Chapter Fourteen: She Cried From Space

Chapter Fourteen

Families were a peculiar entity. Each one was different yet they were all based off the same basic kinds of people. Families didn't involve rocket scientists, watermelon farmers, or brilliant physicians even though a few families had rocket scientists, watermelon farmers, and brilliant physicians. No, families were comprised of fathers, daughters, and mothers. Families were far from being that simple however.

Back before the Catrion War had really gotten going, my father had had an older brother named Roger and a younger sister named Valerie. From the stories I'd been told, Roger had been something of a hero to his little brother. Roger was humble, kind, and generous; he was also good at whatever he did. My father always admired the way Roger sat his mind to a task and completed it with what had appeared to be a natural talent.

Valerie Griffin, my father's little sis', loved life. She adored yellow dandelions, corny cartoons, and long walks in uncrowded shopping malls. One thing my father had known her for was the grace with which she helped people. She'd been the kind of person who went out of their way to brighten the lives of others, often risking confrontation in elevators for holding the door open a few seconds longer in case one more person wanted a ride to the first floor, or anonymously returning discarded groceries back to the shelf they belonged. It was after her my father had named me.

On my mother's side, there was just one uncle but I didn't know much about him. My mother said he was always very protective of her when they were younger; she thought it might have been because of her paraplegia as an infant. According to my father, his brother-in-law was always irritible and cranky. Mom speculated the cause for such behavior (as it apparently only happened around my dad) was a kiss my parents had shared early on in their relationship.

Thus, I could give Victor absolutely no information on my uncle; I hadn't even met the guy. I still had to put up with Victor's unabating questions.

"How did he know your name?" Victor wondered, sitting next to me.

I shrugged, "I don't know--he could've picked it up anywhere. He is my uncle after all." Deep down, I wondered how much longer I'd have to try convincing Victor I knew nothing about the guy. "I'm actually kind of curious how he knew I was here."

Amazingly, I'd succeeded in getting Victor off my case!

"Hmm," His elongated facial expressions showed how surprised he was I'd been singled out. "The E.S. Pheonix Ashe is an Atlantean Class Carrier, right? Maybe he used some obscure technology that's only available on that class of space ship; they're supposed to be really advanced technologically."

I nodded, "It's possible,"

"It's hard to believe we're close to being rescued," Victor daydreamed.

"Yeah," I agreed. "Almost too good to be true,"

Whereas Victor was rather optimistic, I had my doubts; regardless of how my uncle could recognize me specifically, his ability to track me depended on his nearness to the ship I was on and if a homing device could be attached to its hull. Because my dad captained an Atlantean Class Carrier, I knew even this sophisticated breed of spacecraft didn't have the technology to follow a rogue spaceship without a tracking device of some sort. It just wasn't possible.

My pessimism left Victor with nothing else to say on the subject.

"Maybe," He thought aloud. "There's a way to send a message to your uncle."

Figuring his words were purely speculative, I shrugged them off. "I'd much rather send a message to the E.S. Next Dimension."

Undeterred, Victor acknowledged that might have been possible too.

"If my idea works at all, then you could speak to the President of Mars if you wanted."

He had that serious contemplative look on his face, the same he'd worn when I'd asked him what he wanted for his birthday last year.

"Well, that last bit is probably not true."

Unbothered by my inability to speak to the President of Mars, I listened interested. "What's your idea? I wanna know."

The possibility of speaking to my father again, let alone any of my family members, seemed far-away and dreamlike.

Victor lost some of his confidence right before responding. "I'm not entirely syre we'll succeed, but I think there's a chance.'

Exasperated, I pestered him for more information. "Just a minute ago, you were saying you thought I could talk to the freakin' President of Mars--what changed?"

"You see, I think I might know where there's an active computer terminal that can communicate through space." Victor's tone suggested there was a catch.

"Is that it?" As condescending as my question sounded, I was quite thrilled.

"Yes, well, most of it." He pushed his light-brown bangs out of his eyes; it had been a while since his fast-growning hair had been cut.

