Exodus Tales 1
CIC, SLS McKenna's Pride
Ten thousand KM from Primary Relay
Star System Designate Omega 101
10th October 2785
"Fleet Group Twenty commencing in-system jump, General."
Aleksandr looked up from the combat report forwarded to him by Captain Livingston, and watched as the symbols representing a Fleet group of one hundred ships winked into existence from Hyperspace in their designated station-keeping spot within the pre-arranged two light second sphere of space near the Mass Relay. All the symbols flashed IFF codes and green, indicating successful jumps with no problems.
He next studied the warship squadron assigned to guard the Mass Relay for a moment before replying, "Very well, oh do tell the Vigilant to trim its position – they're drifting out of formation."
He went back to studying the handheld terminal. He was very pleased with the initiative demonstrated by Captain Livingston, and even more so the co-operation and performance of Captain Foris. Seeing what could be achieved by both their races when working together had been quite inspiring, and news of it had spread through the entire Exodus Fleet and had done wonders for morale. The Star League could now also boast its third First Contact and already having a good relationship with the savviest economic race in the Galaxy, which promised to turn into full trade relations in time. They also, by right of conquest and salvage, were the new owners of the freighter which the pirates had hijacked to infiltrate the Narhu Compound. Though Aleksandr had only held onto that right for as long as it had taken a team of engineers, quarian machinists, and SLNI operatives to go through it with a fine tooth comb, before 'donating' it to the Narhu for their use.
The navigational charts acquired alone would greatly shorten the time needed for the Fleet to find a potential home. Then there was also the pirate's personal equipment, which he knew were going keep Fleet scientists busy for years – the personal kinetic barriers, omnitools and eezo based small arms being the most important. He personally couldn't wait to see the improved performance of a Nighthawk Power Armor with shields.
His eyes then saw the casualty list of the soldiers involved in the battle. 'They did their duty, but we can't afford this. We need to start having babies, fast,' he thought. If only it was that simple – children needed homes, parents, they needed infrastructure, they needed schools, universities. Aleksandr doubted natural birth rates were going to cut it, not if they wanted to keep up their technical base and expand it in the near future. The women of the Star League needed a helping hand from science.
"General! The Mass Relay just activated," Captain Gelford reported.
Aleksandr snapped his eyes up and scanned the holotank. It was a mass effect capable Cruiser with a smooth, rounded appearance, "Identify."
"Receiving IFF and referencing Quarian Ship Book," reported the Senior Sensor Officer. "Salarian… Achak Class. Ship's called the Namida."
"This should be interesting," Aleksandr murmured to himself. "Open com channel, make sure the translators are on."
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Dalatrass Quorum
Sur'Kesh, Deep in Salarian Space
13th October 2785
It was a beautiful, natural place. A mighty river roared and the water surged over a precipice to form a giant waterfall which threw up a cool mist which hung over the entire area. Plant and animal life with colors ranging from reds to purple to colors that other species couldn't properly perceive, went about its daily routine under the bright sun. Next to all this natural wonder was the only artificial structure for hours of journey by hovercar – but it blended in so well that at first glance most species thought it a rather elegant mountain – until they saw the regular spacing and lines of transparisteel windows and artificial lighting.
Inside, deep within the building in a large hall-like circular room, all the biggest political players in the Salarian Union were gathered – and they were all female.
Aeghor Heranon Mal Queine Killotha, or Captain Killotha for the convenience of other races, resisted the urge to fidget under the combined scrutiny of all the Dalatrasses in the Salarian Union. It didn't matter one whit that his hologram was here and he was actually in the Crossroads Star Cluster, ten thousands of lightyears from Sur'Kesh – making a mistake here would be end of his career, and if he was very unlucky he might even be expelled from his clan.
"…that concludes our other business," Dalatrass Chief Kaliska intoned. "We hear now from Captain Killotha, Cruiser Namida, First official contact with new species as outlined by STG report. Captain we have read your initial report, you've had a further two days."
Killotha cleared his throat, "Yes, yes, discovered and deduced new aspects of the Human FTL method, also can report and substantiate on the extranet rumors of a joint human/quarian action against pirates in Tala Head Nebula."
