The tech and slider preceded us up the ramp and had vanished before we reached the medical tech and the scanners awaiting us short of the lock. Out of custom and habit, I deferred, and was the last one to finish and rejoin the others in an open space beyond the lock chambers and inside the Magellan. The walls were gray, and the sole concession to decoration was the D.S.S. insignia on the wall to my right, under which was the name C.S.S. MAGELLAN, DSE-3.
Ruano glanced at us. “This is the midships quarterdeck, and we’re on the main deck. All the other decks are numbered outward. The even numbered decks are those above us, and the odd numbered ones are below the main deck. Second deck is the one above us, and third deck is below. Fourth deck is above second deck, all the way out to forty-eighth and forty-ninth deck. Fiftieth deck and fifty-first decks are the outermost decks, and the largest in size, because they hold the locks for the shuttles, needle-boats, and loading and unloading areas. Fiftieth deck covers the whole upper half of the ship, and fifty-first covers the whole lower half.”
“Wouldn’t it make more sense just to have circular decks?” asked Tomas.
“It would, except working out the grav system would be worse than the structure on a Gate. The compartmen-talization would be harder, too.” Ruano stopped. “We’ll take the center lift up to thirty-eighth deck. That’s where your quarters are. There’s also a ramp beside it in case we go to low-power conditions.”
There were three lifts, each capable of holding ten people.
Once we got to thirty-eighth deck, Ruano launched into another exposition. “As on Deep Find Station, the officers’ mess will serve both the ship’s officers and all of you who are detailed here as civilian experts. You may sit where you please, except at the captain’s table. That is by invitation only…”
As Ruano went on, I wondered what it was about the lieutenant that annoyed me. I’d certainly made the acquaintance of more than a few self-important, petty personages in academia, and they hadn’t annoyed me half so much as the young officer. That was something else I had let time obscure.
“… All your staterooms are along this passageway. Your names are on the doors. You are to use only the blue passageways on the Magellan, just like in Deep Find Station. If the captain orders ‘General Quarters,’ you are to remain in your stateroom or in your workstation. You are responsible for the cleanliness of your staterooms and work spaces. You have a cleaning facility for your garments on the same passageway.”
Ruano smiled with the satisfaction of an inept provost delivering an address to a hostile faculty. I’d observed more than a few of those encounters over the years, and Ruano was more adept than some of the provosts I’d encountered. That, unfortunately, wasn’t saying very much for either the lieutenant or those long-departed provosts who had equated academic brilliance and blind adherence to formulae with leadership.
“Are there any questions?”
“Do you know when we’ll be departing, and where we’re headed?” asked Melani.
“I can’t say, except that departure is not likely to be more than a few days away, if that.”
“Do you know?” asked Tomas dryly.
“No, Professor. I do not. I doubt that any of the officers and crew do, except for the captain, the exec, and the ops officer.”
Alyendra and I exchanged glances. Inquiring further would have served little purpose except to reveal greater ignorance on the lieutenant’s part, and such forced revelation would doubtless redound to our disadvantage in the future.
“If not, I will leave you to settle into your staterooms. Your work spaces are two decks up on forty-second deck above, and you may find your way there at your convenience, either by the lift or the ramp. Please use the blue passageways. The mess hours are the same as on Deep Find Station…”
Once Ruano had taken his leave, I made my way to my quarters, grandiloquently termed a stateroom, holding as it did a single bunk, with a deep green blanket folded in place, a full-length locker, and an attached multifunction fresher room, barely a meter and a half square. The stateroom proper did have a wall console, so that I could read and compose in privacy, or access what was open to me on the ship’s system, primarily what was termed popular entertainment. Unpacking my wardrobe, such as it was, took little time, and I was eager to see what my “work space” might be.
I went down the blue passageway and took the ramp up to the forty-second deck. There was an open hatchway, with the words SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCE on the greenish wall beside the hatch, presumably the spaces allocated to me and those with whom I had been quartered on Deep Find Station, as well as others I had not met.
I passed one open door and saw Tomas inspecting a console beneath a wall screen. The next door held my name, and from what I could tell, my space was identical to that of the political scientist.
I had to admit that the equipment was first-class. There was a single screen on the wall, showing an asteroid, indubitably the Deep Find Station from which we had been transferred so summarily, and a console that would handle more than anything I could have asked for, including multiple simultaneous inputs from datablocs.
“What do you think, Liam?”
Alyendra stood in my doorway.
I didn’t know what to think. The more I saw, the less I understood why I had even been included on what looked to be a scientific search—or plundering—of a defunct colony. Although others had suggested an alien culture was the objective, that seemed a wistful reverie. We had not found a single trace of aliens or forerunners among the thousands of worlds we had explored over the past three millennia. Why would such appear now?
As for a dead colony, my own expertise lay in analyzing documented trends, and I doubted that such colonists would have left much hard evidence or documentation. Dying civilizations seldom do. Their arts replicate what has gone before. Their technology stagnates, with but minor adaptations of what was created earlier. Political systems atrophy, with most debates and conflicts over who holds power, rather than how it is wielded or for whose benefit.
“Liam?”
“Oh… I’m pondering why anyone would wish to spend so many credits on providing me with such equipment, when it’s likely that my contribution to what they want will be so minuscule.”
“Did I hear what you said?” Alyendra raised her eyebrows. “The great Liam Fitzhugh… a minuscule contribution?”
“To this? Yes. We’ll be looking at a dead colony—or the remnants of one.”
“Perhaps they left records in one of the languages you speak.”
I hadn’t considered that, but it was a possibility. I didn’t consider it a possibility of high probability, but… it was possible. I nodded.
“And just possibly,” she added, “someone wanted your insights. They think it’s important enough that they’ve not let even the junior officers know. What do your remarkable insights say about that?”
“Military secrecy is so ingrained that I have doubts whether that signifies extraordinary significance. On the other hand, others might also reach the same conclusion, further obfuscating the magnitude of what awaits us.”
Alyendra shook her head. “You could have said you don’t know.” She smiled. “Would you care to accompany me up to the officers’ mess? We are approaching midday.”
I bowed and offered my arm.
“I’m not that infirm. Not yet.” She laughed.