Chapter Ten

Jack In

Andromeda Orbit

'Priorities, does the word mean anything to you? Cause I was under the impression that a simple word like that wouldn't be too hard to understand!'

'It is you, who obviously has a problem with understanding what the most important task at hand is.'

'Argh, we need to figure out how the ship works!' Stark said, again, he just kept repeating himself.

'We have tried to move forward with it, we have been doing nothing but try. Now it is time to pay attention to other important matters.' Loki explained. Again. Stark was bull-headed and refused to listen and Loki was really at the end of his patience with him.

'Searching through the ship and the cargo is not an "important matter"!' the human replied. 'We are the only ones here and the fucking cargo won't go anywhere!'

'Yes, but if the cargo is something valuable, then there is a chance that the owner will be looking for it, so we need to be prepared,' Loki told him.

'I get that, but this is more important! Are you not understanding what I'm trying to tell you here?!" Stark was raising his voice now, clearly as frustrated as Loki felt.

'I do not see how more could be done,' Loki said firmly. 'Nor why I need to be here for it.'

'Because I don't understand the fucking language!' Stark snapped.

'I have already translated every single text that appeared on that wretched display, no matter what you did nothing new showed up!'

'And don't you see how that's a problem?' Stark asked and turned towards him fully. 'There's something missing, okay? The displays only show a fragment of information about the ship, nothing more! And no matter what I do I cannot get more out of the computer! And on top of it I cannot even do any real input! The displays are useless for any real data entry and nothing in this room is even remotely suitable for it either!'

'You could change our route just fine,' Loki argued. Stark pinched the bridge of his nose and took a few large breaths.

'Do you know what's going to happen if the autopilot or any of the systems need manual input and I have no idea how to do it? Hm?' Stark asked, his eyes were blazing angrily and his whole stance was tense and frustrated. 'I could change our route because the auto-pilot was already on and I only had to change the direction, but there have to be dozens of systems running and I can't access them. This is a ship, I need to be able to control it, because if I can't you can bet your ass that this lovely journey will end with a lot of falling, crashing and a big explosive fiery death.'

'Asking me to translate the same texts over and over again will not solve that problem,' Loki told him. They have been trying to access the main systems for hours now and the only thing that changed was that they became angrier as time passed.

'You know I'm really wondering what you would've done on your own, killing everyone who knew how to drive this thing before getting some information out of them.'

'We have only been trying for a few hours, I am sure it cannot be that hard,' Loki answered sternly.

'No, it can't be,' Stark agreed as he ran a hand through his hair. 'But this translation thing is making the process too slow, if I could read everything on my own I could work faster, but we don't have time for you to teach me this… whatever language.'

'I couldn't teach you if I wanted to, I do not speak it myself.' Stark frowned.

'But you're translating.'

'All-speak, I told you. It's different.'

'Okay, maybe it's time for this conversation,' Stark said and sat down to one of the chairs, looking expectantly at Loki. 'What the hell is All-speak?'

'I use All-speak, and so do other gods and other old races of the Nine Realms. I understand all languages and I am understood by all.'

'How is that possible?' Stark asked. Loki could see how his mind was racing, trying to figure it out himself.

'You would not understand my explanation.'

Stark snorted. 'Try me.'

'It is magical in nature,' Loki started. 'But only on a base, subconscious level, because even those who are not wielders of such powers are able to have it.'

'But-'

'When you speak I understand you, because what I hear is the meaning of your words and not the words themselves, and what you hear is what my words mean and how they exist in your tongue.'

'So you basically get the definition of something, instead of the specific word.'

'That is a simplified explanation, but still correct. A word is nothing but meaningless sound if there is no idea behind it, so the sound does not matter only the idea.'

'But I suppose special phrases, colloquialisms or double meanings don't always translate well.'

'That is correct, some turns of phrases exist everywhere, but some are unique to one world or another and thus not so easily understood.'

'Icons, indexes and symbols,' Stark said after a beat of silence. 'Audible signs have a correlation with their meaning, because words are just sound patterns and they get their meaning from their mental association with symbols. Symbols have strong association with other symbols, which anchors the meaning of the word.'

Loki looked at the human for a moment. 'That is a surprisingly accurate description.'

'I am a genius, although that was only like high school level linguistics. That's how you read too, right? Written words are the same as spoken ones only they're directly visible, so they are symbols linked to the same semantic content as spoken words and sounds.'

'Correct again.'

'I have absolutely no idea how that's possible!' Stark exclaimed. 'I mean sure you understanding the meaning without having to understand the specific audible or visible signs is one thing, but being able to project the content to others, so that I hear the signs and indexes and symbols I know while you only speak the meaning… okay no, I am not getting into this, my head already hurts by the complete and utter unscientific impossibility of it all.'

Loki chuckled. 'You do miss some of the basic concepts because of your limited knowledge about the laws of the universe and cosmic powers.'

'Limited knowledge?' Stark asked by raising an eyebrow.

'I am able to understand the meaning, because words have power, so do symbols and signs, and their power comes from the cosmic energies that make up the universe.'

Stark stared at him for a long moment, eyes unreadable. 'Okay that's it, we turned way too new age-y for my taste. This conversation is over. I don't wanna hear more about how your magic fairy powers work.'

Loki was ready to admit that he was amused. 'But you are gathering higher knowledge, Stark. I think you should feel honoured that I am willing to share this much with you.'