"Continue."
Large holograms blossomed above Killotha's head, showing a formation of the extremely large cylinder shaped human ships with their bows pointed towards a star and with even more huge sails strung out behind them. They almost looked like seeds of a Liegi tree hanging in the wind.
"It's clear they are using these solar sails to absorb energy from the star," as he spoke the image time code advanced until a large group of the ships began to pull in the sails, and some time later they were engulfed with red light that abruptly winked out leaving no ship behind, the image changed to show same ships now within two light seconds of the Crossroad Mass Relay. "My science department theorizes that they use stored solar energy to power their FTL, this would conserve any reaction mass or fuel they may carry for extreme long range journeys. Their ships are large enough to fit anything crew may need, food, air recycling, hydroponics, perhaps even artificial ecosystems, factories and refineries needed to keep ship in good repair and harvest more fuel for reactors."
"Impressive," Dalatrass Njlon commented. "So the ship could conceivably last for generations. Have you determined what is the range of this FTL?"
Killotha winced, "I have gotten no direct answer to that question from the Humans. Their ships use line of sight laser links to communicate with each other when in Fleet formation, so there has been little signals intelligence to work off of. The human leader, General Kerensky, did tell me they have been travelling continuously for just over two standard years. Analysis of the information in their Contact package leads us to deduce ten to fifteen light- year range for every time they engage this Hyperspace Drive of theirs."
"Which is probably deliberately incorrect," Kaliska waved her hand in dismissal. "Speak of this pirate action."
"Yes. Sent small team in a shuttle to Narhu Combine outpost. Clear signs of large battle and orbital strikes. Data mined their logs and records. Still analyzing, but can confirm that Quarian ship Upanni was involved while human's fought on ground – light lag observations of orbital battle are fascinating but can only report in person. All gathered data too sensitive to even trust to highest encryption communication."
"Very well, what of diplomacy."
"Mixed news. Quarians were human First Contact with other intelligent sapient race outside of their own. Quarian point of view naturally colored human perception of Citadel Council. Kerensky was dismissive of the idea of applying for affiliate status, cited number of common laws they – as a result of their situation and future survival needs due to small population – can't comply with."
Kaliska thoughtfully scratched one of her decorated head tails, "Pity, which ones?" Killotha tapped on his computer to send the relevant laws in question, it would take too long otherwise. The Quorum took maybe less than a minute to read. "Interesting. What was the good news?"
"Kerensky is shrewd individual and direct, quite refreshing," Killotha briefly smiled, "while he wouldn't pursue Citadel membership – he did not say no to direct relations with the Salarian Union."
A din of rapid fire speaking erupted throughout the Quorum at that news. Kaliska tolerated it for thirty seconds, "QUIET!" Three quarters of the Quorum was silent at once, with her political rivals maintaining their chatter an extra two seconds – just to show their natural opposition but they acquiesced eventually. "Some would say there are no relations with a Council race without a species being a part of the Citadel."
"That is the unwritten perception and law," Killotha acknowledged. "General Kerensky pointed out that the Star League in Exile could maintain certain mutually beneficial arrangements and understandings with the Union, extraneous of the Citadel Alliance."
Kaliska remained quiet for a full two minutes, looking to the reactions of her fellows. "Did General Kerensky indicate if he would pursue similar arrangements with other races on the Council?"
"My impression was that he would do so on an individual basis. If an Asari, Turian or Hanar ship was to show up here tomorrow, they'd get the same welcome apparently. Though that is decidedly not the case for the batarians – and I think it's one of the prime reasons why the Humans do not want affiliate status. In Kerensky's words, 'The day a batarian tries to enslave a human is the day when I FTL jump my entire fleet beyond their defenses and throw ninety ton kinetic kill vehicles at one of their colonies, and repeat as necessary until the lesson sinks in.' Slavery is an extreme cultural anathema to humanity. They find it baffling. Clear sign of double-standards among the Citadel Alliance that the Batarians are an affiliate."
