Warship’s Mania

Had I known we would be held up for this long after arriving in the Graedalir system I would've taken a stack of books from Ragni's quarters to read. What better use of senseless downtime? Though, with the speed I read with I would go through them all before they had cleared us for entry into the system.

Everybody in the command center was sliding into their own pits of boredom of varying depths, except for Ragni and Salukam. The Head Demon Ecologist was silently communicating with his subordinates regarding an outbreak of demons they had difficulty containing. Ragni was similarly agitated, though she didn't show it in a way that was obvious to humans. Unable to use my trick of sending off nervous tics to a lonesome avatar, she faked a relaxed posture to hide the tension in her body.

She spoke to me through her implant: Shishi, how quickly can you start a dry fire sequence on any of the armaments on your major petals?

I was seated on my taboret, leaning backwards and looking up, the hind pair of my arms holding my taboret's legs, the front pair crossed behind the back of my head, the right hand of my lower pair casually gripped Hekkamuk, while the left hand slumped to the side. Though the prospect of even a mock battle excited me at this point, I replied without betraying my facade of boredom. I can configure my particle cannons within a few of your heartbeats. Do you want me to do it right now?

Wait for my command, but do warn the minutes assigned there.

She, of course, referred to the debacle on the day of my launch where I terrified a good portion of my crew when in a bout of anxiety I had started cycling my armaments' configurations. It was the first time she had scolded me.

I will, I said with a nervous laugh.

Good girl.

The attitude of these people towards the divine spirits of their Ships still baffled me sometimes but I accepted the warmth of that little bit of praise.

With our discreet conversation out of the way, Ragni casually trained her gaze on Salukam. "Is there a problem, Demon Ecologist?"

"Some nasty demon got here on the last signal from the waystation, ma'am," he said. "We're having trouble containing it."

"From the waystation?" It had been the excuse she had been looking for. "They've held us up long enough. Break orbit and plot a course for the nearest naval base."

Through her implant she gave me a silent command: Now.

Righting myself I nodded with a sharp toothed grin and fired my mundane drive while simultaneously deploying my long range cannons. Their external structures, normally folded and stacked on the underside of my petals, were pushed out by projections of hard light. Corrugated spires began to hum with power running down to spinning rings, all glowing an ever brighter electric blue in my Sphere of Influence. Even the crudest and dullest sensors would easily pick up a vulgar display of power like that.

"Captain?" Melusum had clearly noticed the vulgarity. "Long range cannons have—"

Ragni didn't give the Weapons Officer a chance to finish her sentence. "Yes, I gave Shishi the order. They won't object to an armed and ready Mezhained Warship leaving."

None felt the need to object to that simple fact.

After a lagging silence the waypoint responded to our sudden activity, prodding us with a tight-beam. "They're opening comms again, ma'am," Adumed said. "Anyone willing to bet whether they're angry or afraid?"

"Let's hear it," Ragni said.

The voice that came through sounded confused most of all. "Waypoint 5 to Mezhained ship. Uh, we have not cleared you for intra-system travel. We, ah, would like to remind you our system is currently in a state of war." While the words were Usormbaati I sensed that even those among the command crew who weren't fluent in the language understood enough of what was being said.

"Our mission here is a diplomatic one," Ragni said, "We merely want clarification on claims regarding some specific asteroids and stores of Fae Matter in the Ikkatfo 4 system and have no intentions of getting involved in your local struggles. Surely whoever you answer to will respect that fact."

The silence that followed lasted long enough for a quick back and forth throughout the hierarchy of waystation 5. "Right.. Mezhained ship, you have been cleared for intra-system travel. May your mission be a successful one."

"Thank you. We are glad you came around to our point of view."

Thus ended our contact with waystation 5 of the Ikkatfo 4-Graedalir entry point.

I laughed and kicked my legs before I hopped off my taboret. "Want me to make my cannons fully battle ready?"

"No." A disappointing answer. "Just keep up the current show for now."

Despite losing out on my chance to parade around the system with fully loaded weapons, I gave Ragni my most enthusiastic smile. "Yes, my captain!" I said, nearly saluting her in the 21^st century manner.

"Good." Ragni got up from her cushion. I offered one of my right hands which she ignored until she was fully on her feet.

"I'll be in my quarters until we arrive. Don't bother me unless it's sufficiently urgent."

With the entrance for the Captain's Quarters right next to the command dais, it took only a few steps for us to find ourselves inside and away from prying eyes.

A sound clank meant the door was properly closed. Her Mezhained mind satisfied by that sensory confirmation, Ragni followed it with an undignified sigh like the stochastic trembling from a violin played by the clumsiest beginner student. She pulled her hammock from its designated pocket on her work uniform and gave me an uncertain smile. I was the only one she could show a smile like that to, and only when we were alone together.

An alcove with two attachment points for a hammock was her appointed place of rest. As soon as she had it hung up she slid into it from the side, assuming a diagonal position with one leg bent at the knee. She made no effort to wrap herself in its fabric.

I watched her and sat down neatly on a cushion at the single low table this small room could afford. Placing five of my hands on my lap while the last one held on to Hekkamuk I must've looked like an obedient guard dog resting near her master's feet to an outsider. In reality I wanted to take a break from being the crew's all important deity and humbly sit like a Mezhained. Both of us had a yearning for a moment like this where our status was temporarily forgotten but I doubted she would've noticed that feeling in me even if she had her full attention on me. After all, it was me who was the wise Vugni.

"You're doing great," I told her. She needed that.

