Skipping Space

Dustin shifted uncomfortably in his seat as the weave-jump arms extended either side of his head. Rye had needed to adjust them, but had according to her she had “not got time to make shit look pretty when I’m working miracles, Dusty.” As a result, where previously there had been sleek grey arms projecting from his seat there was now a tangled mess of half-disassembled circuitry and hanging cables, held together by an array of duct-tape and cable ties. Hoping that the exposed capacitors by his ears wouldn’t pop while he was scanning and singe his hair off, he glanced at the assembled crew.

Meli gave him a thumbs up from her console, Rye patted him on the shoulder from where she’d been making some final adjustments to the chair behind him, and Naera gave him a nervous grin. Bleu meanwhile frowned but said nothing. The doctor had insisted on being present when she’d seen what Rye was doing to the scanners - clearly, the Queri woman hadn’t the same level of trust in the Rabyth that he had.

“All set?” He asked, hand paused over the controls. Meli nodded. “Whenever you are ready, li’ah’a.” He tapped the button, and the world faded out. The brightness of the weave and the headache from trying to view too many routes at once had gotten less the more practice he’d had at navigation - and so with care he **** his attention to just the immediate area; the current system and a handful of stops beyond. They’d discussed that too - in theory Rye’s addons to the system would eventually be able to process everything he saw before he **** the scan to filter it down. That relied on her having a clear picture to work with of the expected load.

With some effort, he expanded the range while narrowing the number of paths he could see, seeking out a route to Rakhsport. Unsurprisingly, the number of possible routes for something still over a week away was much larger than Sola’s databanks had offered. He skimmed them, looking to see if any were quicker than their current path. For once there actually was - a delicate curve that skipped three systems from the one they’d be jumping out of later that day. Locking the path in with a thought, he pushed his mind into the now familiar disconnection routines and breathed a sigh of relief when his vision returned to reality.

Blinking at the returning lights of the bridge, he glanced around. A golden blur rapidly coalesced into the face of Rye. “Congrats on utterly slagging the array I built Dusty. Got great data, give me… oh, three days? Maybe four? And I’ll have one that won’t melt the instant we turn it on. Then we can really start to push it and fine tune stuff. Might need to grab some parts when we’re at Rakhsport tho.” Meli gently steered the cheery bunny girl out of the way at that point, allowing Bleu to step in and half-blind Dustin with a torch.

Shaking his head to clear the spots from his vision, Dustin grimaced at the ship’s doctor. “What the hell was that for?” he asked. The Queri woman shrugged. “I wanted to check your visual response after this… experiment. You’re fine.” She then turned and headed for the door, leaving Dustin unsure if she was cross with him being well or just business-like and wanting to get back to her other patients.

Naera meanwhile was gazing at the arcing line the screens were showing of the new flight path he’d tracked. “So that’s a new route you found?” She asked, before shrugging. “Doesn’t seem that impressive.” Dustin grinned. “It’s a route between known endpoints that knocks about a day off our flight time. We’ll send a probe through to double check, but this one I’m happy to use even though we’ve got passengers on board.” The green-skinned woman’s eyes widened at that, before she scurried after Bleu muttering something about the dinner menu.

Dustin sighed as he watched the newest member of the senior staff leave. Meli moved up next to him, before curling into his lap at a gestured request. Wrapping her arms around his neck, she studied his face rather intently. “You’re thinking too much without talking to us again li’ah’a. What’s the matter?” Dustin leaned in to give her lips a peck before leaning back in his seat and guiding his fiance’s head down onto his shoulder. “Everything is so much busier than when it was just you and me. We’ll take this jump if the probe reports it safe, and there’ll be more once we’re past Rakhsport - but every day closer to Earth is a day closer to a whole bunch of decisions.”

Meli brought her hand to his chin and tilted it down so that he was looking at her. “They are decisions you do not need to make alone my love.” She said, her ears flickering between contentment and adoration. “Flying onward after Earth - you know that we will all be with you, regardless of whether that is a quiet farm on a colony raising a family, or aboard this or any other ship seeking out the secrets of the cosmos.” Dustin smiled at his first love, leaning down awkwardly to kiss her upturned face. “You’re right. It’s just…” a finger to the lips silenced him. “Both our li’oha’a and I have discussed this. We are in agreement that you are likely to want to continue to travel, and it is what we want as well, awkward as it might be.”

Dustin was glad that he’d cleared the bridge of junior crew before the weave test; he was pretty sure he could feel his cheeks flushing the longer Meli talked and an embarrassed captain did not make for an inspiring leader. The Velca hesitated then, before choosing her next words with care. “As to the other members of the crew - I am aware that you feel that circumstances have meant you could not spend enough time to get to know the doctor before the attack on the colony. Given that she is very busy caring for patients it is unlikely that you’ll get a chance before Rakhsport - another reason to hurry there.”

He nodded. With every other member of the senior crew, there’d been lots of time to get to know them immediately after they had joined, but Bleu had more or less gone from organizing the new recruits straight into crisis management. “That’s a good idea. I’ll raise it with the doctor over dinner and then schedule a proper meeting after we’ve dropped her patients off.” Meli nodded, then gave a vague wave in the direction of the galley. “With regards to the others, stop making trouble for yourself by worrying about a decision you don’t have to make yet li’ah’a. Those scientists that want to help the human fleet, and our chef - I’ve spoken with Trea’k, and whether we take them further or they are dropped off in the care of EarthGov, either way they’ll be fine long term. With one or two exceptions that she’s working more closely with, our counsellor reckons they are all moving in a positive direction.”

His fiance’s words did a lot to alleviate his concerns about how well he knew Dr Bleu, and far less to settle his worries about the situation with Naera and the others. On the one hand, the food the green-skinned woman had been cooking was amazing, and the scientists had been doing solid work in the systems they’d been coasting through. On the other, he was still a little uncomfortable about taking them back into probable danger once Sola made it to Earth. Meli seemed to sense his remaining concerns at that point, because she took his face in her hands and pulled him into a much deeper kiss. Dustin resolved, in between moving his own hand around to squeeze his lover’s ample rear, that the best course of action was as she said to just wait. He’d get detailed reports from Bleu and Trea’k in any case, which should make approving or denying the requests far easer.