3 - United

Transcript

At-Un was settling in. Which was always a big deal for At-Un. She never ‘settled’. She had in fact spent her entire adult life not really bothering to get used to any place she was currently at. But, weirdly, North Star was starting to feel very much like a home. More specifically, the people onboard were starting to feel like a family.

“Seriously though, you wanna see the nebula.” She said to Otis, who had taken to driving. She owed her adventure to his kindness back on Hermes, and she hadn’t forgotten it. But she had also not forgotten learning about the Spatula Nebula in school (or rather, her very alien equivalent of school, pretty much like you’d expect but with lasers). Ms Fronk had regaled the class with the story of the old war, and also pointed out how beautiful spatulas, and by extension the spatula shaped nebula, were and are.

“When I tried to point the ship at the nebula, Alpha materialized and started shaking his head at me.” Otis said, with his customary mix of authority and confusion. At-Un walked around what the crew seemed to have definitively decided was called the ‘control donut’, and put her hands on her hips, striking her most determined pose.

“Are you a man who takes orders from a hologram?”

A pause, while Otis considered.

“I mean, yes, definitely, he’s smarter than me and he’s from, you know, space.” Otis replied, shooing her away from the viewscreen she was stood in front of. At-Un leant forward, grabbed the control stick, and veered it left, towards the nebula. Alpha pixelated in the middle of the donut.

“No!”

“Yes, Alpha. It’s going to be fine and interesting and cool.”

Alpha pinged out of existence, as At-Un gave Otis her best ‘told you so’ look.

And then the alarm started. It sounded like a Jalaxian forest rhino trapped inside an imperial sentry droid. Very loud and screechy and unignorable. The oddest part, was it didn’t seem to be coming from the ship speakers. Alpha rematerialised.

“Oh no. Oh no oh no oh no oh no.” He said, unhelpfully.

The noise continued, Otis put his hands over his ears. At-Un was consistently disappointed by the limits of these humans’ biology. They seemed custom built to be boring at parties. The alarm was annoying, but she’d heard worse. I mean, she’d had worse composed in celebration of her by the people who’d fallen in love with her along the way.

She smiled. The smile was rudely interrupted by a voice even more cacophonous than the alarm which preceded it.

“THE VESSEL HAS ENTERED A SYSTEM BELONGING TO THE THIRD DYNASTY OF JERTVOR. PREPARE FOR JUDGEMENT.”

Alpha was still repeating his oh nos over and over. Otis was looking at her with a mix of fear and annoyance. Belto and Tara burst in, crowding the small room.

“What did you do?” Tara asked. At-Un noted that she asked Otis specifically, who gestured towards her in frustrated defence.

At-Un ran around to Otis’s console, started mashing buttons, but nothing seemed to work.

“The Jertvor Dynasty has temporarily taken control of all ship systems.” Alpha said mournfully. “We’re locked in. And they appear to be accessing our teleporter.

“Stop them!” Belto had clearly heard the same stories about the Jertvorians as At-Un had. The nasty ones. With the spikes and the complex pulley systems.

Alpha subdivided, duplicating into two, then four, then eight Alphas. They ran to each console, adjusting settings, taking control of the ship. At-Un especially appreciated the one who went over to the vending machine in the corner and took out four drinks, distributing them to the rest of the crew. That was the famous customer service you got with Proxy Clausula Five holographic assistants.

“JUDGEMENT IMMINENT, PLEASE DESIST RESISTANCE.”

At-Un looked at Otis. ‘I’m so sorry’ she mouthed. He gave her a kind smile, and then the lights all went off.

[intro music]

At-un heard someone gulp down their recently acquired vended beverage with a stoic defiance that impressed her.

“OK. What are our options?” Tara asked in the blackness. The only light was from Alpha, as multiple of him kept working the consoles.

“We don’t have any.” Said Belto.

The Dynasty of Jertvor was well known. At-Un explained to the humans that they had claimed control of this whole sector during the war, and even though that war was subsequently won and over, they still took those assertions very seriously.

“So why steer into it?” Otis asked.

