Safe Harbor

Posted on Thu 17th Nov, 2022 @ 12:50am by Commander Paul Graves PsyD & Captain Jason Harrington & Exo-Comp EXQT

1,632 words; about a 8 minute read

Mission: A Fresh Perspective
Location: SB109 Arrival Dock
Timeline: MD 1, 1300
Tags: up top - Jason

Paul Graves stood near the entrance to the umbilical walkway that led to Antero, still wearing his formal uniform from the Piping the Side ceremony, as he'd had no time to change clothes yet. Despite reading the damage report from Captain Stark, he was still horrified at the amount of damage the small ship had taken. Jason and his crew had been lucky to survive and lucky to have been rescued and towed. From outside, at least, Antero looked like a heap of scrap metal, though it was clear that some repair efforts had already begun.

Jason slid a leather glove over his new hand. While he was waiting for a more permanent, real hand to be grown, the hand he now used was more robotic and cold, even though it was covered with synthetic skin. The nerve receptors were near that of a human hand, the force that could be delivered was far greater. He hadn't had time to practice shaking hands with anyone in effort to find out how much force he could deliver without making anyone uncomfortable, or even injuring someone, so he was hesitant to shake his old friend's hand. He headed down the narrow walkway that stretched a short distance from his ship to the landing. He made the familiar shape of Paul Graves and smiled.

Paul caught sight of Jason and smiled back. He moved forward partway to greet him. "Good to see you, Jason! I'm glad you made it here alive. I was pretty worried." He began to move his hand forward to shake Jason's but then felt his friend's reluctance and lowered his hand to his side. "How's your crew?"

Jason lifted his gloved hand, "I still need to get accustomed to this thing, but it's good to see you as well. The crew is holding up pretty well and we have a few guests. That is what I wanted to talk to you about."

"I'm relieved to hear your crew is all right. Care for something to eat, or would you rather get straight to business?" Paul asked.

"I am a bit hungry and could use some food right about now." It had been quite a while since he or Mia had something to eat, and it was just a little past lunch for them, at least. Everyone on a Starbase probably had different time zones since they came from all over.

"All right. Does Orchids & Jazz sound good or would you prefer something like Pick a 'Wich? I'm easy, either way," Paul said.

"That sounds fine to me, I always make it there at least once every time I come to SB109. I find the owner very intriguing and the food is good." Jason smiled at his friend, "How have things been?"

Paul took a wild guess, based on Jason's flare of interest at the mention of Orchids & Jazz and complete indifference to the sandwich shop, which restaurant Jason preferred. He led the way to the turbolifts.

"We just piped aboard a new starbase commander barely an hour ago," Paul said, "thus the formal uniform. Ever hear of a Captain Elena Navarra? She's our new CO. Has quite the diplomatic chops, so we'll see what Starfleet has in mind for the Triangle with her in charge."

"I was wondering about the fancy threads but didn't want to think that you were overdressed to meet me. The thought that you were wearing your dress uniform for me never crossed my mind at all. I can't say that I've heard of her, but leave it to Starfleet to have a diplomat at the helm of the atarbase. You always need one such as that to defuse situations. Let's just see how long this one lasts." The tubolift stopped and Jason had already stepped off.

* * *

Inside the ship, while waiting for docking to be completed, Merel made her way to the location where the Exo-Comps were repairing the damage to the impulse drives. She watched the efficiency with which they worked together, and found it similar to a beautiful dance. Finally, she spoke.

"So, Jason and I noticed that you are thinking of leaving us," she said. They'd been pretty definite, but she wanted to leave the door open for other options. She was having trouble imagining the ship without them now.

"You are free to do what you want, but we hope you know that we have really become fond of you all, and we wonder how we ever functioned without you now. You can stay with us, with full crew shares, which would be 7%. Will you think about it? I mean maybe you can find better here on the starbase, and maybe that is more ... satisfying or exciting or whatever. We hope you choose to stay, but we understand if you don't."

She stopped, not sure what other enticement she could offer them. "Oh, and I reversed your money return. You don't owe us anything. You saved us and earned that money."

