Chương 18: 010 – We Meet Again

Thirty minutes into the cycling pulse of prime numbers, a vessel was launched from Stargazer Fortress. Once they managed to get a visual on it, Trout felt a sense of mild disappointment from the buried parts of him that was Cadet Trout. It wasn't some kind of exotic and alien shape that implied inexplicable alien technology. It was…

a triangle, approximately ten meters long from thrusters to nose, with a vaguely triangular fuselage that flared out a bit in the back with into stubby 'wings' that probably acted as thermal radiators. It was all aesthetically pleasing smooth curves, and there was a bit in front with windows that Trout was almost certain was the cockpit, or whatever it was they called the place the pilot was. It was almost… mundane.

The fact the little ship was traveling at approximately 12 kilometers per second was far more interesting. By itself, the speed wasn't significant. They had fighters on the ship that could achieve those speeds, but those had specialized thrusters that ran on QEC, and which not only generated thrust but also prevented time dilation and probably a dozen other things needed to keep the fighter from becoming an expanding cloud of plasma.

The Tiwada had ships that could match the ship's speed and size, but they were very QEC-hungry propulsion systems, and like the quantum drive was actually more fuel efficient the larger and faster the ship it was propelling was going. When the transmissions ceased, the little ship had come to a stop a bare hundred kilometers off their starboard side, well within the range of their ship's lasers and railgun turrets.

Trout had ordered for those to not be online and tracking, although that was more of a symbolic gesture. The railguns could be activated easily, and the laser resonators deep inside the ship were already online, their output ready to be routed to emitter arrays all over the ship's hull. First contact or not, this was still a military vessel, and while he had no intention to have them fire the first shot, the Venture would be prepared to fire the second and last shots.

Trout sat on the bridge, waiting for them to be hailed. They were ready to record any transmission from the Kaydekeenians, although this time it would not be streamed live through the ship. Everyone sat on the bridge sat attentively, doing their best to look like they were completely focused on their stations and duties and not waiting for aliens to contact them. However, instead of receiving a signal, what they saw was movement on the hull of the small ship.

A familiar yellow and black space suit was emerging from a hatch on the underside of the ship, only to turn around and anchor their feet to the ship's hull. He wondered if this would be Rain again, or some other Kaydekeenian. The space suit had a large pack attached to its back now, and as they watched the alien knelt down and drew the picnic basket from inside the air lock they'd just emerged from.

Picnic basket held in both hands, the Kaydekeenian turned to face the Venture and then stepped off the hull, before suddenly accelerating towards the Venture. Seeing it again still made Trout's heart feel like it was being squeezed by someone using it as a stress ball, and from the distressed sounds that arose on the bridge, he wasn't the only one.

While they'd been taught to operate space suits and space armor, not even Marines were expected to cross multi-kilometer gaps between ships in nothing but a suit and a thruster pack, and definitely not in orbit around a planet, with its potential for debris moving at velocities faster than railgun rounds.

"Contact security," Trout ordered as the ship's external cameras kept track of the approaching alien.

"Inform them to be ready to provide a friendly escort for our incoming visitor when they arrive on the hull."

"Bawipu guranah weepuh ninibong!" The still-nonsensical words greeted Trout as he activated the two-way communications between the office off the bridge and the quarantine room once more. This time their visitor was alone in the quarantine room, and a chair had been placed behind the table, though their guest had not availed themselves of it yet.

"Baah weep grana weep ninny bang," Trout replied with his best approximation after several replays of yesterday's conversation. Even to his own ears, it sounded atrocious.

"Welcome to the Venture. To whom am I speaking with today?"

"It's still Paladin Rain and Paladin Princess, Captain Trout," was the reply, the oddly-accented English sounding cheerful. He hoped that interpretation was actually true.

"We will be acting as the primary contact between our two civilizations for the foreseeable future. I hope this won't be a problem?"

"Not at all. I look forward to continuing to speak with you, Paladin Rain."

"As do I. However, there is a possibility I will be replaced in nine months." Nine months?

"May I ask why?"