That was a profoundly fair question. The honest answer was that At-Un had always assumed the stories about Jertvorian diplomacy were overblown, hyped up to make the nebula seem cooler. Or maybe put out by the Jertvorians themselves in a bid to impress and terrify the galaxy.

This didn’t feel very overblown anymore though.

And then everything burst into light and sparkles. They were being teleported. At-Un saw Alpha grab a portable projector off a shelf and hand it to a rapidly dematerialising Belto, before saluting them all in a somewhat underwhelming way. And then the crew were no longer on the ship, and everything was stars.

For a moment, At-Un assumed they’d been teleported into space. Not her first time. She exhaled and closed her eyes, as she knew she was meant to, if she ever found herself in a vacuum. She balled herself up, and awaited either death or a miracle.

She stayed that way for a good few seconds, before Belto kicked her.

“You alright?” He asked.

They were not in the vacuum. They were instead in a vast transparent chamber, seemingly hanging beneath a Jertvorian vessel. Gravity was slowly activating, and they sunk to the floor of the chamber. This was a prison cell. Outside, an impossible distance away, hung the North Star.

Belto squeezed the portable projector, and Alpha appeared, back to singular status now.

“Oh no.” He said, like a broken transmitter.

Otis helped At-Un up. She blushed and turned to the group.

“I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean for any of this to happen.”

Tara and Otis put their arms around her.

“It’s OK,” Tara said, “we’ll find a way out.”

Belto had raised an eyebrow. It was very clear that he would not be forgiving her quite as quickly as her new friends had.

A door appeared and opened in front of them, and a Jertvorian stepped out. She was tall, and incredibly skinny. At-Un had never seen one in person before, few had, as they kept themselves to themselves.

“Select a representative.” Said the Jertvorian.

The crew looked at each other. They’d never really gotten around to officially selecting a leader. Tara stepped forward.

“We don’t really have one, you see-”

“Representative noted.”

At-Un detected a moment of surprise on Tara’s face. It wasn’t fear, something else. She was surprised to have been endorsed. Tara didn’t seem to be aware of what everyone else was, that she was already leading them.

“Session begins, judge presiding.” Said the Jertvorian. “I am Suvak, judge for the sector known by outsiders as ‘The Spatula Nebula’. This name is offensive, but to speak the nebula’s true name to outsiders is blasphemy, so we shall use it.”

Circles appeared on the floor beneath each of their feet, columns of light swirled up: force fields. Tara tentatively touched hers, but an electronic hiss emanated, and her hand would not pass through. At-Un shook her head ‘no’ to her. At-Un admired that Tara’s default position to any barrier was to test it. She also noticed that Alpha had been left outside a forcefield, presumably because he was technology, not a person, in the eyes of Jertvorian law.

“Defendant movement limited. I hereby declare that should there be disruption, you will be neutralised immediately. Your compliance is required and expected.”

Tara raised her voice above the hum of the forcefields, “What!? What gives you the right to kidnapped us?”

Suvak strode between the forcefields.

“You are hereby charged with trespassing. Under interstellar treaty, such trespass is punishable by imprisonment for up to 700 years.”

At-Un winced. She’d be middle aged by that point. A long time. She wondered how long humans lived for, the expression on Otis’s face heavily implied ‘less than 700 years’.

“When found guilty, you will be transferred from this vessel to one of our prison worlds. You will be exposed to the full terror of an inhospitable climate and a grotesque array of our worst enemies. You will be granted with the opportunity to consider your actions fully, their impact on the Dynasty and all who toil for its purity and beauty.”Suvak made a somewhat disturbing face of pride at that thought. At-Un wondered how many of the stories she’d heard were true. She wondered if she’d ever forgive herself for getting her new friends into this.

“Our first question of your representative, is whether you are to be judged as a group, or would like to nominate the guilty party. If a guilty party is nominated, we will transport all others back to your ship.”

In future retellings of this story, At-Un imagined she’d embellish. Add a heavy pause. A terrifying gap in the action where she doubted her crew’s loyalty, whether they’d sacrifice her for their own good. She probably would have wondered that, if Tara had given her any time at all to do so.

