2.20.1

Unintended Consequences

The next day, Astrid sat in the mess hall with Tenya’s book and a cup of green tea.

Around her, crew came and went. Plenty of work remained to keep the Aldebaran abuzz, leaving the Channeler to her rest period.

Familiar Statics sat, chatted, then returned to their duties. It wasn’t until one of the more reclusive signatures plopped at the table that Astrid interrupted her study.

Across from her, the ship’s mechanical engineer peered over a laden tray. Deep brunette sprouts of hair still poked from their ties, and the woman didn’t dive into her meal. A sign she didn’t plan to stay.

“Tilly,” Astrid greeted. “What can I do for you?”

“Can you tell the difference between the Aldebaran’s engine and others?” The woman asked abruptly.

“Um…” The Channeler closed her book. “Yes, I suppose.”

“You ‘suppose’?”

Astrid reminded herself of the seriousness with which the mechanic took her work. “Yes. I can. But probably only because I’ve spent so much time here.”

“And would you be able to tell if something was off?”

Astrid strummed her fingers along the spine of her book. “Maybe. Do you have a more specific question?”

“Suppose I needed your help with something. Do you think you could handle yourself in the engine room?”

“Do you? Need help with something?”

“No,” Tilly answered too quickly. Then begrudgingly, amended. “Maybe. But not until we dock. It’s against protocol to tinker while we’re in the air.”

“Good call.” Astrid huffed in agreement. “Is there anything to be worried about? Do I need to do some research?”

“No. It’ll only take a few minutes. Before we take off next, alright?”

Already, Tilly collected her tray and stood. Astrid sensed a hesitation, maybe even a secrecy to the woman’s query, and the Channeler reached for more details.

“You know, Dell knows his way around, too. Why do you need me?”

“Let’s just say it’s an energy issue,” Tilly deflected. “I’m sure it’s nothing you and I can’t handle. And I don’t want to worry anyone unnecessarily.”

Astrid could tell she’d get nothing more from the woman. At least not while outside her lair. So instead, she nodded.

“Alright.”

Still, the potential “issue”, whatever it may be, pestered Astrid long after Tilly trudged off.

It stuck with her for the entire next day, until the Aldebaran finally pulled into the outpost station.

Outposts offered respite and enabled long-range comm traffic for ships further “out to sea”. It served a good place to rendezvous with any from the Fourth Fleet.

While Romo and a handful of crewmen set about locating a secure room on the station for their interrogation, the rest of the ship prepared for report filings and comm calls. Astrid, instead, made her way to the cargo hold and the set of double doors nestled between the twin staircases at its rear.

Beyond, the engine purred contentedly. Not at full bore, as in flight, but neither powered down, as Tilly suggested.

The irritation on her senses vibrated through the Channeler’s body. Manageable from a respectable distance. And for the first time, the specialist made her way to the engine room.

Each step closer pushed a tingle into her nerves. It almost tickled. Then itched. And when Astrid emboldened herself to reach for the doors, all the tiny hairs on her arms stood on end.

She took a deep breath, braced herself, and peeled the door open.

Her body felt warbled by the influence of a machine she dared not approach on her first tour.

Her eyes widened, as before her, stood a massive bulb of pulsing power. It rose into the largest chamber of the ship, spanning all three levels in its singular atrium.

And all around, consoles and monitors beeped, hummed, and growled in time, like an orchestra at the command of its conductor.

Astrid blinked, temporary stunned while her body shook in her boots. If it felt as such when idle, she held no interest in experiencing it up close at its most awake.

Like an excessive stretch on muscles, her body ached for retreat. But the Channeler waded through the discomfort and let it fill her up, a stark reminder of all that she was.

Energy.

“Hey, Channeler, shut the door!”

Tilly leapt from a perch atop one of the consoles, and hurriedly closed the doors behind her guest.

The noise within proved tolerable, but it remained a constant nuisance on the senses.

The young woman seemed mostly unchanged since the day Astrid first met her. She’d cut her hair, it seemed, just as Astrid. Instead of two messy buns, she now donned two squat little pigtails, no more than five centimeters each, one on either side of her head.

Tilly crossed her arms and raised an appraising brow.

“Before we go further, is it safe for the engine that you’re down here?” Tilly posited over the drone of noise.

