Untitled (2 page)

   But there was one consolation, and again Gabriel felt dangerously close to smiling as he thought of what awaited him in the engineering wing. He'd nearly fallen into despair after boarding the evacuation ship, until he'd run into a member of his engineering crew who confirmed that they had managed to wheel the—very classified—piece of equipment on board.

   Time to pick up where he left off. Gabriel tied the purple belt, the color of engineering, around his waist and stepped out of his quarters into the corridor. It was deserted, but for a young Human female with jet-black hair who smiled as she passed Gabriel, continuing down the corridor and into the lift.

   Gabriel had spent the entire previous night in his quarters and hadn't seen any of the Eunnoians yet. As he approached the engineering office door, he remembered Kurt's mention of his boss and felt a pang of nerves. He should have taken the time to read up at least a bit on Eunnoians before reporting for duty—after all, he'd spent two full weeks learning about the Wreeth before going to live with them—but it was too late now.

   The door to the engineering office was framed with a purple stripe and there was a plate with two names printed in Human letters—Xhani Keehe-thona, and in smaller letters, Bianca Perlson. There was a complicated, looping script beneath the names, which he assumed where the names in written Eunnoian.

   Gabriel rapped on the door and waited.

   A deep female voice announced, "You may enter."

   The door was moist with condensation as Gabriel pushed it open. Three faces turned to greet him and he blinked as he got his first glimpse of the Eunnoians.

   The Wreeth had been short, much shorter than Humans, with compact bodies covered in thick gray fur, issued from a planet full of inhospitable winds and sub-zero temperatures. The Eunnoians, at first glance, were the opposite in every way.

   One of the aliens sat behind the engineering desk, another other stood close by, in front of a deactivated broadcast screen. They were both tall, much taller than Gabriel, sleek, and smooth all over, with limbs and a torso that seemed uncommonly long. The one sitting behind the desk had pale green skin, two sets of fluttering ridges running down its collarbone and bare chest and inhumanly large golden eyes set in a completely hairless head.

   The other, leaning elegantly against the desk, was indigo-skinned and green-eyed, the same ridges covering its chest, its thin mouth split into a wide smile. The two aliens also wore light, formfitting clothing, both were bare-chested. Gabriel wondered at their genders.

   There was a Human woman there, too, with rich brown skin and long graying hair. She smiled warmly and approached Gabriel.

   "You must be Gabriel Nagra," she said, holding out her hand.

   Gabriel shook it and nodded.

   "I'm Bianca Perlson, assistant director of engineering. This is Xhani." She extended her hand toward the Eunnoian sitting behind the desk. "You will be reporting to her."

   He suspected Bianca had made a deliberate effort to use the gendered pronoun, to ease at least part of his confusion with this new situation, and was grateful to her. Xhani rose, but did not extend her hand. Gabriel wished he had learned a Eunnoian greeting. The Wreeth did not shake hands, but politely bumped forearms. He doubted that particular greeting extended across another alien race and made a mental note to do a bit of research the moment he had some free time.

   "It's nice to meet you," he said. "I'm thankful you allowed me to join your department."

   Xhani made a clucking sound and quirked her

flat lips into an awkward smile, as though she seldom used the expression. "I'm thankful for the work you have done to date," she said, her voice oddly-accented. "You will do us all a great service if your progress continues."

   "I certainly hope so."

   "And this," Bianca said, now extending her hand toward the other Eunnoian, the one still standing by the desk. "Is Jhuun Tori-senh. He has been eager to meet you."

   To Gabriel's surprise, Jhuun immediately extended a long-fingered hand. He shook it, the palm felt warm and strangely-textured against his.

   "I've read all the reports you have submitted to date," Jhuun said. His voice was mellifluous and otherworldly, and he spoke with the same accent as Xhani, though his was not as strong. "The circumstances that brought you here are not pleasant, Gabriel, but I am thankful for our meeting. I have anticipated working alongside you."

   "That's kind," Gabriel said, only just realizing he still held Jhuun's hand. He released it gently. "But I don't need an assistant."

   "Jhuun is not an assistant," said Xhani. She strode around the desk with long, measured steps, towering austerely over Gabriel. "He is our most skilled engineer. You will find his insight indispensable."

   "Thank you," Gabriel said evenly. "I'm certain I will."

   "Now, come!" Bianca said, cocking her head toward a small door on the side of the office. "I'll bet you're very eager to get your hands on your project again."

   "Yes, absolutely."

   Gabriel followed the trio through the door so low that Xhani and Jhuun had to duck. It led to an engineering workshop, easily three times as large as the office and bigger still than the workshops from Section 14. Though it was riddled haphazardly with tools and equipment, Gabriel only had eyes for the device occupying center stage.

   Three weeks earlier, a ship of Nr'ln and Wreeth victoriously survived a skirmish against a single Maedrom ship, disabling it, but not destroying it. Though there were no Maedrom survivors on board, the boarding party found something infinitely more precious than prisoners—the mechanism for controlling their infamous energy weapon, capable of devastating entire stations and ships in a single burst. They had no defenses against it, no knowledge about its functionality. All they could do was run or evacuate at the first sight of the telltale amber-colored energy of the weapon.

   Until now.