"That will be the time the space service holds its annual tournament to choose who will be the designated First Contact representative," Rain said. Trout had been half-expecting that. Several very smart and nit-picky people had gone over yesterday's conversation word by word, second by second and even frame by frame, and it had not escaped any of them that Rain had referred to themselves as a 'victor'.

"Then I suppose we should make good use of the time we have together."

"Indeed. I've bought several new things with me this time, although I'm afraid none of it is as delicious as yesterday's treats." Rain began unsealing that picnic basket.

"What did you think of the food, by the way?" Trout made a face. They sounded so earnest…

"I'm afraid I was unable to taste it myself, but I was told by those who did that it was delicious." And the 'knugrind nuggets' had all the usual gloom and doom warnings about fried food, but no one really listened to those.

"Oh, that's too bad. Well, I'm sure you'll find it much tastier when it's been freshly cooked." The top of the picnic basket came off.

"And in order to facilitate that, I brought these." It took Trout a moment to recognize the object that Rain took out from the picnic basket as a book. It had been years since he'd touched one, but despite nearly all modern reading materials being accessible on a tablet, terminal or phone, books still existed. He'd heard they were far more common on frontier settlements, where network access could be inconsistent. And some institutions still insisted on hard copies.

The ship chaplains all had their religious texts in physical books. Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

"These are three copies of all of your communications protocols we've been able to decode and are capable of emulating, compiled based on what we've observed from your transmissions, both historical and current," Rain said, setting the book with its plain cover on the quarantine room's table.

"While we've long decoded your public access transmissions, we do not know whether your direct communications use the same protocols and codecs. With this, we hope that we can establish a refined level of radio communications."

"That would be… very useful," he said. The Frontier Cooperative insisted all participating members ascribed to a communications and signals protocol that was kept up to date, and of course everyone in the Confederacy had standardized communications even if the individual states and species maintained their idiosyncrasies with their internal netowrks, so it hadn't occurred to Trout until the COMMO had brought it up that the Kaydekeenians might not be able to communicate with them because of incompatibility issues.

"Thank you."

"It's no trouble at all. It would be very unfortunate if we had some sort of misunderstanding because of an inability to communicate. Best to remove the possibility of it happening as soon as possible. The future will be throwing new challenges at us that will be easier to solve together." Their head tilted in an almost cat-like gesture.

"Oh, before we continue, does your ship need any supplies? Water, oxygen, food?"

"We appreciate the offer, but it's not necessary. We have sufficient supplies." With the war over and little chance for engaging in heavy combat, the Venture could operate for more than a year before needing to refuel and resupply.

"Very well." Rain reached into the picnic basket again, and drew out another book.

"This next might be useful for astrogation and record keeping." There was no translation despite the UT being connected. They had actually said the word 'astrogation' rather than 'stellar navigation'.

"It's the names of all the major planets and notable moons in the system, images of their appearances, as well as their current location in relation to Surcease at this time of year, which should be good for the next few days." The much thinner book was placed on the table.

"We also have a request, if you are amenable."

"That would depend on the request," Trout said carefully.

"Could we ask you to provide us bacterial cell and viral cultures of any microbial organisms that might be on the ship and the ship's population?" Rain asked.

"It's so that we can assess if any of them will infect our biology and begin preparing countermeasures. While we will be enacting sterilization protocols, infection is inevitable. We would like to be able to prepare vaccines in advance."

"We'll see what we can do," Trout said neutrally.

"Thank you. Now, we had to interrupt our conversation yesterday, but today my suit is supplied with several hours of air. I can stay for far longer, so I am available to answer any questions you might have." Rain finally sat down, and Trout was glad the chair was deep enough that their guest could sit comfortably even with the attachment on the back of their space suit. Trout remembered enough about vacuum training to be very envious of their suit materials and construction.

Rain sat like they were actually comfortable on that chair. Though perhaps that was just his ignorance talking. Perhaps their species was really skinny and their suits were actually also multi-layered uncomfortable sartorial atrocities by their species standards. Clearing his thoughts, Trout subtly reached for his tablet, bringing up a file where he'd written several questions that had been brought up by the conclusions the people who'd been studying the video of yesterday's conversation all night.

