Tales of the Parodyverse

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Alan Smithee-Moore
Sun Apr 10, 2005 at 04:01:36 pm EDT
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Whatever Happened to Taciturn Lad? Part Two
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Whatever Happened to Taciturn Lad? Part Two





I dream of living in a lighthouse, baby,
Every single day
I dream of living in a lighthouse
A white one by the bay
- From “I Want to Marry a Lighthouse Keeper,” by Eigen Erika



Once the aggression suppressor enzyme had been injected into Za’ Arabeth her captor got to the point:

“State your business,” he said while relieving the young Caphan of her armaments.

The emerald hued woman had no choice but to comply, “I am Za’ Arabeth, captain of the Ray of Victory. I was en route to Qwe Gon -4 when my warp drive malfunctioned, bringing me here.”

While Za’ was revealing herself to the man she attempted to gauge what exactly he could be. He wore the uniform of the Epitium Infinitium, envoys of the now defunct Terran Empire. Could he be Terran? He looked the part, with his pale complexion and bristly pelt.

After staring at the woman for a moment the stranger nodded, “Use the Power Nodes to get your ship functional. I’ll keep these until you go,” he held up Za’’s weapons.

Za’ followed the man down the mobile gangplank and into a huge docking bay. The chamber was nearly empty, except for several rows of squat, metallic structures that must have served as recharge stations and the aforementioned walkway.

“Who are you?” she asked the man as he hit a few buttons on the hovering gangplank and then stood on its running board.

“Staff,” he replied, as the machine disconnected from Za’’s ship and flew off, leaving the young Caphan alone to her work.

*****


Za’ found a universal adapter to hook the Ray up to the Power Node. While the sloop refueled she shed the bulky oxygen sheath and crawled across the exterior of the sloop, checking the hull for any structural damage. It was a cursory inspection; once her onboard computer was operational it could do a more detailed diagnostic, but she was happy to note there was no visible harm. She clambered back down through the still open hatchway, and into the ship’s command cabin.

The instrumentation indicated that the power cells were at capacity. There was still a problem, though: her computer was down. Without it, both life support and astronavigation would have to be done manually, and since Za’ still wasn’t even sure of her current coordinates performing such duties on her own would be impossible.

She went to the open hatch and called out, “Hey! Hello?!”

Her voice echoed throughout the empty chamber.

“Listen, I need some help. My computer is down. I need someone to run a diagnostic on it. Is this station equipped with an AI?”

There were several moments of silence, “The AI is offline,” a voice replied over what had to be some kind of intercom.

“How can you operate something of this size without a working artificial intelligence?!” Za’ asked incredulously.

Again, after a long delay, the voice quantified its earlier statement, “Its higher functions are offline.”

“Well, can’t you restore them? I need it to check my ship. I can pay,” Za’ had a significant amount of Frammistat Polg Coins hidden onboard, in addition to the standard Skree scrip.

Za’’s question was answered when an explosion of pixels heralded the arrival of the aid she sought. It was an anthropomorphic hologram, composed of green and yellow hard light.

“Gaaaahhhh!” it shouted, before pausing and getting its bearings, then it looked around frantically, “Wait. What?”

Its deep set eyes fell upon Za’, “A Caphan?”

Za’ stared back. For the second time she was looking at something that simply should not be, “You’re a Holovisionary. But you were all deleted!”

“We were? When? What’s going on here? Who are you, where’s Sylis Mumm, and where have I been-” the newly operational (and now quite vexed) AI accessed the station’s mainframe, “the past fifty four cycles?!”

To Be Continued





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