Chapter 22

A light twinkling of bells announces someone at the door.

"Come in," Brigit calls out, and the door slides open, and the Maiden walks in. She has left her formal wear behind and is wearing a typical Tyche crew ship suit.

"I'll take that tour now if you're not busy." The Maiden says.

Brigit closes the applications open on her desk and stands up, brushing off the dress uniform that she hasn't changed out of yet, even though it has been over an hour. "Let's go."

As they are heading out of the door, Brigit turns to the Maiden and smiles, "It occurred to me as I was doing paperwork that you've already seen the ship, at least the specs and design plans and such. You had to approve the budget for it."

"Well yeah," The Maiden says as they continue walking, "But until now, I haven't been inside of the ship yet. We don't get a lot of time to do things like that. Not that I'm complaining, mind you."

It isn't long before they are at the lock. "I figured I'd start here since this is where people first see the ship. So right down this way is the technology nook."

"Hmm.." Brigit looks around with a smile, taking in the neat cleanliness. The two that used the nook have affixed all the tools that stayed out-such as assorted clamps, bulky electronic tests, and such- to the work surface. They have tucked everything else away in the magnetically locked bins. And, since she knows Rory, she knows that if she opens any of the bins, they would be messy. Though Rory knows where everything is unless someone tries to clean or organize it.

At the querying look from the Maiden, she says. "It's only clean like this while we're under way. When docked, it's like a zephyr wind swept through here."

"And of course, here are your quarters, but you knew that." She smiles before continuing. "And this is the engine room. I remember Rory idly wondering why they call it an engine room still when there isn't an engine in here.."

"Tradition," The Maiden says. "Peer pressure from the dead."

Brigit laughs. "I suppose it is at that. Well, over there are the sail generators, at full sail now. And actually, more than we've done in the past. It turns out there is quite a large safety cushion, and we aren't even close to maxing out the power."

"That is the Transition Drive, isn't it?", The Maiden points to the gigantic machine at the back of the room. Though it's hard to tell that it is a machine, as it is a smooth cube with all the complexities hidden within.

"Yeah, and over on the far side is the passageway to the 'Swamp,' as people call it. Otherwise called environmental. It's humid and warm and smells vaguely of algae." Brigit says.

"I haven't seen one of the new Transition Drives up close. They've gotten bigger. We can skip environmental." She smiles, and Brigit walked with her back to the corridor.

"Yeah, the range on these is getting better and better. Pretty soon, we won't need jump ships..." Brigit muses as they continue the tour.

"So down this way and around the corner is the heart of the ship." As they enter the kitchen/dining/lounge area, Doc is working on a batch of bread and eclairs for dinner.

"Hiya Cap, Maiden. Want to sample an eclair before I finish?" Doc asks.

"Don't mind if I do." The Maiden glides over and takes an eclair, looks at it, sniffs it, a low hum of approval escapes her lips as she takes a bite, closing her eyes and moaning in appreciation. "This is wonderful!" The rest disappears almost as fast.

Doc ducks his head and says, "Thank you very much. I only started with patisseries recently, and I look forward to experimenting more."

"And over here," Brigit continues as the Maiden grabs another eclair, "Is the lounge. We eat most of our meals in the dining room, but now and again, we'll eat in here and watch a holo."

"Ooh, have you guys seen the new holo, Sky Seed?" As they both shake their heads, the Maiden continues, and for a moment, she acts as someone her age and not the persona she projects as her enthusiasm boils forth, "Oh wow, you have got to see it! It's about a non-Accord terraforming company trying to terraform an Accord moon and the difficulties they run into, and they somehow made it funny as well. It's really, quite good." She ends and finally takes a breath.

"I'll have to check it out. Will you get us a copy, Tyche? Shall we continue, Maiden?"

Tyche just beeps in response as The Maiden turns and follows Brigit out, leaving Doc to continue with his baking.

"So up here near to the kitchen area is the exercise bay. You'll notice the familiar sights of machines, mats over there, and a sauna right by the shower facilities. But you might not have seen this over here." Brigit leads The Maiden over to the climbing machine.

"Wow, this looks intense. The glass walls are for environmental, right?" She asks as she enters the main climbing area.

