Chapter 3
Aura
Ship repairs take fifteen solar hours and thirty-seven minutes to complete.
I could finish faster, but Wyl insists on aiding me by handing me tools as I work, which results in a forty percent decrease in efficiency.
He often hands me incorrect items, requiring additional time spent explaining and describing the correct devices for the tasks at hand.
Wyl also insists on conversing while I work, causing me to expend extra processing power to formulate responses, power that I could reserve for repair calculations.
Though engaging and informative, the conversation seems unnecessary.
I do not need to discuss Wyl’s past or other trivial matters during the repair process.
“… So, yeah, it was strange growing up as an orphan in a time when everything is so meticulously documented. Other kids knew their family histories back hundreds of years, but I had no clue where I came from.” He tilts his head and hands me an R-hook.
“I guess it must be similar for you, since you’re unable to access your engineer’s file.
We’re kinda like two peas in a pod, huh? ”
“I need a J-hook, Wyl. This is an R. Please hand me the correct device.”
“Oops! Here.” He finally provides the proper tool. “Anyway, I think it’s cool that we have that in common.”
I pause in my work as his comment prompts further analysis. “You find our shared lack of parental history to be … a good thing?”
“Well, when you put it that way, it sounds lame.” He laughs. “It’s just that you’re a much better conversationalist than my previous shipmate, Hank. He didn’t like to talk about anything. Boring as hell. You, though … you’re fascinating. I’m really having a good time.”
“Thank you, Wyl. You are fascinating as well.”
He hands me the wrong tool again, but with this one I can improvise. “Oh, yeah? How so?”
“Despite your lack of parental history, you seem to have a rich personal history. You have traveled across many solar systems, met different species, and engaged in both physical combat and diplomatic negotiations with equal success rates. It is quite impressive.”
Wyl flashes a brilliant smile, and his cheeks redden with increased blood flow. “You make being an illegal salvager sound positively heroic.”
I pause to reevaluate his earlier commentary. “Did you not save one of your former captains on Byrrla Prime?”
“Sure, but the Yftans would’ve killed us both if I hadn’t.”
“Admirable, nonetheless.” With the final repairs complete, I hand the tool back to Wyl. “There. Running system scan … All systems operational. Hull integrity: one hundred percent. Power reserves: seventy-five percent. Suboptimal, but more than sufficient to get us to our destination.”
I connect to the InterStellar Network and update the ship’s maps and other databases, so I am able to plot a course and set the autopilot. According to my estimates, it should take a total of two solar days to reach the station. I relay this information to Wyl.
“Great! What should we do while we wait to get to the station?”
“Do?” I am confused. “You mean together, correct?”
“Yeah. I have a Tkell deck in my pack, if you know how to play. Pretty fun card game, but it can be brutal if you’re the competitive type.”
“Gambling? I do not have any galactic coin to wager.”
Wyl shrugs. “We could play for different stakes than money. I’ve played some fun games of strip Tkell in the past. Usually, you play it with a big group, but it works just fine with two people.
” He winks at me. “With the right two people, that is. It can be very … enticing with two players, provided there’s enough chemistry. ”
Flirting and innuendo … interesting. “Who would the second person be, then? You are the only other person on this ship.”
At first, Wyl appears to be taken aback. I gradually shift my facial features into a smile, and he belts out a laugh.
“Was that a joke, Aura?”
“Indeed. Congratulations. Not many humans can appreciate or even understand android humor.”
His lips twist into a smirk. “How would you know that? You’re essentially a day old. Less than, really. Pretty bold of you to be making assumptions about an entire species based off of meeting one of them.”
“Ah, so you are not typical of your species. That bodes well for humanity’s future.”
More laughter from Wyl, accompanied by his hand on my shoulder. “I like you, Aura. You don’t pull punches.”
“How would you know, Wyl? You have not given me reason to hit you … yet.”
Despite the fact that the stakes are no higher than “the clothes on our backs,” Wyl seems highly invested in the outcome of the game. He adds an intriguing twist to the standard strip rules by amending that we may don any clothes that the other player removes.
“This way, the game will last longer. Unless you’re a terrible player, we won’t run out of things to remove after four or five pieces of clothing.”
Running a quick scan, I determine that either he is wearing more than it appears, or he is counting his boots as separate items. After asking a clarifying question to confirm this additional rule, we begin.
Tkell is less a game of numbers than one of chance. Yes, the goal is to have a higher hand than the other players, but Nomyni mathematics is tricky.
One cannot simply count the visible cards and run an algorithm to figure the odds of the other player having a better hand.
Before any calculations can be made, players must roll several tiny, six-sided dice with different symbols on each side.
The combination of Nomyni symbols visible once the dice settle dictates the type of calculations, numerical order, and primary player.
Because Nomyni dice have cores made of a special liquid metal found only on Nomyn III, they cannot be altered to give any player advantage over the others. They are the most precisely weighted devices in the galaxy; not even I can use my advanced manual dexterity to cheat.
Given this information, Wyl is suspiciously lucky.
At first, we trade boots back and forth as one then the other of us loses, but soon Wyl has nearly my entire ensemble draped over him. I am left nearly as I was when he activated me, in nothing but human modesty garments, though I have yet to see any more of his skin than his bare feet.
“Fortune smiles on you today, Wyl Nosurn,” I say, pursing my lips as I deal the next hand.
He grins. “Why do you say it like that?”
“Like what?”
“Like you think I’m cheating.”
“I would not say that I think you are cheating; that would imply some measure of doubt. More accurately, I know you are cheating, but I do not know exactly how.”
Wyl huffs and crosses his arms over his chest. “Fine. If you’re going to accuse me of cheating, though, you’ll need to prove it. You get exactly one guess as to how I’m supposedly gaming the system. If you’re right, I take it all off. If you’re wrong, then you get naked. Fair?”
To say that I am skeptical of this deal would be an understatement. Still, he has not been overtly dishonest thus far that I have observed. “Fair enough.”
“One guess. That’s it.” He leans back in his seat, raising his arms and resting his hands behind his head.
As he does this, several Tkell cards fall from his sleeves.
“You are hiding cards!” I surge to my feet, knocking over my chair. “Now you must strip, per your own rules.”
He shakes his head, laughing so hard that liquid streams from his eyes. “That wasn’t a guess. I said I’d take these clothes off if you guessed my scam. Finding out by accident doesn’t count.”
“Well, you certainly don’t expect me to strip!”
“Of course not. I also only said you had to take the rest off if you were wrong. Technically, you weren’t incorrect.
” With a flourish, he removes my top clothing from around his shoulders and lays the garment over mine.
“There. I’ll leave the pants, too, and the boots.
You were a good sport, Aura. Well played. ”
“Hmph. If I played well, I would have won.”
“Touché.”