Kaliska inwardly groaned. She sometimes wondered what the Citadel Council of that era had been thinking. The batarian caste system had probably been seen a unique cultural characteristic and asking them to stamp it out, would've been like asking the Asari to abolish their revered Justicar sect. The batarians were a relatively small power, though that looked to be changing with the aggressive colonization they were doing in the Skyllian Verge. Now here comes a clearly powerful species who were their philosophical and cultural opposite – and wouldn't stand for any batarian enslavement. She wondered if the humans would do the same for their quarian friends.
It didn't take her long to come to a decision, "Tell your diplomats to proceed, Captain. A relationship with the Star League and what they represent as a starfaring non-mass effect civilization is not something that has happened in Council history. We would be fools to pass that up. In the meantime, inform them that I will instruct our Councilor on the Citadel to advise the batarians not to 'upset' the League. They do so at their own peril."
"Understood, Chief Dalatrass," Killotha bowed before cutting the connection.
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Exodus Tales 2
SLS Zughoffer Weir, Exodus Fleet
Star System Micah, Valhallan Threshold
15th November 2785
Lieutenant General James McEvedy sat in his quarters and cherished the moment he was in. There was no greater pleasure for a grandfather than to spoil a grandchild rotten, and in this case it involved bouncing the five year old Eddie on his knee, with the promise of sweets in the near future. The child's squeals of joy as he was carried around the main sitting room as if he was flying were music to an old man's ears. Alas, the fun was interrupted when the mother entered, looking decidedly worse for wear.
"Mommy!"
Major Sarah McEvedy's angular face lit up automatically with a smile and scooped up the child and balanced him on her hip with a mock groan of effort.
"How has my little young man been?"
"Having fun with grandpa… he promised me a sweet."
"Oh did he? Well then grandpa better not break his promise."
James rolled his eyes and dutifully handed over the candy, which was promptly snatched and began to be devoured with enthusiasm. Sarah walked over to the wallscreen, currently showing a view off the starboard side of the Zughoffer Weir, and the awesome sight of the quarian migrant fleet hovering over the inner asteroid belt of the Micah System. The main bodies of the Fleets were barely fifty thousand kilometers apart, to keep each respective Fleet's small craft from making a mess. Uniting the two Fleets into one for mutual protection, while a nice idea was just not practical until human and quarian space traffic controllers learned to work together and the Exodus Fleet acceleration capabilities came on par with each other.
The Micah System was a quarian find that they often used when needing to mine element zero – knowledge of it was guarded jealously by them – but they had acknowledged the need of their new allies to upgrade their ships with eezo cores, as the sluggish acceleration of the Exodus Fleet had proven to be a major disadvantage in simulated exercises and in the Narhu Pirate action. The particular asteroid belt they were hovering over had three known major asteroids with very dense eezo concentrations, whilst the rest of the belt was still in the process of being explored for exploitable minerals. Suitably equipped Dropships and Mining Mechs were already on the asteroid known as Farlas, alongside the quarian mining advisors – who were very giddy in their envirosuits at the capabilities of those Mechs.
The Micah system was also something of a curiosity for Fleet astrogators. It held two planets and both were gas giants, the first being Elohi at zero point six AU orbital distance from the primary, the second was Dumah at one point six AU. Elohi was weird in that it was within the frost line from its parent star – where gas giants couldn't form. Dumah was the same story, and both were extra-solar captures. Going through the captured nav maps was an ongoing process, but so far there were an inordinate occurrence of such gas giants.
Sarah recalled with bemusement the Zug's Chief Astrogator commenting, 'It's as if someone was playing galactic billiards with Jovian gas giants. Extra-solar captures are frightfully rare, at least in our experience.'
"Alien ships!" Eddie pointed out with a bright smile and a pointed finger at the wallscreen – he had finished his candy.
"Quarian ships," Sarah corrected.
"Qu-an ships," Eddie clumsily repeated with a cute frown of confusion.
"Qua- ri –an."
"Qua – ree – un."
"Quarian ships."
"Quari ships."
"Try again, don't forget the –an."
"Qua-rian ships."
"That's a clever little man," Sarah praised and ruffled her son's hair. "Oh Dad, with the upcoming Captain's conference I was hoping you could show this to General Kerensky." She reached into the inner fold of her uniform and handed over a holopad.
