Starmind Chapter 37 (Patreon)

With the game up and the golems not really necessary anymore, I tried to stop unlocking Basic Golem Developments. It turned out that I couldn’t; once I started a development, I had to finish it before picking another. That was good to know; a useful thing to learn. I just wished I’d learned it before starting something that took so long!

I told Varlanda all about my conversation with Sophia, what it had said and what I’d revealed, and she told the others. They weren't mad, though they were all very worried about Simeon. If anything, they were understanding — maybe even a tiny bit impressed!

“It's not like you have interrogation resistance- or cointel-training,” Temeri said matter of factly over the link — it was so good to have her speaking to me directly again! “It might have been possible to get out of that without revealing anything, but with the kind of suspicion Sophia had, I don't see how you wouldn't have been caught.”

Varlanda’s sigh was loud. “Really, Cap? You couldn't have put that in a nicer way?”

“This is the kind of thing that needs an objective assessment and honest feedback,” Temeri replied, “but I suppose… Star, under the circumstances, you did very well. Good job.”

“Thank you, Temeri!” My whole being glowed with pride at her praise. I’d been pretty self-conscious about how I hadn’t been able to think my way out of fessing up to Sophia, but Temeri sounded sincere — she’d just needed a little prodding. Which was fine! She was a military woman, more of a fighting captain than an administrative one, and she wasn't great at the social bits of command. I didn't mind. I knew she was coming around to trusting me, and that was all that mattered.

“So… what about Sim?” Bekeri asked. His tone was muted and anxious. He was worried. I think we all were. “Do you think he's really okay?”

I’d been forced to trust that Sophia wouldn't do anything that might hurt Simeon, but none of us had heard from him since the golems came to lead him away. Sophia insisted that he was just fine, if a little winded from his long walk, but we would all really have preferred to hear that from him. But allowing a temporary member of the crew to communicate with the group he’d been pressed into service from was apparently against some stupid rule or another, so we just had to take Sophia at its word.

“Um, can you tell them that I’m pretty sure that protecting her crew is really important to Sophia, and that he’s technically part of that now?” I asked Varlanda.

She passed my words along, and it seemed to help. At least Bekeri sounded a little less anxious.

“Captain,” Harvin said, “With your permission I’d like to try and find him. If I could pick up his thoughts we’d know for sure.”

“Granted,” Temeri said quickly. She didn't even comment on him using her rank! “I don't see how anyone could disagree that these circumstances are extenuating enough to justify divining a colleague. In your own time.”

“Yes, Captain!”

There were some receding footsteps as Harvin immediately got moving, followed by a silence. Then Temeri said, “Just because Harvin called me ‘Captain’ doesn't mean you need to ask.”

“Right,” Varlanda said, laughing just a bit. “I’ll just…”

Then there was more movement, by Varlanda judging by how the volume of the steps didn't change, and the sound of a door sliding shut.

“Oh, hey,” Harvin said softly.

“Hey,” Varlanda replied. “Scoot over.” Then there was a whole lot of rustling before she said, “Comfy?”

“Mmm, very. I’m gonna go deep now, alright?”

“Alright. I’ll be here whenever you come back up.”

There was a soft little Tchup! sound, a relaxed sigh, and then silence.

I managed to hold out for several long seconds before my confusion and curiosity got the better of me. “Varlanda, why does Harvin need you to help him get comfortable while he’s working?” I whispered. Only Varlanda could hear me, but whispering seemed like the thing to do.

For a long while, Varlanda didn’t respond. I almost got a little worried, but I could hear her breathing, so I knew she was there. Just not talking, for whatever reason.

“Varlanda?” I prompted, even more confused.

“Star!” she said, and the cheer in her voice sounded a little strained. “I thought you’d… from our memories… Ah, I’ll explain later, alright? Promise?”

“Okay…” I grumbled. Why was she being weird about it? Had I asked something strange, or rude? I hoped not! “Um… tell Harvin hi, okay?”

“I will, once he’s done finding Sim. But I think I should close the link now, alright? I don’t want to disturb Harvin, so there’s no reason to waste the mana.”

“Oh, yeah! That makes sense. But you’ll talk to me later, right?”

“Yeah, sweetie. I promise.”

Then she closed the link, leaving me wondering. Come to think of it, that night when I managed to contact her Harvin had mumbled something in his sleep, and he’d sounded very close. Had Sophia not given them enough beds?

I’d have to ask later.

*

“... so, after a couple of days with nothing to do but get to know each other better, we realized that we, you know, kind of liked each other. And we started, ah… sleeping together,” Varlanda explained later that day.

“I understand that part,” I told her. “I just don’t see why you’d be so strange about sharing a bed. I’m sure it’s very warm and cozy!”

“That’s not— Actually, you know what? That’s right. We have been sharing a bed, and it is very warm and cozy.”

I still wasn’t sure why that had been so hard for her to just come out and say, or why Harvin had thought it was so funny when he overheard her explaining to me about how sometimes two people found that they liked each other. Crew bodies were squishy, and they radiated lots of heat. And Crew liked to be warm! It made perfect sense! Then I had a brilliant idea. “Do you want me to merge your cabins?” I asked. “I could probably put your beds together, too, though it’ll still be the two mattresses. Then you can sleep together every night when you’re back!”

