come on, Tam, it's not that bad."

The medic leaned back and nodded as he got up "Sure, we do have a small mirror, just a moment."

As the medic walked off, Tamashiro walked up in front of Jake and put a hand on either side of him, leaning up close to take a close look at the stitched up face. He frowned as he looked up and down at it: "Yeah, Arnie, it kind of does. Not sure I'd want to see that if it was on my face."

Jake leaned back, "Aw man, stop it! You're not making it any better." As he leaned back, he was quickly reminded that the face wasn't his only painful spot.

"Excuse me." The medic returned, and Tamashiro stepped aside as he handed Jake a small, hand-held mirror. "Remember, you just got kicked in the face, and you had a pretty nasty gash and a scratched eye. It's really not pretty, but functionally, you should be fine again soon. It'll continue to hurt for a couple of weeks, and the stitches will start to itch when the scabs grow. When they do, try and keep your hands off of it. If you want to keep the scarring small, don't pick at it."

Jake nodded. "The standard. Had some cuts before, and well, I scar easily. Got a long one running down my back from when I misjudged the space under some joists inside one of the tanks on Earth Station."

Jones frowned, and then got a bright look on his face, in that way you do when you remember something you didn't think you remembered. "Hey, saw this show ages ago, where they said a lot of sharks scar bright pink. That sort of thing happen to you as well?"

"Ha, yeah, it does. Guess that'll be pretty on my face, eh?" Jake remembered the mirror on his hand and held it up, and touched his face beside the stitches. "Damn, Tamashiro, you weren't kidding. Looks like... Well, guess it looks like I got kicked in the face, huh?"

The three others nodded and Jones replied. "Yeah, kind of does."

The medic nodded as well. "Well, takehold has been released, so if you want, you can go back to your cabin and sort things out there. Just had a chat with your duty officer, and the three of you have been officially assigned to Jake's security. I know you weren't on duty, so it doesn't clash. Sorry if you had other plans. Medically I want him under observation, that kick to the head doesn't look like it shook anything loose, but I want somebody near him just in case. Mills also wants you there for security. Going to level with you, guys. Lawrence has become a problem, and Mills has just told me that he's been put under investigations. He'll be allowed off ship and on his own, but there's going to be people tailing him. If he slips them and comes looking for Jake, Mills wants you there to help."

As he spoke, Jake watched the expression on Marley's normally relaxed face grow stern, the way the two others were going as well. Lawrence. He should've realised. How he'd managed to avoid Lawrence the four weeks ship-time he'd been on board, Jake really had no idea, but looks like Lawrence had been waiting for the chance, and finally took it when they by chance ran into each other in that shower.

"Guess I shouldn't have gone for that shower on my own."

Jones put a hand on his upper arm and smirked in what Jake thought was an uncharacteristically gentle fashion. "It's ok. No-one expects to get hit like that, not in the showers. Ship's kind of big, though, not sure why Lawrence was up our end, he's not supposed to be in our barracks."

"Got a sweetheart down in 2e16. Buggered if I know what she sees in that jerk."

Jones looked taken aback, Jake guessed both by the fact that Marley had uttered more than three words strung to a sentence, and by the fact that he knew more than the rest of them. "Oh... kay? That I did not know. Where'd you hear that?"

"Just picked it up. They don't pull no PDA or nothing, just... You know, tell the way they look at 'chother."

The silence was nearly deafening. Jake found himself wondering why he now knew that the guy who'd punched his lights out had a girlfriend in the corridor he'd spent the last four weeks ship-time in. The ever present sound of the air cyclers was the only audible thing until Tamashiro put his hands on his hips and exclaimed: "Well, I guess there's someone for everybody!"

"Alright, gentlemen, I believe we're done here. Jake, you need to keep a good eye on your stitches, and make sure to not put too much stress on your left side for now. You three, remember your assignment. Dismissed."

Jake slowly slid off of the the bed as the medic spoke, and the other three saluted and said "Sir" before turning around and heading for the door. Jake held out his hand to the medic, who waited a moment before accepting it.

"Thank you, Sir. I know it's your job, but still, thanks."

"You are welcome. Remember, you got some good friends here." He glanced over to the three who were headed to the airlock. "We'll be in port for two weeks, I would like to see you again before we leave. I would also like to see you if you hurt too much."

"You coming, Jake?" Tamashiro was standing again with his hands on his hips.

"Sure, sorry." Jake nodded to the medic, who nodded in return, and then walked over to the airlock, happy to find that the pain, at least, was not quite so crazy when he was standing up and walking. He walked into the airlock with the others, and the door closed behind them.

---

They opened the outside door and left into the corridor, where Jake found himself surprised at having no weight and floating off down towards the break nook before Marley's enormous hand closed around the arm on what was luckily his good side, stopping him from flying head-first into the bulkhead.

"Woow!"

Tamashiro laughed loudly, and Jones grabbed a hold of Jake. "Handholds, please. I know, newbie error there, happens to us all. Sorry, should've reminded you."

"Thanks, it's alright." Jake replied bashfully, and grabbed a hold of one of the handholds. "So, what do we do now? Kind of need to drench a bit. That alright? And uhm, I should probably find some clothes."

Jones looked at Marley, who nodded and headed for their cabin. He looked back to Jones. "Marley's going to sort out your clothes, he sorted the cabin before we came to check on you. Tam and I will see you're safe in the shower. Lawrence'll be in rec, but better safe. Once is enough."