“We stand united. We don’t nominate a guilty party.”

Tara turned to At-Un and smiled. It wasn’t even a hard decision to protect her friend. At-Un felt tears forming, but willed them away. Her species had that capacity.

“As you wish. We call our only witness, Zenith, sensor operator.”

A holographic screen appeared. Zenith was shorter and chubbier than Suvak (which still made him slim by human standards). He had the general bearing and demeanour that At-Un associated with all tech support people across the universe.

“Zenith, do you recognize these life forms?”

“I do, they are the crew of the ship named ‘North Star’. They entered Jertvorian space approximately ten minutes ago. We immediately asserted control of their ship’s systems, as is protocol, and teleported them here.” Zenith looked, if anything, bored.“You have no doubt that this is the crew of the ‘North Star’?” “I teleported them myself.”

Suvak smiled and nodded. “Thank you for your continued service, you are dismissed.” Zenith nodded, the screen disappeared. Suvak turned back to her ‘guests’.

“That ends the case for the prosecution. We will now move to judgement and sentencing.”

“Wait,” Alpha piped up, “I request attention.”

“This court does not recognize synthetics. I don’t talk to bulkheads either.”

Alpha paused, considering. At-Un wondered if he was forming an impassioned plea for his personhood. Perhaps he would demonstrate to the court that he was in fact a sentient life form, conscious of the world around him. Mortal, wracked with all the frailty and beauty which defined the living.

“Tara, could you repeat what I say, please?” Alpha finally said. Tara nodded. It looked like Alpha had zero interest in convincing this judge of his self evident rights.

“I require all information on Jertvorian law, as protected by the international treaty, in a readable format.”

“I require all information on Jertvorian law, as protected by the international treaty, in a readable format.”

“I will have my holographic assistant read it before we proceed.”

“I will have my holographic assistant read it before we proceed.”

Tara didn’t seem very excited to be playing this game, indeed, she seemed about as unexcited as Alpha sounded excited. Suvak sighed.

“By law, I am to provide that information to you if requested. I wish you hadn’t, it really does slow things down when the defendants try to defend themselves.”

Suvak made a hand gesture, and a bank of holographic pages filled the room. Each covered in tiny small print. Legalese. Text designed to never be read. Alpha immediately began reading it.

“You have ten minutes.” Suvak said, and left the room. At-Un had no idea what went on outside this chamber, but she very much got the impression that Suvak would really rather get back to whatever more interesting tasks she had on today.

-----

“We gotta escape” said Belto, once Suvak was gone. “We gotta find a way out of these restraints and back to North Star.”

“Not possible.” At-Un said.

“Not with that attitude!”

“Not with any attitude, Belto. We’re stuck.”

“Do you have it with you?” Belto asked. At-Un shot a look at him. She knew what the ‘it’ he was referring to was, and no, she had not brought it with her. It was safely back on the ship, at the foot of her bunk. Her look expressed anger, the fact that he should definitely shut his mouth, and that no, she had not expected to be kidnapped by an ancient warrior people, so did not make suitable preparations.

Alpha was still paying intent attention to the treaty documents. He was apparently a fast reader, and had made it halfway through.

“Let me take the stand to defend us, Tara.” At-Un said. “Maybe I can convince them you’re good people, that this was an accident.”

Tara considered it, she looked at Alpha. “It could buy us time, at least. Maybe a few more minutes.”

“Enough time for me to figure out an escape.” Said Belto, characteristically sure of his own abilities. Tara smiled. At-Un guessed she welcomed a bit of optimism from the crew right now.

“Alright,” Tara said, standing tall. “We’ll call At-Un as our witness. I don’t really have a plan after that, but I know all of us are going to try to figure one out, and I’m glad you’re all here with me.”The door to the chamber swung open, and Suvak returned. She looked a little tired, her robes slightly dishevelled. At-Un suspected she wasn’t used to cases dragging on like this. She imagined Suvak thought of the defendants as ‘frustrating’. She liked that. It made her hearts swell.