"You can imitate all features of a climb. It seals to create an environment. For instance, thin air, cold, hot, that sort of thing. It can even simulate wind. Tyche, beginner set up, no environment." Brigit says as she orders up a climb. As they watch, the wall changes from a featureless wall with hand and footholds to a real-looking rock face.

The Maiden walks up to the wall in wonder. "Wow, this looks real!" She reaches out and runs her fingertips along the rock face and says, "It feels real, too!"

"Yeah, it was a great idea that Adair had. We love to climb, and they couldn't stand the thought of going weeks or months without climbing. I can show you quickly how it works, but we'll have to do a real climb later, as I need to get some sleep before my next watch." Brigit explains.

The Maiden nods, and Brigit quickly ascends the beginner wall, and when she gets to the midpoint, the wall moves and creates more rock face for her to climb. After a few dozen feet, she jumps down and rolls, coming to stand next to The Maiden.

"That is amazing." The Maiden says with pride. When her people invent something new, everyone benefits. For instance, they will install this climbing machine on all new ships and retrofit it on old ships when possible.

"It really is. Shall we head back?" Brigit asks.

"I'll lead the way. Let's see if I can get back to my room from here." The Maiden says.

#

When Cali enters, Rory is in environmental watering the herbs. "Hey, do you have a minute?"

"Sure," Rory answers, without looking up from watering. "What's up?"

"Are you okay? I noticed that you've seemed a bit off ever since The Maiden came aboard." Cali leans against a wall, but not before checking it for buttons first.

"Step into my office," Rory waves her arm to the corner of environmental. As they walk over, it astonishes Cali what Rory has done to the swamp. In a little corner nook, Rory has created a casual area. In a space about the size of the restroom is a sizeable plush carpet rug, lots of pillows - too many to count - and several strings of party lights. Also included in the alcove is a smaller nook with a little food prep area, primarily for tea, and a place to warm previously cooked food.

"This is amazing, Rory. Wow," Cali says as she looks around before plopping down on a group of pillows and moving some around to make herself comfortable. "This is like a nest. I love it."

"Thanks. Tea?" Rory asks. At Cali's shaking of her head, she sits down on her own stack of pillows. Then, after crossing her legs in front of her, she asks, "Do you know my history?"

"Not really. Just surface things like you grew up on Cat's Eye. You are friends of Adair and Brigit, and I met you through them." She shakes her head. "I'm sorry that I haven't been a good friend and crewmate by not showing more interest in not just you, but everyone. I'll remedy that, see if I don't."

"It's okay. You're here now; no one else is. So don't beat yourself up too much." Rory smiles and leans back against the wall. "So you know how each world elects a False Maiden and they go on to train to be Maiden for when the day comes when the Crone leaves her post? They stay in government their whole lives in case something happens to the members of the Executive. They elected me to be a False Maiden..." She trails off and watches Cali's reaction.

Cali can see the guilt and on Rory's face and how she is looking to her for approval. She hopes she can ease that worry by reaching over and taking Rory's hands in hers to comfort.

"Isn't there pretty much one who declines almost every time?" Cali asks, and when Rory nods, she continues, "Well then, if it has to be someone, I can totally see why it would be you. You excel in your fields, and well, I know you sometimes struggle with the finer subtleties of societal interaction, which is a pretty important ability for a False Maiden to have." She looks over. "I didn't mean offense."

Rory smiles. "No offense taken. However, it would be a lot easier if people acted predictably like plants and machines!"

"Well, when you study them enough, I think you'll find that with exceptions, of course, most people act pretty predictably. Of course, in Accord space, that predictability is pretty good. Outside of Accord space, however..." she trails off.

It is there for only a moment, but Cali sees the smile of Rory's cheerful demeanor drop, replaced by a downward look and a frown of a fleeting moment of sadness. "You okay?" She asks, "I didn't mean to bring up something painful..."

Rory spends some time staring into space. It looks like she is gathering the courage to speak to Cali, but in reality, she is wondering if she can trust Cali. She had known her for a while, liked her; she is a crewmate. But this was a higher level of trust. So finally, after she spends a moment looking into Cali's eyes with hands clasped, she turns to Cali and starts her story. "You know how we all go on the Bounding..."