Peggy had planned to tell them once the work was done on their ship. The other three only stopped long enough to do the dip and blink routine which was their established greeting. Nessy approached, but Peggy spoke.

(I will convert this to pretty easy to understand bot speak when I have more time, please leave this note here lol)

Peggy prepared her message with great care, taking a solid half second for double checking and reprocessing through social heuristics. Nessy’s soft voice was modulated by their ability to project holograms and perform feats of audio-visual natures, but the voice itself was borrowed from many people. It had the quality of a mother's love letter to a child, as read over a slightly warbled line.

<{Response-[MIARAUMEREL]-(“Antero has provided use of facilities for habitation. Exchange of goods contingent upon successful execution of crew protocols. *(Crew protocols include the well being of Ship system and Crew.) *(With the attack from H’tek, our presence brings hazard to this ship of another attack.) *(Our return of currency/payment will be supplemented by material contributions and restoration of systems to previous working order.) RESOLUTION(ORIGINAL QUERY:(Our departure is a logical conclusion, but not a desired one.) *(This is a safe place by our estimation, but we are not safe elsewhere.”)}>

Mia caught the gist of Peggy's response, and was pleased they didn't actually want to leave Antero, so she spoke up. "We don't hold you accountable for H'tek's actions. That is on him, not you. Some humanoids may blame the appearance they notice, but we look to find the true perpetrators of violence and evil ... and that's not you four.

"You have been extremely helpful to Antero, and you're saving our ship expensive repairs right now. We'd really like to have you be part of our permanent crew. We will do our best to keep you safe, and I think a few weapons upgrades may assist us with that.

"At the same time, we recognize your right to leave, and your right to choose your own future," she added, knowing there were many humanoids, and maybe general biologicals of all kinds, who would not recognize that. She hoped the Exo-Comps recognized it, too. She didn't think of them as naive, but she wasn't sure how much they knew about biological behavior, attitude, and sneakiness.

<{[REPLY]([ZOMBIE]-(Offer Value exceeds Risk/Reward ratios.))}*{[NESSY]-(We acknowledge our debt as unpaid.)}*{[ZOMBIE]-([HTEK] Danger has not been resolved. [SB109] was given as a place of safety.)([HTEK] will damage any ship we are on.)}*{[NESSY]-(Our service to Antero has been gratifying, and we want to continue.)}*{[PEGGY]-(RESOLUUTION:IF [HTEK] is no longer a danger, work with [ANTERO] and [MIRARUMEREL] can resume.)}>

"The offer is open-ended, for all of you. Thank you for considering it. We look forward to working with you on many projects ... and getting H'tek what he deserves," Mia bowed her head slightly toward the Exo-Comps. "We're going to be talking with the starbase personnel, and they may make you a better offer than we can, but we still hope you'll stay with us."

The others had been working but Zombie stopped to watch the conversation. Soon the others followed suit, when Peggy spoke directly from her speakers with a tinny echo. Zombie, however, stopped to sound off a series of frumpy noises. It materialized a small impossibly intricate piece of silicate, a sliding puzzle which looked impossible to solve. Nessy helped translate, "You are the first biological we have met who we trust will not hurt us and let us live. We will not forget this. We will repay you, any time you visit here, we will be your engineers once more. We hope to come back to you soon, thank you."

They went back to work after their display, leaving the trinket on the table near her tools. Nessy had projected a hologram of Miarau and the bots from their earlier days together. It seemed these bots kept logs for sentimental reasons as well, and sent the list to the ship. The file transferred contained four hundred twelve photos. They were very sentimental it seemed.

Merel waited only a moment, picking up the object left behind for her, examining it with a smile, and then turned to go back to the bridge. She loved the photo collection, and would treasure it, but she was left unsure about whether the EXO-bots would be with the ship when it left dock again. Maybe the little bots were, as well.

She didn't know this Dr. Graves, but Jason did. She hoped that would ease their path here.

TBC in Orchids & Jazz, as two friends catch up on life.

 

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