"Worst-case scenario is that some of the functions work but to get the computer operating entirely, I may have to rebuild it from other conmputers I can find on the ship and I have no idea how long that'll take."

I nodded, seeing where he was coming from--until a question struck my mind. "Wait, how are there any computers at all on this ship? Isn't it a Catrion space ship?"

Although paying attention in class had never been a talent of mine, I knew beyond all doubt that the Catrions were technologically inferior to humanity in every way. Sure the genetic capabilities of the Catrions were equal to or superior than those of humans but that was the sole exception.

"Didn't I tell you?" Victor shook his head. "We're on a stolen human ship."

Stunned, I stared at him until he spoke again.

"I don't know how they did it, but I'm confident they stole this ship."

The difficulty of throwing aside his news proved challenging. I knew it didn't matter much that I was a prisoner on a hijacked spaceship as opposed to a prisoner on a legally acquired one, but I had a gut feeling that I knew something about the ship Victor didn'/ Whatever that detail might have been, I couldn't say; it was like my mind knew it byt my consciousness wasn't willing to accept it so soon.

"So where's this computer?" I asked, eager to get back to the communicating with family part.

"What?" His expression went blank for a brief instant as his mind lagged behind. "Oh, yeah, that, follow me, I'll show you.

He wiggled away from both myself and the walls we had leaned against. I didn't have to be told twice to go with him; when Victor got to the airvent, he turned to see if I was ready and found my inertia caused me to crash into him. A few minutes later, after we'd finished laughing, we started into the duct work.

Victor headed to the right, towards the intersection which had intimidated me earlier. Reaching the juncture, he paused and examed the entrances to each of the different tunnels. I couldn't discern what exactly he was looking for until I saw a number written at the base of each intersecting ventilation duct.

He chose tunnel number seven.

Upon starting down this dark, curving tunnel, he started another conversation.

"you know, I found some other interesting things while exploring," He tilted his head down, looking as much at his feet as the crown of my skull. Had I not known him as well as I did, talking to his long bare feet would've indubitably freaked me out. Plus, there was the added weirdness of his shorts being baggy enough to showcase his hairy legs.

"Like what?" I asked, forcing myself to look at the dim, machined metal surface in front of me instead of risking an all-inclusive peep show. "Our stuff?"

"Actually, I haven't found all our stuff yet, it's why I gave you a pair of my shorts."

I looked down at the shorts I had on; if he hadn't told me they were his, I wouldn't have guessed it.

"I was talking about something else though." He crawled and talked as naturally as other people sipped coffee and discussed politics.

"Oh," While talking, I wondered how much my knees and elbows would ache if I had to traverse these ventilation ducts in gravity.

"Yeah," Victor negotiated a ninety-degree turn while nodding; he didn't realize his nod went almost totally unseen by me.

"I found the conservatory--it's not Lake Winnapeg, but it's an improvement over the rest of this hunk of scrap." Judging by his tone, the dirt in the conservatory was at least organic; there was no telling what the grit we trudged through had come from. "I can take you there if you want."

"Not to be rude or anything," I mumbled, "but I'd rather go to that computer than a feral park."

"I know what you mean," He consented. "Oh, we're here."

He pulled himself through an airvent I hadn't even seen us approaching. With him helping me, I pulled myself out into a vast and expansive room, a hangar by the looks of it. Roughly a quarter mile in front of me was the opposite wall, and from that wall to a point about thirty feet from where I stood was a long octagonal corridor with each side being about twice as wide as the hallways in Glenwood County High School, my uncle's health clinic. All along the eight walls of the giant corridor were air locks, each airlock had about forty feet between it and the next airlock. In the space not occupied by airlocks, hundreds of drawers, cabinets, and handrails whispered legends of the mechanics, engineers, and flight crews that once mingled near the airlocks.

I saw fifteen other corridors identical to the one in front of me, aside from the markings of each different squadron of fighters. Spaced evenly among the sixteen massive octagonal prisms, were nine more airlocks.

On the wall behind me, there were dozens of steel ladders in a criss-cross grid covering the entire surface. Each ladder led to a round door that said which deck was behind the door. The wall itself also wore a nametag in faded blue paint, "Fighter Bay Z."