“I would have known before I got this close,” Astrid assured her. “It’s more likely to hurt me than the other way around. So, what seems to be the problem?”

Tilly gestured with a single curling finger that the Channeler should follow her.

Astrid did her best to keep herself as far from the machines as possible, but in the tight quarters, it proved challenging.

Eventually, Tilly stopped at a large ring of pistons that stuck out from a secondary device. Something that, to, Astrid, looked separate from the engine proper, but her limited exposure denied her further identification. Mechanisms churned, and it seemed to aid the engine, somehow. But all Astrid could do was look to Tilly, to implore for more detail.

“It’s the secondary drive,” Tilly explained to her puzzled expression. “It’s like a compensator. Whenever the engine struggles with output, it kicks in to make up the difference. To the outside, nothing’s wrong.”

“But there is something?” Astrid pressed.

Tilly gestured with her hand to the moving parts. “No, it’s doing what it supposed to. It just shouldn’t need to be doing it.”

Tilly continued deeper in, to a workstation littered with tools and consoles spitting readouts Astrid herself couldn’t decipher.

“It’s a contingency. Now that we’re parked and I can power down. I’ll get the engine power back up to full before we’re on the move again, and it hopefully it won’t be needed again unless in case of emergency.”

“Then why do you need me?” Astrid pried.

Then Tilly turned, her gaze adamant, as though surely the Channeler should have pieced it together by now.

“You don’t need me.” Astrid realized.

“It kicked on a couple days ago. While we were engaged with Alfirk and its hunters,” Tilly divulged.

“I did this.” With guilt, Astrid looked from Tilly to the machines, and back.

The mechanic nodded. “That’s my guess. I don’t know what you did, but in your attempt to drain the other ship, however desperate, I think you got ours too. Maybe because of how close it was to the guns. Or the flow, or stream, or however you call it. Your ‘channel’.”

Which, to Astrid, further explained how she managed to avoid catching any of the Statics in it. Though clumsy, her over-broad draw took, instead, from the largest source, the engine. That she didn’t drain the crew, too, didn’t mean she’d been precise.

Messy. Reckless.

“This is a big deal…” Astrid alleged. “Isn’t it?”

“It could have been. Thankfully, there are failsafes and redundancies. And me,” Tilly extended. The woman then climbed on top of her workbench, where another machine hoisted. The girl resumed the work she attended when Astrid first arrived. “I thought you should know before you try something like that again.”

“Tilly, not that I don’t appreciate the heads up. But if you’re concerned, isn’t this a matter for the captain? Shouldn’t he know?”

“I told him,” Tilly informed her. “But you should know. Whether anyone else finds out is your prerogative. But I don’t see the risk if you don’t try something like that again.”

“He didn’t tell the others?”

“Hey, Tills!” A voice chattered through a speakerbox at the mechanic’s workstation. “You gonna turn us off down there? We’re breaking docking protocol!”

Astrid recently learned that most stations grew wary of any ship unwilling to power down completely when docked. An idling vessel looked too much like a getaway vehicle for criminals and pirates. Nevermind that it could mess with the station’s instruments.

Tilly hopped back down to the table and palmed the button. “Copy that!”

The woman brushed past the Channeler to a mass of controls. It took several adjustments and levers before the engine finally sank into a resonant hum. Then went still.

Astrid felt pressure release from all over the edges of her consciousness like a great sigh throughout her body.

Immediately she could breathe easier. She found the capacity to pose one more question.

“Tilly, why are you helping me?”

The young woman already delved back into her work. Now that the engine safely rested, Tilly all but climbed into the mechanism to get better a leverage over the compensating device and its connections.

“Hm?”

“You could have told the whole crew. Maybe even used this to make a pitch to get me ousted off the ship.”

“Why would I do that? What good would that do me?” Tilly didn’t look to the Channeler. Her eyes, instead, bore into her task.

“Because..” Astrid's expression grow as bewildered as the rest of her. Truth be told, she possessed no idea why Tilly would want such a thing. But by merit of not knowing the young woman well, it left room for assumptions. And Astrid realized, she came ready to expect rejection.

“Nevermind. Just… thank you.”

Tilly waved her off with one of her tools.