Her eyes turned their focus away from a point on the ceiling and back to me. A worry far too focused inward behind them confirmed my suspicion. "You think so?" she asked, countenance full of doubt. But she knew what kind of being she was talking to. "Ship's judgement..."

I gave her an uncertain smile that betrayed my inner feelings. "I don't always believe in it. My 'perfect judgement', I mean."

She gave me a sideways look. I took that to mean I had to elaborate, which I would've had I not wanted to hide my origins.

"I-I truly believe you're m-my captain," I said. Despite inhabiting a mechanical form, I swallowed hard. "'This woman will guide me and our crew'. That was my belief when we first and I couldn't see you as anything else. It was hard to grasp that my assessment was so correct that nobody would doubt it, especially when I didn't even know what I myself was." It had been a decision that had come from the ground of my soul, far away from the illusion of my self. And that illusory self had trouble comprehending she was a tiny boat floating down a mighty river.

Ragni raised her hand. The hand that bore the still healing wound she got from enclosing it around Hekkamuk's spearhead. Careful eyes of violet traced that line, reading the promises and the burdens of responsibility contained within. "A child came down from Vatugnem with wisdom and potential but almost no knowledge of this world. Of course I would take the honor of guiding her."

"Do I really have wisdom? It's really hard to believe."

She lowered her hand and looked back at me. "Doubt is a common virtue among the wise, especially doubt of their wisdom."

"Sometimes the doubters are right and they're not wise, just dumb."

"That is a very wise thing to say," she said with a sneaky little smile.

The small spike in agitation this caused proved too great for the small frame of my avatar to contain. Three of my hands flew up from my thighs, balled up into fists, and shook adorably. "No, no, no!" My tone of voice was emabarrassingly whiny. "This wasn't supposed to be about me, I was trying to cheer you up!"

Ragni softly chuckled at my tantrum and shifted herself to a lounging pose in her hammock. "You cheered me up just fine, Shishi."

"All by accident. See, see? I'm not wise if I did it by accident!"

Closing her eyes, folding her arms behind her back, and with a hint of a smile Ragni continued her teasing. "All right, I can see you were mistakenly gifted with cuteness instead."

It was times like these where I felt the age represented by my avatars. I rose from my cushion, grumbling quietly.

Ragni noticed the rustling of the fabric and opened one eye to regard me. I stared back at her with an angry frown, standing there like that for a moment before I dove my face into her lap, stunning her with surprise. Both of us were still until I felt the gentle touch of her hand on my head. I turned my face up at her, this time my frown one of worry. She smiled and scooted away from the center of the hammock to make enough room for a child sized individual. "Join me," she said followed by an inviting gesture.

Despite my tangle of limbs I climbed into it with an ease calculated from deep within me. If it had been the past me I would've surely misunderstood the effect of shifting weight on a suspended piece of cloth like this. Many peoples in the 21^st century had the habit of sleeping on predictably unmoving surfaces, after all.

Ragni wrapped an arm around me and pat my head with the other. "They're testing both of us, aren't they? Not just me."

"That's what I think," I said. "For what it's worth, I believe you will do fine."

"Is that so?" One of her pale fingers ran down my braid and played with the beads dangling from it. "I might not have the amazing intuition you and your sisters have but I feel you will do the same."

The hammock rocked when she made a slight shift of her center of mass. It was a pleasant sway that could easily lull my prime avatar into that pseudo-sleep. "Arms aside, you're a bit smaller than Ela,"

"Of course I am," I said. "It wouldn't do if I were taller and more developed than my older sister, now would it? Then again, she's 'bigger' than the older Warships and I'm the baby regardless."

"'The baby?'"

While I had used ordinary Mezhained words the phrasing had confused her despite its straightforward meaning. A little bit of ingrained English had broken past the surface of my soul's river.

"I'm a newborn," I said without missing a beat. "'A child who came down from Vatugnem with wisdom and potential but almost no knowledge of this world.' The youngest Warship is just a baby compared to her sisters." What luck that she couldn't possibly fathom that I had an ancient dead language hidden inside me.

"At some point age must become meaningless to you," Ragni contemplated out loud. "Did Ela feel like this when she was newly launched? I should've gotten more advice from her and Iro."

"You were really close to succeeding captain Zhulaimer, weren't you?" I said. "But in the end he didn't feel like retiring from the navy, even at his age."

"Instead it was me who felt the call of a peaceful life."

I had seen the scars on her body. Wounds could easily be treated to prevent scar tissue from forming, but there were reasons to leave them untreated, the primary of which being the memory of a marital duel. Shubesh Velteragni—before becoming my captain—had gotten into a fundamental marriage to start a family. And yet, here she was, back in the navy to take on this important role many dedicated their lives to attaining only to be snubbed by their Vugni. There was a palpable envy among some of the higher officers towards this returnee from a commoner family who had initially thanked for the position.

I did not care to dwell on the petty feelings of those who never stood a chance and recalled something Ragni had mentioned earlier. "You used to do this with Ela too?"

She nodded. "Old Iro was very lax when it came to her and me."

"He could tell how well you two got along, I'm sure."

"In the end he couldn't say no to her, like a doting father spoiling his daughter."

I thought on that. If captain Zhulaimer was Ela's father because he was her first captain, did that make Ragni my mother in this life? My cheeks glowed with a holographic blush at the thought. Luckily Ragni had closed her eyes and couldn't tell.

This was what a mother was like, right? This care and warmth? Not the kind who would hurl a bottle of cheap bourbon at me or let me starve, but the kind who could give me little times of peace like this.

Too bad Salukam was about to disturb this peace.