If where I stood was the floor, I'd estimate the distance to the roof above me was about two and a half football-field-lengths. The proportions of the hangar certainly made one feel insignificant; spaceships were rarely limited by the same constictions placed on maritime vessels back on Earth.

Victor and I had entered into the bottom corner of Fighter Bay Z from an airvent beneath Deck 7 but above Deck 8. As if the hangar's nauseating size weren't disorienting enough, coming out of the wall sideways and upside-down in relation to the direction the words flowed totally scrambled my sense of direction.

"It's this way," Victor pointed diagonally and jumped three corridors up and two to the right, using the network of ladders to steer him to the opposite wall.

Rolowing his lead, I wondered if we'd be able to find our way back as our world spun on end. Without Victor leading me, I doubted my ability to return to my cell--not that I particularly cared to.

He stopped at the seventh airlock on the side beneath the side opposite the side nearest the side we entered the octagon from, at least, I thought it was that one. This airlock was different than all the others; above it, a tired light shone green. Sensing our presence, the airlock's pneumatic door zipped open hissing slightly.

"Welcome Bravo 74," A computerized female voice announced.

"Go ahead, you first." Victor half-poked, half-tickled my sides. "The working computer's on this fighter; I haven't yet found one that works on the main part of the ship."

"Is it safe?" I wondered, asking over my shoulder. "I mean, I don't want to accidentally release the fighter from the lock."

He nodded. "I'm pretty sure you'll be fine."

"Pretty sure isn't good enough!" I cried exuberantly. "I'm no pilot! I can't fly a spaceship if I do accidentally release it!"

"Relax," Victor soothed. "The fighter's computer even says the propulsion system is offline."

"Glaring at him, I swatted his nudging hands away with my tail.

Tentative in my approach, I sidled into the airlock. At the end of the relatively short tunnel was a fancy-looking red pleather seat. SLiding onto the cushion with my legs slipping into the designated cavities, I wondered what my mother had felt during the Catrion War; she'd been a fighter pilot and according to my dad, one of the best (although I personally always figured him to be flattering her). For a brief moment, I envisioned myself strapping into the seat while other fighters around me scrambled to dogfight hordes of attacking Catrions.

And then reality kicked in again. More specifically, a torn spot on the back of the seat pinched the fleshed beneath my shoulder blade. Wincing, I tried to reposition myself but to my utmost annoyance, the skin of my back stuck to the chair. Peeling my almost-bare back off the seat made a fantastic "shhhhlock" sound.

Once I was situated, I noticed the heads-up-display. The first thing I looked for was the detail Vicotr had promised would be there; "All propulsion units are nonfunctional and offline." Satisfied, I searched for a way to communicate with someone, anyone.

Before finding the icon I needed on the HUD, something else caught my attention; visible through the thin glass monitor and the thicker glass of the cockpit window were twelve letters in a row. Despite the dirt and grime covering the faded characters, I could still read them. Together, they read "E.S. KYOKUJITSU."

Bemused, I quickly found what I needed. Problems arose when I discovered how many different types of communication I had to choose from. There were literally dozens of options at m fingertips, ranging from short-range holographic video feed to intermediate range telephone broadcasts, to long-range HTML encryptions. On top of that, I honestly didn't know who I was exactly contacting; I didn't know if I could reach the E.S. Pheonix Ash or Next Dimension without their specific codes.

Unsure what else to do, I broadcasted my message on all frequencies, channels and methods of communication.

"hi, my name is Préyhen Valerie Griffin. I and at least five others are being held against our will aboard the E.S. Kyokujitsu. I do not know where we are going or when we will get there, but I do know that we need someone to help us. Please, if anyone receives this message, save us. I am sending this message in secret without the knowledge of my captors, so please, please be quick. I-In case help comes too late, I-I want my father and mother to know I love them and am sorry for-for everything.: I couldn't say anymore because I was already crying; those tears had caused me to slur several times already.

I didn't know it, but my family structure had just multiplied exponentially in size; every breathing soul had just adopted little Préyhen Valerie Griffin into their family, including the President of Mars.