Chapter 18: What Next?

I awoke several hours later. This time no-one had disturbed my sleep or woke me up prematurely. Ship hadn’t alerted us with any news.

I wasn’t alone. Koluna and Jem were still asleep. I hoped I was back in their good books by now. They looked so peaceful. My mind drifted back to a few hours ago, when we faced extinction by three enemy vessels. We prevailed, and the foe didn’t. But how many more enemy vessels would turn up, intent on wiping us out?

I hadn’t had many quiet mornings to myself. We were frequently rushing here or there being chased or chasing others. Fighting for survival consumed much of my waking moments. Perhaps once this thing was over, I could visit somewhere secluded to meditate alone. Something I missed from Tian Prime was I had lots of time to myself.

I did my visit to the en-suite and approached the food dispenser to get a beverage. On a whim, I asked the food dispenser, “Display a list of beverages commonly consumed on Earth in the morning.”

I selected ’Café au lait’. It tasted different, but as I sat at the table and sipped the mug of brown liquid, it kind of grew on me. I wondered if this was something my mother ever consumed. I could feel a mild stimulant effect of the beverage. The other effect was the odour disturbed Koluna and Jem. Soon everyone was up, and both were sampling my beverage. I soon realized my one mug wouldn’t be enough, so I walked over to the food dispenser and got two more mugs of the beverage. This was another new experience I was adapting to, sharing food and beverages. On Tian Prime, you kept to yourself.

Finally, Jem was awake enough. “Ship, status report.”

“No new vessels have arrived in the system. The probe has arrived at the derelict vessels and is examining the wreckage and collecting items of value,” said Ship.

“Thank you Ship. Brian, Koluna, what’s next?” she asked.

I held back a bit. I’d been going first a lot recently. After a while, Koluna spoke. “What is your final goal? We came here to visit your home world. You have seen it. Your people are gone. It’s a hostile place, and now we’re hiding behind a moon. What do you want to achieve?”

“Originally, I was hoping for a homecoming to meet with other Baglogi. An injustice was done to my people long ago. I’d like to punish the foe for what they did, and I want to stop them from doing it to others,” Jem answered.

“Was destroying those three vessels enough punishment?” asked Koluna.

“No.”

“The foe that wiped out the Baglogi died a long time ago. The crews aboard those three vessels were probably their descendants. They didn’t kill your ancestors. I admit they came here with hostile intent, and we defended ourselves. But can we justify genocide of another space-faring race? Won’t that make us as bad as them?” Koluna was asking some tough questions. I was glad I hadn’t jumped in. I was thinking about simpler things like survival and breakfast. Uh-oh, Jem was looking at me for input.

“I’m not clear on the ethics here. I’m better at coming up with ways how to do something,” I answered.

“We took out the pirates together.” Jem was getting worked up.

“Are they pirates?” I asked, “Because if they’re pirates, then the answer is clear.”

“Perhaps the probe will find some answers that will help clarify things. We don’t know how many foe vessels there are,” Koluna offered.

“We took out three vessels. If there’s only three more, we have a chance. If there’s another three thousand vessels, we’ve no chance. I think we need to prepare carefully. How about we finish breakfast and continue this in the main bridge?” I offered.

Jem shrugged her agreement.

We finished breakfast, got ready, and made our way to the main bridge. I looked at the tactical display and I had an idea.

“Captain, may I?” I asked as I pointed to the display.

“Be my guest,” said Jem.

“Ship, please highlight the line from the derelict vessels to where they entered the system. Now extrapolate that line out. If they came in a straight course, this could point to their home system,” I said. The display zoomed out until this system was tiny. Adjacent systems appeared at the edges.

“Along that line, can you locate any inhabited or inhabitable systems?” I asked Ship.

“Confirmed. The line travels close to an inhabitable system, about 4 days at hyper-drive,” said Ship.

“Great! Now Ship, tell me you can make another probe, equipped with hyper-drive and cloak?” I asked.