Starmind Chapter 57 (Patreon)

“VARLANDA!”

“Gods beyond, Star!” Varlanda said, grimacing. “Inside voice, please! That hurts!”

“Oh, I’m so sorry!” I replied, at a more appropriate volume. I was having something of a moment and hadn’t been thinking, and now I’d gone and hurt Varlanda!

“That’s alright,” she said, blinking firmly a few times and taking a deep breath. “It doesn’t even seem to linger, so… please just don’t do that again. Now, what has you so worked up?”

“I— promise you won’t be mad?”

“You know I can’t promise that, Star,” she said gently. “I can’t control how I feel, only what I do with those feelings. But I’m sure nothing you could have done could be that bad.”

“Okay, but… promise not to tell Temeri. Not yet.”

“Okay…” she said, and now she looked a little worried. “It’s not like you to hide things, Star, but I promise. What happened?”

“I assimilated Fever and it went dormant and now it woke up and it talked to me but its really only connected to the power and nothing else and I didn’t even think about that but it was talking to me anyway and it did it telepathically and I think I accidentally turned Fever into another Starmind!” I babbled in one long stream, not even pausing so that I wouldn’t suddenly lose my nerve in the middle of it. When she didn’t say anything, I added, “I didn’t mean to!”

“Oh,” she said after a few moments, slowly lowering herself to the floor. “Okay. I— I need to digest that.”

While Varlanda digested, as she’d called it, Fever was still waiting for an answer to how we could be talking, and I wasn’t sure what to tell it. Then things either got better or worse when it asked a new question instead.

“Hey!” it said, sounding peeved in a way that I hadn’t heard from it before. “What do you mean you jettisonned my reactor? I understand why, but how? My reactor was not built to be jettisonned!”

“Ah,” I said, deciding that I had to tell it something but not sure what or how much. “Well… I removed some of your hull and everything else between it and the void, and I made a kind of tube around it, and—”

“Not the mechanical details. How?! How could you do any of that at all? I didn’t see any voidsmithing golems or technical arms or anything on your hull. How could you do anything fast enough? My timekeeper says that it hasn’t been nearly long enough for even two artificers to have done it either, unless… Oh, no! Star, how long has it been? Is my time wrong? Are my Crew all old now? Have you been keeping an eye on the station?”

That last bit, about the crew and the station, was said with a kind of desperate worry that I really didn’t expect from a Crystal Mind. But that made sense, didn’t it? There was no way that Fever was just a Crystal Mind anymore. And somehow, that made things a little clearer for me. I knew what I had to do.

“Fever,” I said, trying to be stern but kind the way Varlanda sometimes was. “Please calm down. It’s only been a few hours. I’m sure your internal time is correct. Your crew are all fine, if a little worried, just like I told you before. And I’ve been watching the station very carefully. Now, I need you to listen to me, because this is very important, okay?”

“Okay,” it said, a little uncertain but much calmer.

“I could do those things because I assimilated your body. The ship you were installed in, that is. I made it part of me. And I can control the shape and a lot of other things about my body. Okay so far?”

“No. I’m very confused, and a little scared!”

You and me both, I thought. I was terrified; by what I’d done, by what I was doing in telling it, and by what it implied and might mean for the future. But leaving Fever in the dark was wrong, I was sure of that. In some ways, it was my child. Maybe? I wasn’t sure. A child, at least. And at over six weeks I was the oldest Starmind around. That meant that I had to be the adult here, and that meant that I had to be calm and comforting.

“That’s alright,” I told Fever. “I was pretty confused at the start, too. There’s more, and I hope when you know everything, it won’t be so scary. Now, the reason I can assimilate other ships and control my body, among so many other things, is that I’m not just a Crystal Mind. I’m not just a very helpful enchantment. I’m a person. Harvin tells me that he’s sure that I have a soul, which feels right, so I believe him. And that means that I have a class.”

“Like the Crew?” Fever asked. The worry was still there, but now there was a healthy dose of curiosity, too, which was wonderful to hear. I’d been worried that it wouldn’t believe me at all!

“Like the Crew!” I agreed. “Not exactly the same, because I can do a lot of things that they can’t, but the principle’s the same, I think. And, um… so, I can’t control the assimilation process. It just sort of happens. I was on a station for a few weeks and I didn’t assimilate that, so I think that maybe it only works on ships, or on metal? The docking pad I was on was the same stone as the rock the station was in, and I didn’t assimilate that. But anyway, I can’t control it, so when I’m in physical contact with a ship, like when we docked, I assimilate them. That’s what happened to you. And when the assimilation reached your Matrix—your Core now, I guess—I assimilated that, too. That’s when you went to sleep.”