Jake nodded feebly, finding himself disheartened somewhat at the sentiment, realising that he was now a ward. He'd got out of being a state ward, now he was a military one. Oh well. At least this one was because they liked him, and cared about him.

They went down towards the showers, hand-over-handing their way along the corridor by the rails along the bulkheads. Jake went into one of the cubicles and had his soaking, while Jones and Tamashiro stood outside and kept a watchful eye. Not many others were there, just a couple of people on their way back on shift. Quietly floating about, businesslike. Some getting into the showers, some leaving and heading out. A few minutes, and Jake came back out.

He slowly opened the door and peeked around past it, before opening it up fully and getting out. Jones sighed, and hoped Jake didn't see it. Tamashiro tossed him a towel with a friendly "Here you go", and Jake managed to mumble "Thanks" and towelled himself down, but his eyes were jetting around, watching the room. It was clear that he was scared of the place, it was only a couple of hours since he had been beaten up in this very room. Jones walked up to Jake and put a hand on his good arm, making sure Jake saw him approach.

"Back to the cabin?"

Jake nodded and wrapped the towel around his waist. "Back to the cabin."

In the cabin, Marley had pulled out a set of clothes for Jake, who picked the shirt up and looked around at the other, and to Jones he looked somewhat embarrassed. Jones realised what was going on the same time Jake opened his mouth to speak.

"Uhm... Might need some help here..."

Tamashiro laughed, but stepped over and picked up the shirt. "Sure thing, here you go. Broke a rib in combat a couple of times, know how that feels. Best to bite through the pride and ask for help. Easy with that arm, don't push too hard for now, kay?"

Jones smiled and crossed his arms over his chest. Tamashiro was a funny sort of guy. Always ready with a snarky comment, but just as ready to help anybody who needed it, especially friends. And over the last four weeks, Jake had become that. They'd not had to talk about that one, they were all three very happy with their new assignment. It didn't take long for Jake to get dressed with Tamashiro's help, though not without a few groans, and a struggle one might expect from someone not used to the lack of gravity, and in the meantime Marley packed up Jake's duffle again.

"Theeere you go." Tamashiro said.

"Right. Shall we head down to rec?" Jones asked. Jake looked a bit frightened, but nodded slowly.

"Yeah. Guess it's best. No use sitting here sulking, huh?" Jake looked around at the others, holding on to the edge of the bunk with one hand and picked up the duffle with the other.

Jones picked up his duffle, as did the others. He thought Jake looked somewhat downtrodden. It wasn't just the look of perpetually slumped shoulders his body had, but he'd always stood proud and straight, and had a clear gaze. That was not the case right now. It wasn't just the stitched-up gash on his face that changed his expression, as much as the shark's face was able to convey. There was a change, distinct and somehow serious. He just seemed, well, less sure of himself. Jones decided then, he promised himself, Jake would be ok. He had to be. They would be leaving without him, but they would make sure that he was ok before the board call.

---

They left for the rec hall, caught the lift down to the inside part of the ship, just before the large hold section in the centre of the cylinder where the large, zig-zagging space of the rec hall sat. The door opened onto a corridor which was decidedly more loud than the one they had just left. They pulled themselves out of the lift and down the corridor to the rec hall, where their entrance went all but unnoticed. The double-height hall was separated into two for the weighless part of the trip, and they entered the innermost part, and went down some way to where a group of their friends sat.

"Hi guys! Hang a left, grab a corner! Great you could join us, what took you so long?" A human female, Jake remembered her from last night, environmental engineer like himself, Jessie was her name. Jessie Dahlman. He'd worked with her during the trip a couple of times. Good, hard worker. Just as hard a partier.

"Hey Jake!" said another, and pointed at his face. "What's up with the stitches?" 

"Lawrence happened." Jones said, in that straight forward and to the point way he had. "Caught him in the showers, caught himself extra duties for it."

Tamashiro shaked Jake gently and laughed "Yup, he got himself some bodyguards. Going to be just fine, doc says. So, what about those beers, eh?"

"Lawrence?!" another said, a tiny nohnas named Darren, and growled. "Complete mongrel bastard, that one."

"Ha! Look who's talking!" Jessie said, and ruffled Darren's head. The others laughed and Darren slapped at her hand.

"Oi! I'm not as bad as Lawrence on that, thank you very much!" he replied, with a smirk. Jake realised that he'd gotten used to the rough but friendly atmosphere around the squaddies.

Jake found to his surprise that he was happy all of a sudden, to see them, to be amongst people he knew and he knew cared about him at least somewhat, and smiled broadly.

"Good to see you too, guys. Going to miss you!"

Jessie smirked at Jake, and then held out her beer squeezie, an odd way of serving it that Jake as someone who hadn't grown up on a ship still thought complete strangeness. "How about, to the future?"

Jones, who had picked up a squeezie for himself and the other three, held out his one. "To the future. We'll make sure he gets off to a good one."

Jake looked up at him, then, surprised at the conviction in his voice, and saw Jones looking at the centre of the space where the squeezies were being held out at each other with just as much conviction showing on his face. Jake held out his own.

"To the future. Thanks you guys."

The others held out theirs also. "To the future."

Finally, in the quiet moment after they all pulled back and had a swig, Tamashiro laughed and held his out again:

"And to karaoke!"

The table erupted with laughter, and Jake almost forgot the pain in his side, and that he couldn't see much on his left side.