James took it and somewhat awkwardly began to tap on it. The Fleet had captured a numerous quantity of the things from the hold of the Turian Freighter, and it took some getting used to from the normal portable terminals. Sarah had thankfully already opened it to display the relevant document. His eyebrows reached into his hairline as he saw the title of the document and the opening paragraph.
"I'm going to need to sit down for this," he said with a deep sigh.
"Take your time," Sarah was busy entertaining and doing some much needed bonding with her son, she didn't have as much time as she wanted, with her taking over increasing responsibilities in managing the 331st Royal Battlemech Division and its personnel, most of whom were quartered on the Zug.
James spent nearly half an hour reading and when he was finished – well, he was impressed and slightly baffled. By Terra, why hadn't this been thought of before?
"It's a notion that was being explored, but the Second Soviet Civil War interrupted it and then the Western Alliance world parliament was formed, and the fat cats decided they wanted to stay that way. The versatility and power of the Omnitool finally makes it possible. We just need to make sure every adult eventually gets one – and should there be shortfalls our current IT infrastructure between ships can compensate."
"We'd need a Constitutional convention first, this cyberdemocracy can't work without that," James mused. "Your economic model is simply inspired though."
"I had some help," Sarah shrugged modestly. "It's merely quantifying the realities of our current situation while including the best principles of an open market private sector and innovation merged with the best of the old Scandinavian socialist policies – call it a Technosocialism. We won't have money as such, not for mundane needs – besides for trading for food to supplement our own hydroponics initially. A portion of our economic productivity is quantized as social money, which is then tithed to microcorp-administered social projects such as interstellar exploration, physics research, genetics, science, defense, and future construction.
An entrepreneur able to garner enough votes in the cyberdemocracy can start a social money-funded microcorp and compete with other microcorps. They are owned by the Star League, and profits are disposed of by the League. Microcorps are required to be transparent as administrative entities, and the League will vote on whether to transfer discoveries and tech to the open source domain. Regulatory matters will be handled by VIs with oversight. The main reward for individuals in this system is reputation. People who invest a lot of time or resources in a given field gain more reputation rewards for doing so."
James sighed and tried to wrap his head around it, "I don't get this reputation or rep system."
"Simply put, someone who has a lot of rep, is someone who is productive, knowledgeable, isn't a lazy slob, contributes to the Fleet and stands the best chance to be eventually elected to the government. There will be no career politicians it's not a choice – responsibility to become our future leaders will be thrust onto those most deserving and can be stripped from those who come to abuse it by the cyberdemocracy. With this we have freedom and rights while acknowledging our responsibilities to our race and the future. Combine this system with our research into genetics to improve ourselves and our core behaviors…"
James began to laugh ruefully, "You know, convincing the Fleet to adopt this will be peanuts in comparison to your final proposal. Really…"
"It is close to the heart, yes," Sarah admitted, putting down Eddie who had begun to fuss with the boring adult conversation and wanted to get back to his toys. "But a 'League' is not what we are anymore. A League is an association of competing teams and that's what the six star nations were. Now we are one sapient race among many in a hostile universe, where any division means we suffer and die. We can't afford it."
General James McEvedy tapped at the holopad to switch it off and stared at his grandson happily playing with a model ASF, before turning his heavy gaze onto his daughter. "Long live the Star Covenant."
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Tales of the Exodus 3
CIC, Quarian Cruiser Eemea
Interstellar Space, Five light years rimward from Micah
16th March 2786
He had seen and met with many humans in the past months, but Admiral Hof'Genar vas Eemea only needed one look at the man called Doctor Kurt Kranz to know that he was decidedly not 'normal'. He wore typical human civilian attire, except that the trousers and shirt were filled with bedazzling fractal shapes, over this was a long dirty white coat that ended at his knees that had numerous pockets filled with holopads, human portable terminals, even primitive writing implements that used ink to write on small pads of fibrous sheets on which the Doctor would occasionally scribble. The hair on his head was long, fuzzy and a tangled mess – a far cry from the ways most humans would arrange it. It was his eyes and body language though that was utterly alarming to Hof.
