A. K. A. The Alien: series 3

and Atkinson was incapable of accepting the idea that he could ever be wrong about anything.

  “One good thing to have come out of this whole farrago,” said one of his more senior bosses to another, still fondly believing I could not read their communications, “is that Atkinson has revealed his true nature.” I thought probably any one of Atkinson’s subordinates could have told them all about his true nature had they bothered to ask, but it was obvious Atkinson was not going to stay employed by Min-XR for very much longer. So at least I had been of some use there.

  Lieutenant Shue told his superiors his theory about my base material body and his belief that I was probably visiting Camp Munro incognito. Their response to this was to return smartly to Plan A, and get me away from the place as quickly as possible, and the pace stepped up noticeably on the preparation of the ship for the new deployment. The replacement crew began to arrive to fill out the empty cabins, and in between unloading supplies and learning their way round the ship, they kept a sharp eye for a glimpse of the resident alien.

  About a quarter of the crew were original crew, lured back by the higher wages. The others turned out to be mainly people eager to talk to a genuine alien and, hopefully, become my new best friend. Min-XR Command had even managed to sneak in a scientist or two; since Lieutenant Shue had passed on his theory that my very flesh-like body might be made out of rocks, they were more desperate than ever to study me. Presumably Command wanted some people on hand should I have a sudden change of heart half way through the deployment and decide to start talking to scientists.

  The ship’s complement was down by at least two since Dr Howard had insisted I be given a cabin of my own so that she could have an alien-free hospital for the duration of the trip, and of course I could not possibly share the two-person cabin with a human. Lieutenant Shue helped me move my belongings into my new room, next door to his own. It was smaller than the ward and designed to hold everything required for two people on a long-term deployment so there was little available wall space for my artwork, but it was at least all mine.

  When I stepped into the cabin I found a box full of drawing paper and other art supplies sitting on one of the beds. They had not bought a single thing on the list I had given them, but had instead made sure I was well supplied with paper. My artwork was the one thing they could study and they did so eagerly in the hope it would reveal some of the inner workings of my mind.

  A door opened across the corridor and the man coming out gave a well-executed start of surprise at seeing me.

  “Hi,” he said, coming to stand in the doorway. “Moving in, eh?” He held out his hand. “I’m Sam Carlisle. I live just across the way.”

  “So I see,” I said.

  “Yeah, right,” he replied, and laughed. “Anyway, if you need help for anything, just knock. I can show you round, explain things, help you move in. Anything. Just ask.”

  There was a lot more cheerful blahing as he set up the framework for a future friendship with me. I neither encouraged or discouraged him, and after catching one of Lieutenant Shue’s more amused expressions, he finally pushed himself off the door jamb with an “ah well, must get on.”

  Lieutenant Shue waited until he was out of earshot.

  “There’s going to be a lot more of that,” he said.

  And he was right.

  3.8. The quibble

  With the new crew came the new captain. His name was Paul Southey, and according to his personnel records he had been an outstanding cadet and a highly successful officer, but a surplus of self-confidence had meant he had made one or two decisions that had cost the company money. Not quite enough money to get him fired, but enough to stall his career. He had no interest in meeting an alien: he was hoping that volunteering to take this job would convince Min-XR that he was dependable, keen and willing to do anything the company wanted, in the hope it would get his career back on track. He was a once bright young thing who was now ageing, and rather too well aware he had not quite lived up to his early promise.

  It was two days after his arrival on board before he summoned me to a meeting, the delay intended to make sure I understood my place in the greater scheme of things. Lieutenant Shue came to escort me to the conference room. In case I had forgotten the way there, presumably.

  Captain Southey was said to be young, good-looking, charismatic and capable of inspiring great loyalty. But he was not about to waste any charisma on me.

  He looked me up and down. “Sit down,” he ordered, and continued to study his nexus.

  I sat. I could do obedient.

  “I have read Captain Munk’s report on her experiences with you on the previous deployment,” he said. “Let us get something straight right from the start: I will not tolerate similar games while you are under my command. And make no mistake, while you are on my ship, you are under my command. Do you understand?”