Many of them were very concerning, such as the implications of their stealth technology.

"I hope you were able to return to your station in time?" Trout said.

"Yes, someone was able to meet me partway and was able to deliver a small air tank for my suit. Thank you for asking! And yourself? I hope you slept well?"

"I slept well enough. Do you mind if I take notes during this conversation?" He held up his tablet.

"Oh no, go ahead," Rain said.

"We're taking notes as well. What would you like to start with first?" Trout considered. While inquiring about the garlic was tempting due to its implications, on consideration it was ultimately irrelevant.

"First of all, I would like to inquire as to what government you represent, Paladin Rain. I'm sorry if this sounds impolite, but as we are ignorant of what system or systems of government you Kaydekeens organize yourselves under, I'm afraid I must ask for clarification." For a moment, Rain was silent.

"Kaydekeens?" they repeated, saying it exactly the way that Trout had. Oh no. He'd been saying it wrong, hadn't he?

"I'm sorry, did I mispronounce it?"

"That depends. Where you trying to say Kaedekin?"

"Yes, Kaydekeen." There was a long silence. Trout's heart sank. Eventually, Rain said, "The term is both singular and plural. It is unnecessary to add an 's' at the end.

'Kaedekin'—" They enunciated each syllable, drawing it out as Kah-Eh-Deh-Kin.

"—can refer to any single one of us, or all of us as collectively as a people."

"Ah. I see. Thank you for the correction."

"It's no trouble. You're unused to the term, so misunderstandings are to be expected. Now, I believe you were asking if I represented our government?"

"Yes."

"Then no, I do not represent any branch of government, as I am a member of the space service, not the civil service."

"I'm confused, then," Trout said.

"Yesterday, you introduced yourself as a duly deputized local representative. If you do not represent your people's government, who do you represent?"

"We represent the Kaedekin." Rain sounded equally confused.

"Not just any specific branch of any specific service, but all Kaedekin. Every sister and buddy in the Dancer system." Trout frowned.

"I'm sorry if I'm sounding repetitive, but can you please clarify something? If you do not represent your government, where does your authority as the presentative of your people derive?"

"The First Contact Representative Tournament," Rain said, sounding more sure of themselves now.

"We hold it every year, and it's open to all members of the space service. The winner becomes the first contact representative and is part of the First Contact Team until the results of the next tournament the following year."

"And… from where does this First Contact Team derive its authority from?" Trout pressed.

"… I'm sorry, I don't understand the question?"

"Let me rephrase the question. Who formed the First Contact Team and gave it the authority to do what it does?"

"Oh! Well, that's a long story. Originally, the First Contact Team was not part of the space service because we didn't have a space service yet. Instead, what would become the First Contact Team was a special crossover team consisting of members from the Sky, Void, Field, and Metro Rangers, the only branches of the defense service that existed at the time. Their purpose was to find a peaceful resolution in the event of an alien invasion.

When we achieved spaceflight capability and the space service was formed, the First Contact Team was transferred to the nascent space service, along with Rangers from the various branches of the defense service that formed the initial core of the Star Rangers." Trout recalled yesterday's conversation, and the repetition of peaceful intentions.

"I… see. When was this… special crossover team established?" Rain was silent for a moment.

"Four hundred and seventy-seven years ago," they said eventually.

"The space service was formed sixty-three years later." A note was duly made.

"I see. And who decided to transfer the First Contact Team to the space service?"

"That would probably be the Sorceress Captains of the branches at the time. I'm sorry, I don't know their names. I can check when I get back." Sorceress Captains?

"That's fine. And who in the government authorized it?"

"Why would the government be involved?" Rain sounded confused again.

"It was a purely defense service matter." A sinking feeling began to fill Trout. Was their government a military dictatorship? And with the Hegemony drive readings still continuously active…

"Very well. I'm still confused about some things, so would it be possible for you to explain how your government works and its relation to your defense and space service?"