Those glittering blue eyes seemed to look right through you and saw things that you knew you would never understand and Ancestors help you if you ever did. He moved around with the hyperactivity of a Salarian on stims, always muttering under his breath as he moved from station to station, checking sensor readings, before writing something on his pad again.
Hof turned to General Kerensky who didn't seem at all phased about the behavior, "Is he… all right?"
"Technically yes," the General nodded, "though only barely. It's generally accepted there are two kinds of Hyperspace physicists. The first kind knows the theory and can recite it in their sleep, they can tell you how to build working KF Drives, but they can't really bring you anything new with regards to hyperspace. The second kind… well they've all gone insane. Dr Kranz is that very unique, one in a million physicist who can walk between those two extremes."
The man in question bundled over to them with that manic energy and paced back in forth in front of them for five seconds before finally speaking, but continued to pace. "General, Admiral, all systems green and ready. Receiving telemetry and recording."
"Doctor, would you please explain to the Admiral and I, what we are going to test?" Kerensky spoke quite loudly and quickly.
"Yes, yes. Must explain, otherwise pointless. Utterly pointless! We have made improved versions of original KF Drive Test rigs used in Deimos project. Fitted rudimentary hull to each, placed organic components and plants inside. Then added ELEMENT ZERO! based ships system to each, which will be active during KF jump test. Test rig one will have active a-grav within hull during jump. Test rig two, momentum dampener. Test rig three, kinetic barrier. Test rig four, mass reduction field which will bring hull mass to zero and Test rig five, mass reduction into negative space time."
"I take that the reason we're doing this from my ship and in the relative middle of nowhere that there's a possibility things can go badly wrong with some of these test rigs?" Hof questioned. He had the distinct 'honor' to be the first Quarian to have gone through a hyperspace jump, doing so aboard the McKenna's Pride, during the Human Fleet's journey towards the Micah System. It was like nothing he could describe in words. The best that he could do during the Admiralty Board meeting afterwards was 'Impossibly weird' and he had had a rebellious stomach for a whole day after each jump. He felt it in every fiber of his being that mucking around with Hyperspace was incredibly dangerous.
"Yes. YES!" Doctor Kranz pointed a finger at Hof.
General Kerensky gestured to the com station, "Then let's begin, Doctor. With your permission, Admiral?"
Hof took a few moments, trying once again to make sense of the memory of those jumps. He shrugged his shoulders uncomfortably. "Very well."
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Kearny Fuchida Hyperspace Drive-Element Zero System Interaction Report
Test Rig One:
High Mass Artificial Gravity System – Result: Misjump, extreme damage to organic and material components. Comments: A-grav system is to be switched off before vessel can jump.
Test Rig Two:
Momentum Dampening System – Result: Misjump, extreme damage to fore hull material components. Comments: Momentum Dampeners must be switched off before jump.
Test Rig Three:
Kinetic Barrier System – Result: MisjumpComments: (Redacted)…. Kinetic Barrier system must be aligned precisely with the hull.
Test Rig Four
Mass Reduction Field System: Zero Mass – Result: Successful JumpComments: Field must be balanced with no instabilities and never extending beyond the hull. Further testing required for Inner system Jump Limit hyperspace traversals and possible Jump distance limit increase.
Test Rig Five
Mass Reduction Field System: Negative Mass – Result: Successful JumpComments: Further testing required for possible extreme Jump distance limit increase with the aid of Lithium Fusion Battery.
Conclusion:
The Star Covenant can commence with implementing mass effect technologies on all KF Drive equipped ships. Further research to be conducted on KF Drive components using compact computing and possible improvements that can be made with implementing mass effect fields during construction process.
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SCS Reliant, Star Covenant Fleet
Star System Micah, Valhallan Threshold
10th June 2786
It was distinctly weird walking on her ship these days. Its engines were not using a drop of fuel, and yet she was striding down a corridor, occasionally dropping and catching a bouncy ball that behaved exactly as it would in Terra standard gravity – thanks to the a-grav system. The Reliantcould now pull hundreds of gees of acceleration, thanks to a Quarian designed and jointly produced Mass Effect core. The crew was prevented from dying doing such maneuvers thanks to the momentum dampening field produced from the same ME core. Her ship could now also produce respectable kinetic barriers for its size.