Varlanda sputtered a bit, and sounded very flustered as she said, “That’s a very kind offer, Star, but I think it’s a little early for that.”

“For what?” Harvin asked from somewhere nearby.

“Nothing,” she said evasively.

Harvin laughed. “Come on, tell me!”

“You should tell him!” I agreed. “Or I can just tell him when you all come back, I guess.”

Varlanda groaned. “Fine! Harv, she offered to merge our cabins. Give us a nice, big, double bed, too.”

“And you said no?” Harvin sounded immensely disappointed. “And here I thought we had something nice going.”

“Can we give it a month, at least? I’m sure she’ll be happy to let the offer stand. Won’t you, Star?”

“Of course!”

“She says she will,” Varlanda said smugly.

“A suspicious man might point out that you’re the only one who can hear her,” Harvey pointed out.

They went on play-fighting for a while.

The fact that they were going on like that was a pretty good indicator that they thought Simeon was fine. Which he was, according to Harvin. Simeon was stressed, and worried about the rest of them, but from what Harvin had been able to pick up he was being treated well. Most of his thoughts were about how to most effectively treat various people, which sounded to me like a Simeon in his element.

“I’ll be the first to admit that I know almost nothing about healing beyond the mandatory first aid we’ve all been trained in,” Harvin told the group once he’d finished checking on Simeon, “but it sounds like there’s a few people in stasis, all with some pretty bad injuries. I got the feeling he might ask for more mana crystals, so be ready for that, Star.”

“I will!” I told them via Varlanda. If Simeon could use the mana crystals to help people, I was happy to let him have as many as he needed. It wasn’t like I was using any; I was trying to keep as many secrets from Sophia as I could, just in case. I wanted to trust it; it didn’t seem like it wanted to keep us prisoner, as such. But it had all those protocols binding it, and I had no idea when one might cause trouble. I figured it was better if Sophia didn’t know everything I could do.

Like assimilating ships. Probably shouldn’t let it know about that. I didn’t know if the ability worked on anything else, but considering I’d taken control of Sophia’s golems simply by them touching me I could see how it might feel a bit threatened.

Then it was back to more waiting, more or less. Sophia was restricted from letting the Crew and me use station communications to talk to each other, but it did nothing about our own method even though it had shown that it could. Harvin checked on Simeon regularly, with or without Varlanda to help him get comfortable. The pixie golems returned twice to pick up a total of four more mana crystals, but otherwise nothing much happened until I finished unlocking Basic Golem Developments. That gave me three new options: Golem Control Limit, Golem Control Range, and Golem Durability. And while I was sure that they were all very useful, golems weren’t really my focus anymore.

My Development Matrix was one of the things I wanted to keep secret from Sophia. That sadly meant that I couldn’t talk to the Crew openly about what to do next. What I could do was to monologue at Varlanda while she was having breakfast that morning, until she gave me some kind of response that I could interpret as an opinion. So after I’d laid out my thoughts to her, both about how she could advise me and what I thought of the available options — unlocking something new is expensive and pointless, mass isn’t an issue at the moment, and I’m not sure about prioritizing golems — I asked Varlanda what she thought, and waited.

After a while, sounding relaxed and thoughtful, she said, “You know, I’m pretty damn satisfied with this enchantment. I know fleshcarving isn’t exactly accepted, but I put a lot of work into designing this. And then, to lay it down in just minutes… I just wish I could have made it more efficient — well, that, or that I could recover mana faster.” Then she laughed softly. “But who doesn’t want more mana regeneration, right?”

“Oh, yeah,” Harvin agreed from nearby. “Most of the time I have to pace myself. I could do so much with a better mana recovery. You know what, though? I never really saw the problem with bodily enchantments. And doing it on yourself, and succeeding? Honestly, Vee? That’s sexy as hell. I mean, the willpower!”

Somewhere, Temeri snorted.

As for me, I was very proud of myself. “I read you loud and clear!” I told her. “I’ll start on the next level of Maximum Mana Regeneration right away!”

“But what I really wish is that my efficiency was higher!” she added quickly. “I’m not quite at my limit here. Back on Mundus I always was. Feels like a waste, not to be at my limit, you know?”

“Oh! Right,” I said sheepishly. I’d just been about to start the wrong Development, but she didn’t need to know that. “That’s what I meant. I’ll just do that.”

Mana Regeneration Efficiency was the boring option, but I couldn’t argue against more mana being better. It was just… I wished I had a few months to unlock everything and see what new options I’d get. I wanted to do Crew Developments, and Manufacturing, and I was very curious about Thrusters… and Teleportation. But if I didn’t know what I needed, I just couldn’t go wrong with more mana regeneration.

That same morning, only an hour or so later, Varlanda was almost in tears as she told me how Sophia had made an announcement — quite happily, too, as Varlanda told it. On the orders of the Temporary Medical Officer they were getting a bathing and laundry room added!

“No more damn washing in the damn sink!” Varlanda said, her voice high and tight with emotion. “No more greasy hair! No more rotating socks and underwear by smell!”