'Higher knowledge? I don't think so,' the human said in a distinctively unimpressed tone. 'That's not higher knowledge, that's magical mumbo-jumbo voodoo bullshit that is going to drive me up the fucking wall. Can we get back to the fucking problem now?'

'Fine,' Loki agreed. The sooner they figured out how to operate the ship the better. 'We are obviously missing something.'

'No kidding.'

Stark went back to his displays while Loki started walking around the room. He started searching around the larger seat that was in the middle of the bridge, thus Loki assumed had to be the seat of the Captain or Commander. Just as Stark noted before there were no control interfaces or anything that looked like something that may help controlling the ship. Truly, it looked like the seat was nothing more than something to sit down on, but Loki doubted that. There had to be something. They noticed earlier that the bridge had a rather large viewport, but they were shielded from the outside. Obviously those viewport shields could be moved, but they did not figure out how yet. There had to be something that would give the controls over all of this. Loki kept searching and his eyes landed on a circular slot next to the commander's seat. He ran his fingers over it.

'What is this for?' he asked. Stark looked over to him.

'No clue, it's empty though. It could be a holographic display or a simple cup holder.'

'It is too large for a cup,' Loki observed. The circle was about six inches wide and not too deep.

'I think something has to be put… oh!'

'What?' Stark asked.

'I'll be right back,' the god said and turned around and walked out of the room despite Stark calling after him.

He was still too exhausted, he should've thought about this sooner. Fortunately it did not take him long to get where he put down all the weapons and gadgets he found on the crew's bodies. He searched through the pile then headed back towards the bridge.

'Remember that you told me to take everything that may look useful before I threw the bodies out?' he asked the human once he was back.

'And?' Stark asked. Loki in answer held up the thin metal he took off from the head of one of them. 'Oh! Is that some headgear?'

'Its previous owner was wearing it on his head,' Loki said as he walked back to the main seat and put the little metallic band into the circular slot. It was the same size. When it slid into its place the whole thing lit up with a small glow, but otherwise did nothing.

'Okay, so that's where you keep it,' Stark observed then picked it up. It was not a full circle, also it was rather thin and was not even an inch wide. 'Well, no speakers or anything, so definitely not a normal headset, but it does seem to have sensors at the end on the inside,' Stark remarked. He looked at it from all sides then slid his fingers over the edge where tiny lights lit up right away and a display appeared, similar to the floating ones, only smaller. 'Oh, I see,' Stark said and slid his fingers over the same spot again, now in the other direction. The small lights on the side and the display between the two edges vanished.

'So what is it for?' Loki asked.

'Time to figure out,' Stark declared and put it on. He adjusted it until it rested around his skull, the two ends touching his temples.

'Do you have any idea what you're doing?' Loki asked.

'Nope,' Stark replied and slid his fingers over the side again. The lights lit up and Stark promptly stumbled forward, grabbing hold of the seat next to them not to fall.

'Stark?'

'I was not expecting that… I'm alright… oh… this…' he shook his head a little then opened his eyes again, not letting go of the seat. 'Oh this is brilliant… this is so brilliant… holy shit.'

'What?' Loki asked impatiently.

'There are no manual interfaces beside the basic ones,' Stark answered. His eyes looked glazed over and he was frowning very hard. 'Cause you have to communicate directly with the ship.'

Stark straightened up and stared ahead, the display before his eyes shifting symbols and texts rapidly.

'Oh this is like the big brother of my hub… oh this is awesome, this is incredible.'

'What are you talking about?' Loki demanded.

'I need to directly command the ship!' Stark said and his voice lost that surprised tone and was turning into that of excitement and glee.

'How?'

'Shh… no wait… I need to figure it out.' Stark frowned again, there was intense concentration on his face while Loki just stared at him. It had to do something with the device, but the god did not know what yet. Then Stark started mumbling under his nose, obviously talking to himself, just thinking out loud.

'No… too abstract… computers need clear data… clear clear… no no… slower… oh my god this is really something… simple, numbers, codes… clear codes, data… come on… come on now.'

Loki looked up in surprise when several different displays appeared around them at once, all showing different data and numbers, various graphs and texts.

'Are you doing this?' he asked while he looked around.

'Just getting info… oh… oh wait… I think I found…'

The shields over the viewport started to slide open revealing the space outside. Loki could see the bow of the ship before them, and space all around. Some starts were too blurry because of their speed, but the ones in great distance could be seen properly. It was nonetheless quite a great view.

'How are you doing this all of a sudden?' Loki asked.

Stark looked at him again, his eyes focusing on him once more. There was a smile playing on his lips.

'This is a DNI! A direct neural interface,' he said in a tone that implied that it had to be something wondrous, whatever it was. Then his eyes unfocused from Loki again and he was either staring at the display or nothing at all. 'A highly advanced one, the speed of data transfer is incredible and it doesn't even require any artificial intracranial receptors… oh this is unbelievable… I don't even know how sensors are picking up everything this well… direct meaning… ha! Suck it alien language and magic speech, hello science, I missed you baby!' Then the human fell silent. Displays were popping up, moving around without anyone touching them. The mortal seemed to be lost in his own little world.

'Stark!' He called his name. It took a long moment before the human's eyes focused on him again. They were bright and wide and quite excited. 'So what can you control on the ship with it?'

There was that smile… no rather smirk on the human's face again.

'Give me some time… and everything.'

x-x-x

Author's Notes: I'd like to say sorry in case there are some grammatical mistakes in the story. The reasons for that are A) English is my second language and B) I do not like to get a WIP story to a beta. You would have to wait a lot longer for each update if I did that.