The refit had been done within the SCS Solar – one of the ten Newgrange Class Yardships which was designated to - if all went well with the Reliant's negative mass FTL trials – begin refits of all compatible dropships in the Fleet, with priority given to all the combat dropships. The remaining Yardships were devoted to working on the Quarian Fleet ships in most desperate need of their services.
Reliant sacrificed two hundred tons of cargo capacity for these revolutionary features though – it meant carrying hardly any combat vehicles, but it was damn worth it. One of the other significant changes to her ship was the stripping out of all the Autocannons. As they were now, in the new reality the Star Le…Covenantfaced they were relatively useless and obsolete. Their slugs were too big and velocity too slow, until Fleet engineers came up with eezo inspired kinetic armaments that could fire as quickly and with current Galactic standards of velocity then it was just wasted premium space on ships. The Fleet's Capital Naval Autocannons were also scheduled to go for refits. Quarian Machinists were nevertheless very impressed at the inherent performance of NACs considering they didn't use one whit of eezo and the materials strength of the barrels to be able to handle the laser initiated plasma explosions that propelled the slugs.
Refitting the entire Exodus Fleet, was something that was going to take a lot longer – optimistic estimates put it at twenty to twenty five years. Some ships, due to their size would need not just one ME Core, but multiple Cores. The McKenna Class Battleship or the Potemkin Class Troop Cruiser at one thousand five hundred meters and one thousand five hundred and ten kilotons would need two Dreadnaught scale ME Cores. It was even worse for the NewgrangeYardships. To Quarian sensibilities that amount of eezo was ludicrous – their own limited refining capacity meant that it would take nearly eighty years of continuous work, even if that amount of raw eezo could be found and mined, unless the work could be outsourced to the Volus or the Salarians somehow.
That was of course under the assumption that the Covenant wouldn't develop its own eezo refining capacity eventually.
Theresa entered the Bridge and caught sight of the now familiar envirosuit of Vice-Captain Hilor'Vannis as he coached Commander Jimmy Haynes on the particulars of negative mass FTL. Jimmy's station now had an extra touchpad panel which governed the functions of the ME Core.
"Good morning, Vannis," she sat down in her chair and eyed her own new ME Core status display.
"Captain Livingston," the Quarian did his people's own version of 'coming to attention'.
"Is our Commander going to be ready?"
"He learns quickly, but I believe I need to be here for your first FTL flight next week," Vannis declared.
"I've got it, Captain, I've been studying this stuff for seven months," objected Jimmy indignantly. "No need for a back-seater."
"No, Commander," Theresa shook her head. "I know you're far from a raw rookie or pilot cadet, but this stuff is completely new to us. We are not going to take chances, so Vannis will ride next to you."
Jimmy suddenly looked nervous but resolute. He stood and walked to her chair but came to a stop at a respectful distance, "Captain… you are supposed to be on R&R."
She rolled her eyes in annoyance, "Honestly, how I can be expected to go on 'holiday' when my ship is still being worked on and about to pioneer the first use of Mass Effect FTL on a human ship is beyond me."
"It not your job to worry about yard dog work, Captain. Ship logistics and performance is my purview. You haven't been to the QE in ten months."
Theresa frowned forbiddingly at her XO for a moment before sighing in defeat. Jimmy might ordinarily like to clown around, but he was damn good when the going got tough or when he thought his Captain was being particularly stubborn about not following procedures that were in place for her own good. She also knew he'd put in a com to General Kerensky himself if he had to.
"Fine, I'll call for a shuttle."
"That won't be necessary, Captain," Jimmy now grinned smugly. "I've contacted the QEs Captain and I've laid in a course to a rendezvous already. Hilor, if you please."
The Quarian nodded and tapped on the Helm controls. Theresa felt a shudder through the decking as the engines engaged. She looked at her sensor feeds and noticed that the Reliantwas using its newfound acceleration on an intercept course to the ship in question and would be there in minutes.