  I had no idea what he thought he could do to control me, but if I said that out loud it would only lead to a lot more talk. “I do,” I said solemnly.

  Lieutenant Shue stirred uneasily beside me. He knew I was only saying what the captain wanted to hear.

  “You do not attack any of my crew. You never take control of the ship. You obey every single order I give you.”

  He paused. I realised this was my cue. “Of course,” I said.

  “The Advisory Committee has requested that Lieutenant Shue continues in his role as your primary contact.” He spared a quick glance at the Lieutenant. It was the look of a man who was not sure he liked the idea of any-one other than himself being singled out for a special role. “I assume you are happy with that?”

  “I am.”

  “You will not carry out any activity without discussing it first with the Lieutenant. You will do nothing at all without my express permission. Do you understand?”

  “Will this be part of the Agreement?”

  “Agreement?” Captain Southey said, then realised what I meant. “Oh. Your ‘agreement’. There will be no ‘agreement’ this deployment. There will be special treatment for you, full stop. As a temporary member of my crew you are obliged to obey me just like any other member of the crew.”

  Hmm.

  “I see.” No Agreement, but I had to obey him in everything. He clearly hadn’t read Captain Munk’s report on me with any great attention to detail.

  “If you obey the rules, you and I are going to get along fine, and you will be free to observe away to your heart’s content. Do we understand each other?”

  I understood him perfectly. He, however, did not understand me at all, but I really could not be bothered to quibble.

  “We do.”

  “Good.”

  Lieutenant Shue looked like he couldn’t decide whether to embarrass his new captain by pointing out I hadn’t actually agreed to anything, or whether to let it to pass in the knowledge it would make no difference anyway. So I winked at him, and he looked away without saying anything, and the Captain went on to blah-blah about the great things that could happen if Min-XR and I worked together.

  Lieutenant Shue was pretty much a pragmatist when it came down to it.

  3.9. The use of umbrellas in space

  The sick queen angelfish died on the day of our departure. I scooped out the dead body, made a copy of it and put the new version back in the tank before any-one noticed. I still had a page of a text-book on angelfish visible on my nexus when Lieutenant Shue came into my cabin, with strict instructions to keep me under close observation during our departure to make sure I did not attempt to remain behind at Camp Munro, but he did not notice it.

  His attention was on the open umbrella taking up much of the floor space.

  “What is that?” he asked. I looked at him, and he pulled a face. “I know what it is. I mean, why have you got one?”

  “I might need one.”

  “No you won’t.”

  “You never know.”

  “You will really, really not.”

  I looked back at the umbrella,
but luckily it had dried. I had been using it in the shower, and had so far discovered its drawbacks at lower body coverage. I had also made a Japanese parasol, but that had been a lot harder to test.

  “Come on, why have you got an umbrella?”

  “I was interested in the mechanism of the folding ribs.”

  I closed the umbrella and spent the next twenty minutes demonstrating and discussing the design of the ribs. So much ingenuity creating a device that was only half successful at its intended function.

  We were interrupted by the ship-wide P.A. announcing that we were now under way and set for claim 2909/JR03/13C.

  “When can I visit the Defiance?” I asked.

  The Defiance was the new Invincible, and would accompany us on our deployment. I had asked to visit her before we left Camp Munro but they had said wait until we were under way. We were now technically under way.

  “Wait a while until their crew has settled in. It’s a new crew, like us.”

  Lieutenant Shue picked up the parasol and investigated how to open it.

  “You are going to miss the funeral services for your friends from the Invincible,” I observed.

  “I am.”

  “Does that make you sad?” I asked. He did not reply immediately, so I added: “Or are you annoyed? Or irritated? Or angry? Or resigned?”

  “We’re not talking about it,” he said.

  So we talked about parasol ribs instead for the next quarter of an hour instead.

  3.10. Talking in tongues

  Lieutenant Shue’s cabin was next door to mine,