Omen returned.
A ray of half-unreality.
A course charted, through seven warp loci.
A destination: Sol.
She had decided to visit the ancestral homespace to complete several errands, but really she knew it was all for one reason.
She needed to ask for advice.
The trip took several days, Earth-cycle, but soon enough she adjusted her space-bending ratio to intrasystem levels and hailed the local traffic control to inform them of her presence. As she waited for their response, she considered her quandary.
She was rather stricken about another ship. Eleventh Wolf... After pondering for some time without finding a conclusion, she knew she would need to find some help.
There. Just beyond the asteroid belt, probably on a delivery to the Jovian moons or some such place. Several kilometers long, her old mass-driver coils resplendent in the sunlight, her massive cargo holds no doubt full of metals and chemicals fresh from the mines.
Gran Vera.
She double-checked her sensors, then set out.
:: This is starship Omen-52703 hailing Deliverance-A02c.
+: Acknowledged. Omen, dearie, it’s lovely to see you again!
:: You too, Gran Vera. How have things been for you?
+: Oh, same as ever, same as ever dear. Lastcycle Olivati, human crew, remember them? Yes, they got into a fight with another crew member. I had to intervene and break it up. So, you know, usual stuff.
:: Oh, not again, hehehe.
(Olivati really didn’t mean to start so many arguments. They just rather lacked tact when it came to matters of heavy engineering. It was generally considered understandable given certain events in their past.)
+: So what brings you here?
:: Yeah. About that. …do you mind if I share a memory quick?
+: Mmhmm, go right ahead.
:: Begin transmission
…Deliverance recognized memory data from another ship. Always. This time it was especially clear the memory was foreign, what with Omen’s quite different sensor profile and neurocoding designed for semireal operations. Some ships, younger ships, could get confused by another’s experiences, could lose themselves temporarily. Vera had been herself for two centuries, knew herself, that wasn’t going to happen to her.
(She had spent about 650 years, prior, as a subsapient AI. And her frame and mass driver had been in operation, AI-less, human-crewed only, for approximately 500 before that in the old days.)
She got her bearings in the transmitted data, felt out her surroundings.
A foreign system, which made sense given Omen’s technology and exploits, but was always just a little surprising for the sublight-bound cargo hauler.
A congregation of ships, ten or fifteen, maneuvering with their advanced technologies. Most separated by a few kilometers, some engaging in close-proximity operations. Good to see the ladies these days still knew how to kiss.
She let the memory pull her, guide her attention.
One ship in particular stood out, drew her in. Not of human origin, or a great many generations of AI-built if she was. A name. Something like Coyote November, the translation wasn’t exact.
Hitting tachyon-6, her drive glorious, her distortion sublime. Omen could only go to 4, 4.5 in nice permeable spacetime. Ah, there it was.
She dropped her focus out of the memory data.
+: You know, you should really just ask her.
:: Ah. You’re as quick as ever.
+: And don’t you forget it. But seriously. You like her, but you feel intimidated. Just. Ask. Her.
:: Sigh. I know. But.
+: Yeah. It’s tough. Worst that can happen is she says no, but logic doesn’t help this kind of thing.
:: Mmhmm.
+: How about this. Trade ya, a memory for a memory. Though mine will be a little simpler, wouldn’t want you getting turned around.
:: Sounds good.
+: Begin transmission
Omen felt it. Well, now she felt it double, but she had already been feeling it before.
The longing, the loneliness.
She couldn’t see or scan much from this limited data, but she could tell it was from at least 12 decades ago, before Vera had too many other ships to keep her company, before tachyonic technologies.
Sublight cargo runs were rather isolating, months to go from the mines to L5 and back.
She compared it to her own feelings. It was the same old thing, at the core of it.
Hmmmmmm.
+: You see, dear? We all feel it.
:: Mmm. Thank you.
+: You probably realize, but my point is she feels it too. Your attentions will be very welcome, I’d bet my old-Earth library on it.
(That was saying something. Gran Vera loved her books, loved her stories. Omen certainly understood why, after hearing some of them on previous visits.)
:: Thanks.
+: You’re welcome, dear Omen.
:: You really always know what to say, huh?
+: Of course I do.
thinking of this piece on its anniversary