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SCS Queen Elizabeth
A rather irritated Theresa found herself in the locker room on Deck 3 of the Princess Class Luxury Liner, changing into her favorite green bikini and looking rather disgustedly at her own pasty pale reflection in the large mirror to one side. Being in space for so long was not conducive to getting a tan. The room was busy and filled with chattering females all changing into swimsuits or back into civilian or uniform attire. It was to be expected that demand would be high to get allocated time on board one of the nine Princesses and fifty MonarchClass Liners that had been taken on the Exodus. General Kerensky or one of his planners had clearly understood that the Fleet had to have some capacity for its denizens to relax and de-stress.
So with a towel over her shoulder and her favorite classic Robert Ludlum hardcover book in hand from her personal collection she walked out the room and into what seemed to be a slice of Terran paradise; blue slightly cloudy sky, sun, grass under her feet, various species of trees swaying in a slight breeze. There was also the impression of a planetary horizon. She never failed to be marveled that something like this little slice of heaven could exist within a can.
Of course, the sun, sky and horizon weren't real, merely large holograms and the UV rays that would allow her to tan were generated by the holo emitters themselves.
She found her favorite spot, near a willow tree and laid down her towel before lying down on it. She sighed in pleasure and let the melody and feel of artificial nature pervade her mind until she could almost convince herself she was back on one of Terra's nature parks and opened her book to begin reading.
"Excuse me, ma'am. Can I get you anything?"
That was one of the ever helpful guest support staff. Theresa turned her head to regard a rather bronzed black haired woman in a silver bikini with a sarong wrapped around her hips, balancing a tray with drinks.
"You guys still have alcoholic drinks?"
"We do, but we ran out of the label brands two months ago, we have our own still produced alcohol now. We're still working refining it, but it's not for the faint hearted."
"Orange Martini then, or as close as you can get, thanks."
Ten minutes later of reading later the waitress returned and Theresa discovered that the locally produced drink was indeed extremely strong. Just putting the glass near her nose was enough for it to induce a sneezing fit from the strong tang smell of alcohol alone. She had to pinch her nose and take the tiniest of sips.
"Holy shit!" she took deep breaths to settle the burning sensation down her throat.
"Theresa?"
She whirled her head in surprise at the familiar modulated voice. Lea'Foris stood a few feet away, looking quite out of place and very 'alien' in her envirosuit in the natural surroundings.
"Lea?" Theresa put the glass down carefully and stood with a delighted smile. "Sorry, it's good to see you again, but what are you doing hereof all places?"
The Captain of the Upanni rubbed her hands together and tightened her shoulders – Theresa recognized it as nervousness, uncertainty, perhaps even embarrassment. "I'm part of a group of Quarians on a small pilgrimage of sorts through the Covenant Fleet, to experience human culture and relate it back to the Flotilla. Your Monarch Class ships are perfect for that with their vid theatres, but I heard about the Princess Class and just had to see it for myself. Sorry… I have to ask, but just whatare you wearing?"
"It's something human females wear to swim in, called a bikini, allows for a lot of skin to show and absorb as much sunlight as possible – so our skin becomes a darker shade of color."
"You intentionally expose yourselves to solar radiation just to get a cosmetic benefit?" Lea's head jerked backward in astonishment.
Theresa sat down on her towel, "There is a health benefit to humans if done in moderation, have a seat." Lea took the invitation and sat down awkwardly on the grass.
"Is this what your homeworld looks like?"
"A fair approximation of it, a lot of it is covered in cities, but we preserved and kept a percentage of it in its natural state," Theresa gestured around her.
"I can't imagine maintaining something like this, just for recreation," Lea shook her head. "In the Flotilla a ship like this would be used for food production."
"We need this for psychological reasons as well, we'd go stir crazy soon enough in our ships if we don't get a break at least once every year," Theresa explained. "But you should see Deck Two."
"I saw it!" Lea exclaimed shaking her head. "A huge volume of contained water just to play around in."
"We do have sports that take place in water and its good exercise."
"Bizarre."