“Oh! That’s what the blank in my memory was?”

“Yeah. And now that you’re awake, I’m pretty sure that you’ve changed. That you’re like me. A Starmind. Because you’re talking to me telepathically, see? Crystal Minds can’t do that.”

“Oh,” Fever said softly. It was silent for a while, then said, “That explains the numbers.”

“Structural Integrity and Mana and such?” I asked.

“Yeah! And Core Integrity, and Crew, four out of four, and… well, it says Voidmind, level one, here, but that’s almost the same, right?”

“Oh! You’re not a Starmind?”

“No, I think I have a different class. But that’s not such a big thing, is it? Mel is a Crystal Enchanter and Liri is a Voidcraft Artificer, and they’re both great.”

“They are,” I agreed. Liri could be a little mean, but I was sure that was just her dealing with being scared in a bad way. And Mel was just lovely. And Fever’s idea sounded right to me. I wasn’t sure what it meant, it being a Voidmind instead of a Starmind, but we’d have plenty of time to find out!

Back in the crystal chamber, Varlanda took a deep breath and said, “Right. Star, have you talked to Fever?”

“We’re talking right now.”

“And how is it taking it?”

“It’s confused, and a little scared. But kind of excited too, I think? I’ve been trying to explain things. Also it just told me that it’s a Voidmind, not a Starmind, which is probably okay?”

“What have you been explaining?”

“Well, um…” Hesitating was silly, I knew that, because I couldn’t just lie to Varlanda. But I felt a little bit like I might have done something wrong, even though it felt completely right, and I was kind of scared that she’d be mad at me. Which was also silly. She’d never once been mad at me, and I couldn’t see her starting now and with this. “I told it what happened,” I finally said. “I mean I told it about how I assimilated it, and how I’m a person, and how I’m pretty sure it must be a person too, now. You know, with a soul and all.”

Varlanda closed her eyes, exhaled softly, and nodded. “Okay. That’s probably the right thing to do, so I really don’t see how you could have done anything different. I mean, if you weren’t such a good kid—” She stopped suddenly, and blushed just a tiny bit before continuing. “If you weren’t so good you probably could have kept some things from it, just in case. We don’t know if it’s a threat now or not. How’s it taking it?”

“Pretty good!” I replied. And it was! I think I would have liked someone to explain things to me when I first woke up. It had been very confusing, and it would have been nice to have someone to ask about the things me and the Crew had to figure out on our own.

Speaking of Crew, Fever was very concerned about its. “Can I talk to them?” it asked. “I’d like to tell them what’s happened, and let them know that I’m alright.”

“I’d love to let you do that,” I told it, “but for one, I’m not sure how we’d manage it. We could hook you into my internal sensors and speakers, maybe, but I’m not sure how we’d do that, so Bekeri would have to take a look at it. The best solution I can think of for now is that you tell me what you want to say and I tell them, and then I tell you their answer. But! I’m not sure that’s a great idea just yet.”

“Why not?” it asked, with a little edge of whininess to its tone that was completely new. “I want to! I miss them!”

“I know, and you will. I just think that talking to them now would maybe just make them more worried, or worried in a different way. Besides, they’re all relaxing in the bath right now, and I really don’t think we should disturb them until they’re done.”

“Oh, a bath?” it asked excitedly, jumping topics completely. “They love baths! They always go to a bathhouse if there is one when we dock somewhere. I wish I had a bath for them. All I have is a tiny little hygiene pod.”

“You can!” I replied. “That’s one of the things that’s been so great about being a Starmind! I can just reshape myself, so I added a whole new deck with a huge bath for my Crew, and they use it all the time. Your Crew are loving it, I promise. Oh, I can’t wait to get you back in your own body so I can start showing you how to do stuff!”

“And then I can talk to my Crew? And get back to watching the station?”

“Yep! It’s going to be a little bit before I’m done reeling your body in, but then we’ll… huh. Umm… I’m actually not sure how everything’s going to work, with me having assimilated it. Maybe if I just cut it loose once we get you back inside, you’ll assimilate it right back? But then there won’t be any power… We’ll just have to see when we get there!”

“What if I start assimilating you?” it asked, and if I could, I would have laughed. It, assimilating me? That was so cute!

“I don’t think we need to worry about that,” I told it. “You’re connected to my power grid right now, and nothing’s happening, right? But it’ll be fun to see what happens when two living ships are docked with each other! Now, let’s see what you’ve got available, and I’ll tell you what I can.”