“Thank goodness!” I replied earnestly. “That’s just unsanitary!”

“Gods of the void, yes! I’m sure it’s just my imagination, but my scalp is crawling.”

Then I suggested that Harvin would probably appreciate her being clean, too. She thought that was a very rude thing to say, for some reason. I didn’t get it. They were sharing a bed — of course he’d want her to smell good!

The next time we talked, Varlanda told me that it only took three hours from the announcement before some golems came and cut a hole in one of their walls, where they installed a new door. And just like that, they had some proper hygienic facilities! I could have done it faster, of course, but Sophia did the best it could with the tools it had.

They’d all offered to let Temeri go first, apparently, and she’d joked about not being sure if she should be grateful or offended. I wished I could have been there. Temeri was so sad and serious most of the time that every smile and bit of humor out of her felt precious. But at least Varlanda was laughing when she told me, and I heard Temeri snort in the background, and that just about made up for the disappointment.

Knowing that Sophia couldn’t do what I could was a huge relief. We’d all been afraid that Sophia might have had complete control over its station body the way I did over my own ship body, but apparently not. Which meant that any defenses or other nasty surprises would have to be installed ahead of time, and not improvised on the fly. I’d asked Sophia about how it closed off the tunnel, and while it wouldn’t tell me any specifics or what else might be waiting there, it did let me know that the seal had been created by a very large, very fancy enchantment engraved on the rock, which Sophia could trigger at will and took a heaping load of mana to use.

I still hoped that everything would end peacefully, but it was nice to know that our chances of success if we tried to escape were only “abysmal,” rather than slightly below “none.”

The next day, after spending the mana she’d recovered overnight to keep the link open all morning, Varlanda contacted me again early. It was only a little past noon when she opened her link and said, “There. Apologies, Captain.”

“Not at all, Tell,” Temeri said. “Captain Tammeron, please continue. Or start from the beginning, if you would.”

“Right,” came a tired voice. It sounded like it came from a speaker somewhere, and I quickly queried Sophia, who considered for a fraction of a moment and decided that yes, it could patch me in on this communication directly.

Tammeron barely paused, but when she continued I heard her much more clearly. “I’m… Acting Captain Tammeron, I guess. Gods of the goddamn void, what a mess. For me to be in command… Anyway, Healer Tell here tells me that I’m mostly regenerated and fit for duty, as long as I can do it from a sickbed. Wanna say hi, Simeon?”

“Hey, everyone,” Simeon said. He sounded tired, but in good spirits. Satisfied, really. “I imagine you’ve had Diviner Alder checking on me, but I just wanted to confirm that I’m in good health, and that I’ve been treated well. Sophia didn’t even mind when I tried to order her to release us all — no luck there, I’m afraid. And no idea when I’ll be back. There are quite a few patients here, many of them in worse shape than Captain Tammeron. Um… that’s it, I guess. I miss you all.”

“We miss you too, Sim,” Varlanda said, with agreeing murmurs from the others.

“Captain Tammeron, when can we expect a decision on our status?” Temeri asked. I was pretty sure that you weren’t supposed to take quite as sharp of a tone with your jailors as she did, but Tammeron didn’t seem to mind.

“I don’t want you all worrying too much,” the Acting Captain said, “but I hope you understand that I can’t just let you free right away. I need to actually look through what Sophia’s gathered and interview each of you to make a proper, informed decision. For now, though: Sophia, Temporary Medical Officer Tell and his regular crew are allowed to talk all they want, alright? Monitored communications, but otherwise no limits. Can you do that?”

“Happily, Captain!” Sophia chirped somewhere in the background. It sounded incredibly pleased, which made me feel better about trusting it, choice or no.

“Good. The rest of you: Captain Carlon, Enchantress Tell, Artificer Bekeri, Diviner Alder and…” Tammeron hesitated for a long moment before continuing. “Starmind Distant Star, I suppose? Sophia and Healer Tell both insist that you’re a full person, so… yeah. I’d like to welcome you all to the Ex Nihilo Project Independent Research Station, colloquially known as Sophia. I’d honestly prefer that we’d never met at all, but since you’re here I wish it could have been under better circumstances. Sorry about the treatment; Sophia’s great, but earlier iterations had some pretty rough and pragmatic tendencies that the doctor had to lock down hard.” There was another long pause, during which Tammeron breathed heavily. Then she chuckled darkly and said, “Better a suite than the void, right?”

“I think that’s enough for now,” Simeon said firmly. “You’re barely out of stasis, and you need your rest. Star, thanks for the crystals. I can’t tell you how much they’ve helped.”

“Yeah,” Tammeron said. It sounded like she was dozing off, and I wondered if she was just that tired, or if Simeon was doing something. “Thanks. Real helpful of you. I’ll be scheduling private interviews with each of you tomorrow, Distant Star included. Then I’ll need a day or two to make up my mind. Tammeron out.”

“Thank you, Captain,” Temeri said. “Carlon out.” And then, after a while, when there was nothing more from Tammeron, she sighed and said, “Thank the gods for NCOs. Crew, I think we’re going to be okay.”