   They'd codenamed it the M-Alpha. After much debate, it was decided that the weapon was to be brought to Section 14, and so it had fallen into Gabriel's hands. It looked unimpressive, sitting there in the workshop, a depowered juggernaut, a misshapen trapezoid of Maedrom alloys barely as high as Gabriel's hip, its smooth coppery panels scorched from the laser blasts necessary to tear it free from the Maedrom ship. Still, it was impressively and solidly built, and the first thing on Gabriel's mind when the thing had been brought to him was how many lives it had taken.

   "I thought for certain we'd lost it in the attack," Gabriel said. He ran his hands along the panels, feeling the bumps and dents, relieved that it had taken very little damage in the attack and subsequent evacuation.

   "It was brought here from your ship last night. I have not touched it," Jhuun said, and he crossed his arms over his chest.

   The gesture seemed odd to Gabriel until he figured it was the Eunnoian equivalent of holding one's hands up, palms out, in a hands-off gesture.

   "I was waiting for you to arrive, so we may consult."

   "Thank you," Gabriel said.

   "We have work of our own that requires attention at the moment," Bianca said. She laid her hand on Gabriel's arm. "But we will assist in any way we can."

   "Please consult with us if you need anything," Xhani said officiously.

   Gabriel thanked them and watched the two women leave, suddenly feeling a little exposed and uncomfortable as he and Jhuun were left alone. He'd had an engineering team of his own back on Section 14, but his intuitive understanding of the M-Alpha had made him the chief worker on the project and his team had been relegated to handing him tools and avoiding being injured by repeated testing. He didn't need or want an assistant, especially not an alien one.

   And especially not one who was making him…well,
uncomfortable.
Gabriel was not an exceptionally tall man, but after towering over the Wreeth, it was odd for him to be chest-level to Jhuun. He couldn't help but stare at the bare torso with its rich indigo skin, where the two pairs of soft ridges fluttered gracefully around the collarbone and ribs. The body shape, the swells of muscle and finely-boned limbs reminded him of gymnasts and acrobats.

   Not unpleasant to look at, to his Human eyes. While he'd certainly had many Wreeth friends, he wouldn't have considered any of them to be attractive.

   He chalked it up to the novelty and blushed as he noticed Jhuun was studying him with the same mixture of curiosity and admiration, staring at him with oversized, solid green eyes. Well, what the hell was
he
looking at? Gabriel certainly wasn't the first Human he'd spoken to.

   He wanted to say something, break the ice and end the awkwardness, but Jhuun beat him to the punch.

   "I notice you have a Wreeth accent," he said.

   Gabriel blinked at the unexpected statement. "Er, that might be. I've been speaking Wreeth a lot for the last few years. It was easier for us to learn their language than the other way around."

   "Very understandable," Jhuun said. "Similarly, we've found it easier to learn the Human language. There are sounds in the Eunnoian language that are difficult or impossible for Humans to reproduce. Though the reverse is also true."

   Gabriel nodded. Xhani had pronounced Jhuun's name differently than Bianca had, with a hushed trilling sound on the first letter that seemed difficult for a Human tongue to replicate. Of course, Jhuun himself had not pronounced Gabriel's name entirely correctly—it came out sounding like
Gab-rel
in the alien's accent. The Wreeth language had been simpler, with easy syntax and fewer sounds than the Human language.

   "I'm surprised you're familiar with the Wreeth language," Gabriel said. "Surely you never lived with them? I didn't think you could handle each other's atmospheres too well."

   "We cannot," Jhuun said. "But the Specialty store on the station stocks some of their movies. I very much enjoy their comedy stories."

   "They're okay," Gabriel said. "Listen, if you want to help, see if you can find a laser spanner so we can open the casing here. I'd like to pick up where I left off with this thing."

   Jhuun made a clucking sound, reaching for a shelf on the back of the workshop and retrieving a laser spanner. Gabriel expected him to hand over the tool, but instead the alien ran long, tapered fingers along the edge of the M-Alpha, feeling for the seams and working the beam of the spanner inside.

   "Wait—" Gabriel said and stopped just short of grabbing Jhuun's hand and pulling him away from the weapon. Okay, he clearly knew what he was doing, but there was something visceral about watching someone else, someone unfamiliar, touch
his
project.

   "Apologies," Jhuun said, pulling the spanner away. "I didn't mean to damage it."

   "No no," Gabriel said and he sighed. Now he was just acting like a brat, trying to keep someone else from touching his toys. "Go ahead, you were doing fine."

   Nimbly, Jhuun continued to detach the casing. With Gabriel's help, they managed to slide the casing free and both immediately peered inside the guts of the weapon. Unfamiliar circuitry, a bundle of electronic nerves that Gabriel had just barely begun to understand. Scorched, banged up, but mostly intact, ready for him to plunge his hands back in. He felt his heart race at the thought.

   He glanced sideways at the alien who was kneeling and also staring inside the casing with equal amounts of awe. Well, at least he wouldn't be facing the pressure alone this time.

   "Such luck, to have found this weapon," Jhuun said, gathering his legs beneath him as he sat in front of the M-Alpha. "The key to our salvation, if we can create a defense for this weapon."

   "You said it," Gabriel said, sitting down next to Jhuun. He reached into the heart of the M-Alpha, tracing a winding cable with his fingertips to see where it connected. "This bastard's killed enough people."

   "Yes." Jhuun clucked. "We watched the broadcast before your ship arrived. My sympathies for the destruction of your station. And for your lost friends."