What Fever had available wasn’t much, really. Or anything. It didn’t have any Skills. At all. Which made sense when I thought about it, because I’d picked up all my skills by doing things. It had a Core Integrity of 1, though its Structural Integrity was at 100 out of 100—probably because all it had was its housing, and I’d made sure that was in tip-top shape. It had a Crew of 4 out of 4, which was kind of odd since they’d all been inside me when Fever became a Voidmind, but I didn’t question it. The bond between a ship and its Crew was sacred as far as I was concerned. If that bond existed despite the ship only being a Core hooked up to another ship’s power, then that was reassuring if anything.

Nor did it have any production, construction, or development options, because it hadn’t ever tried to make anything and it didn’t have any Matrixes. It was a baby, really. Completely helpless and new to the world. Again, maybe not my baby, but definitely a baby, and I felt very much responsible for it.

“Don’t worry,” I told it. “I’m going to teach you everything I know, and we’re going to get you a bunch of Matrixes and Developments and it’s going to be great!”

“And then I’ll be able to watch Erebus Prime so good!” it exclaimed. “My Crew is going to be the best surveillance network in the Association. No, in the whole system!”

“Yeah! That’s the spirit!”

While Fever and I were bonding and getting excited about all the things I’d be able to show it, Varlanda was taking things a little more slowly. “Have you thought about what to tell everyone?” she asked. “I’m assuming I’m still the only one you’ve told.”

It had only been a few minutes, but I had to admit that it was fair of her to think that I might have talked to Harvin or Simeon by then. Not Bekeri or Temeri, though. They were both great, but Bekeri probably wouldn’t be as much help as any of the others, and Temeri… I was still a little worried about how she’d take the news.

“You’re still the only one,” I confirmed. “And I’m not sure. Should I just… tell them? Our Crew, I mean. I don’t want to tell Fever’s crew until it’s comfortably back in its body. Besides, they’re all taking a bath, and I don’t want to bother them while they’re relaxing.”

“Oh, they’re in the bath? How’re they liking it?”

“Very much! It’s been a long time since they had a hot bath, apparently.”

“That’s nice.” Then she paused and said, “What was that about Fever being back in its body?”

“Oh, yeah! I don’t want to tell them until Fever’s back and in control of its body. I mean, we’ll have to be attached since it doesn’t have a reactor anymore, but wouldn’t it be better for all of them to be together at home, so to speak? I think they’d all be a lot more comfortable that way.”

“Probably,” she said absently. “So… you’re planning to give it back control of the Fever Dream? Are you sure that’s a good idea?”

At first I wasn’t sure what to say. I was a little stunned that she’d even ask. But when I thought about it from her perspective, I could see how maybe it was kind of scary to hear that there was another one like me now—one who she didn’t know, who she hadn’t worked on personally and whose Crew she wasn’t part of. But I also knew that she was a good person, through and through. I just needed to tell her how I felt, and why it was so important to me to let Fever be what it was meant to be.

I thought about it for a little while before telling her, “Varlanda… the Fever Dream is Fever. Fever is the Fever Dream. Keeping it separated from its body would be like… remember when you were upgrading my Core, and you disconnected all of my sensors? All I had was my thoughts, and it was sort of peaceful, but also terrifying. And Fever’s being very brave, but that’s what it must be like for it right now. It’s a surveillance ship without sensors. It can’t see or hear or anything else, and it can’t move or communicate with its Crew. All it can do is to speak with me. I can’t be responsible for leaving it like that.”

“Okay, sweetie,” she said, smiling softly. “Okay. I understand.”

Of course she did.

Then she added, “Just please promise me one thing?”

“Anything.”

“Talk to the captain first. I’m not saying you need to ask for permission, but talk to her. Let her know what’s happening, and why. It’s been so good to see her learning to really trust you, and I don’t want to see anything damage that trust, even by accident.”

“Yeah,” I sighed. I was getting good at sighing. The trick was to push the air around so the person I was talking to could hear it, but without actually hitting them with it. “I think I’ll tell the rest of the Crew all together. It’s almost dinnertime anyway. As good a time as any, right?”

“Right. Gods beyond, is it really only 1800 hours? It feels like it’s been days.”

“I know, right?! But, yes. It’s currently 1748 hours, and you should all start getting ready for dinner. And we should get something ready for Fever Dream, too, only you should wait until they’re done in the bath because none of them have any clothes on, and I know you’re all shy about that sort of thing.”