Alpha rejoined the group. “I’d like to confirm with the court that Tara is our representative.”

“As I said, please keep your synthetic quiet. I don’t have time to waste.” At-Un knew that was a lie, the judge had plenty of time to waste, she just didn’t want to.

Tara glanced at Alpha.

“No, I think I too would like to confirm that I am definitely the representative.”

“Yes, under the law, in light of the treaty, you represent the group. You have so far waived the right to nominate a guilty party and therefore continue to represent all defendants, who will be held to the decision and sentence of this court.” Her voice became more frustrated as it went on. “In all honesty, I can assure you that my views on sentencing become more draconian the longer you waste my time with these redundant questions.”

At-Un noticed that Belto was quietly testing the forcefield around him. She’d never seen a thing he couldn’t break out of. Suvak did not notice.

“We wish to call our own witness, At-Un.” Tara gestured at her.

Suvak sighed. She had five lungs, so it was a particularly deep and impressively emotive sigh. Suvak sighed like At-Un’s father did when she called him and asked for anything at all.

“As you wish. Quickly though, please.”

Suvak stepped back, and listened. Tara turned towards At-Un. “Can you tell the court how you met us?” She asked.

At-Un smiled at the memory. “I was in a bar, I met Otis, I bought him a drink, and then we rescued you from gangsters. It was a fun day.”

Belto pitched in, “I believe it was me who did the rescuing.”

“True. Belto saved you, I was the distraction. I’m good at distractions.” She was. But she also knew that that skill would be next to no use here. Suvak didn’t look like a distractible woman. Indeed, she looked like a woman frustrated by her own focus.

“Look. This is all my fault,” At-Un continued, unprompted, “if I hadn’t wanted to visit the nebula, we’d still be on track to that moon mystery of yours. I know what I did. Suvak,” she turned to address her directly, “please, accept my guilt. Let the rest of them go.”

Tara interjected, “As representative, I’m not going to let you do that, At-Un. We’re in this thing together.”

Suvak sighed again, although this time she only used two of her lungs. She was too frustrated to invest her entire respiratory system in service of communicating her displeasure. “Are we done?”

“I have a question!” Alpha said. Suvak began to respond but Tara cut her off, “go on, Alpha.”

Alpha paused, and chose his words carefully, “At-Un. Who does the North Star belong to?”

Odd. The answer was obvious, so she gave it. “To Tara and Otis, The non humans are just hitchhikers. I like to think we add a bit of colour to proceedings, but it’s their ship.”

“Thanks,” Alpha responded.

“You’re done.” Declared Suvak.

At-Un looked at Belto. He shook his head, and gave a four armed shrug. He was not going to be able to get them out of this.

“Your honor,” At-Un said, again closing her tear ducts, “take me, let them go!”

“You heard your representative. She voids your request.”

“I am guilty. I did this. It’s not fair that they suffer for what I did. I live by a philosophy..”

At-Un noticed Belto rolling his eyes. So she cut herself off.

“Just because I choose to live a certain way, doesn’t mean they should be punished with me. Please, take me and let them go.”

“The law is clear, the treaty must be maintained, all who enter this system follow the same procedure.” Suvak was straightening up her robe, ready to cast judgement, “I will never understand why so many people take the risk when we have made ourselves very clear, across all planets of the galaxy.”

“Not all the planets.” Alpha muttered.

Suvak turned, “What?”

“I thought you couldn’t hear me.”

“You know I can, AI, don’t waste my time. And yes, all planets. Did you not read the treaty?”

“I did. It was long and I was grateful for the ten minutes you gave me to read through it. It was relatively easy to read, because it was just a list of planets, moons and colonies who’ve signed the treaty. Every populated planet in the galaxy.”

Alpha smiled, and looked at the crew. At-Un was sure she saw a wink.

“Indeed,” Suvak said, “now, to sentencing, I feel that-”

“I didn’t see Earth on there.”

“What?” Suvak replied.

“Oh. I said I didn’t see Earth on there. It’s marked as an unpopulated planet on most starmaps. It’s also, well, not unpopulated. Turns out, it’s populated with a whole species of hairy bipeds who care a great deal about T-Shirts, and each other, and deciding that when a spaceship turns up that they should definitely get on it and see what’s out there. They’re kind of fantastic. ‘Humans’ they call themselves. Weird word, doesn’t really roll off the tongue.”

“And?”

“As you established, very clearly, Tara is the representative of the crew of a spaceship which belongs to her and Otis here. Both of them are humans. Both of them are from a planet that you were unaware of until 30 seconds ago, and with which you definitely don’t have a signed treaty.”

Alpha gestured at the treaty, as if inviting Suvak to double check it. Tara leant forward, as intimidating as she could be within a forcefield.

“Let us go, Suvak. You don’t have any power over us.”

Suvak looked confused. She took Alpha up on his offer and searched the treaty for any evidence against what the pesky hologram had said. If Earth had a population capable of owning a starship, it must surely have signed. At-Un couldn’t help but start laughing. She liked humans more and more every moment she spent with them. Not the sort to wait for permission to head to the stars.

“You heard the lady!” Shouted Belto.

Suvak turned back. A sneer darted across her face. “You are dismissed,” and then, through gritted teeth, “I apologize for the inconvenience.”

The forcefield cylinders retreated back into the floor. Belto looked set to lunge at Suvak, but Otis grabbed him firmly. Tara stepped forward, a hand outstretched to shake. Suvak was immediately confused, but after some miming from Otis, figured it out. They shook hands.

“Thank you for your help in this matter,” Tara said, sounding surprisingly official, “I am excited to begin trade negotiations and bring our two societies together, but for now, if you’ll excuse us, we’d like to go back to our ship and continue on our mission.”

Suvak looked down, ashamed, At-Un assumed, by the utter failure of her legal maneuvering. “Immediately.” She growled. And with that, they were back on the North Star.

----

The North Star sliced through space at rapid speed. Rainbow starlight flickered on its hull, as its grand engine roared hot and red. Onboard, the crew sat around the control donut, with Alpha in the middle, comfortably returned.

“We will be out of Jertvorian space in a few moments. We are now over half way to Proxy Clausula Five.” Alpha informed them. At-Un could tell he was relieved to no longer be playing lawyer. She imagined keeping four biological creatures alive in the cold of space was mildly more enjoyable.

Everyone seemed relieved. It did really seem like a lot of people out here were out to get them. She turned to Tara. “Thank you, Tara.”

Tara smiled and held her hand. Nothing more needed to be said.

“Incoming transmission, it’s broadcasting systemwide.”

“CASE CLOSED” It was Suvak’s voice again, booming and terrifying. “THE DYNASTY OF JERTVOR HAS DECLARED THE CREW OF THE NORTH STAR OUTSIDE OF JURISDICTION. THEY ARE FREE TO RETURN TO THEIR JOURNEY UNHARMED. THIS HAS NO BEARING ON THE TREATY, AND ALL FUTURE INCURSIONS WILL BE TREATED FAIRLY AND HARSHLY.”

Everyone was smiling now. Everyone except Belto.

“What’s wrong, man.” At-Un asked.

Belto tapped at the console, replaying a clip from the transmission.

“- FREE TO RETURN TO THEIR JOURNEY -”

At-Un didn’t understand. They were free. That was, by all measures, a good thing. She noticed that Alpha was also looking uncomfortable.

“They just declared the name of our ship, where we are,” Belto said, “they told anyone who wants to know our location where we are. And if that someone knew where we were coming from, they’d have a good idea where we’re headed.”

“The gang. Grunk” Otis said.

No smiles left now. Tara was the only one who looked hopeful. At-Un liked that about her. If today had taught her anything, it was that Tara was a born leader, even if she didn’t believe it herself, yet.

At-Un was more than a little scared. They were free, but those looking for Belto would be on their tail soon. She didn’t think she had the courage to tell her new, loyal friends that the gang might be looking for her too.

At-Un was probably going to have to tell everyone what was in her luggage.